1 Peter 2:4-10 Living Foundation for a Living Home

This passage presents a picture of the various ways people respond to Jesus. Especially given salvation in Christ is brought about by simple, Humble means. Humanly speaking, there is some foolishness to the Cross as the foundation of our salvation. How are we to respond, and what are some implications for us as a Church?

As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in Scripture:

“Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone,” and “A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense.”

They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. (1 Peter 2:4–10 ESV)

We’ll be answering three questions this morning. There are no clean verse divisions because Peter states his points and then supplies his scriptures verses and then restates everything a second time. Basically, we are asking 3 things:

* What does it mean that Christ is our Cornerstone?

* What does it mean to stumble over Jesus?

* We are called living stones, so as living stones who have received mercy, How then do we live as God’s people?

Let’s answer these things in Summary: These verses reference many places in the scriptures where we have the image of Christ as this anchoring cornerstone. A Cornerstone is the first stone that is carefully laid in a building’s foundation. The entirety of its foundations, the stability of its walls all depend on the quality, the strength, and the presence of this stone. The entire building is being entrusted to this precious stone. So it is a wonderful image of Jesus, and it naturally leads to the image that in Christ Jesus, we no longer come to physical stones and temples to worship. But instead, we, in Christ Jesus, are the body of Christ, the living temple of God, indwelt by the Holy Spirit. So we gather not for sacrifices but for Spiritual Worship, especially our prayer, praise in song, and the Reading and Preaching of the Word. And further, the new testament church is now the true and spiritual fulfillment of all the promises, names, and titles for physical Israel, the physical temple, nation, and priesthood find their fulfillment (continuation) in Christ and the Church, according to this scripture text.

Back to the first question: #1 What does it mean that Christ is our Cornerstone?

Peter is doing good biblical theology here. First, he knows that Jesus’ death and resurrection is the true fulfillment of the entire temple and sacrificial system. And so, both Jesus and his people fulfill these things.

In John 2:19 standing next to the physical temples says,

“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” [20] The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” [21] But he was speaking about the temple of his body. [22] When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Ok, So Jesus says, I am the true temple And Further, eventually Paul and Peter say you are the true Israel, the true temple in Christ Jesus as well. That is God’s presence with his people on earth, for worship, and to proclaim salvation that sin is atoned for. No longer by a physical sacrifice and priesthood but by Jesus and simple spiritual worship (See John 4 and the woman at the well, no longer a physical temple? But what? Worshipping in spirit and in truth.

There are Three References Peter quotes (if you have a reference bible you should be able to spot these), Isaiah 8:14, 28:16, and Psalm 118:22. First the two chapters of Isaiah speak of how the both the houses of Israel the north and the south ignored the word of God, ignored calls to repentance, and specifically mocked the simplicity of the call of the prophets to repent, turn back to Go