1st Peter
Notes
Transcript
Living Stones
Living Stones
So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation— if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
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.
Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.
1. The church is pictured as a building and Jesus is the cornerstone.
2. We are a royal priesthood in the sense that we serve at God’s pleasure. We are not needed as intermediaries as the Old Testaments priest were.
3. Jesus is a strong foundation for the church but a stone in the path that causes the one who rejects him to stumble. those who reject Christ are nor just indifferent to the gospel but become offended by it.
a. some will persecute the church
b. others will slander God’s name
c. but we are to keep focused on leading those who will listen to him
4. we are to be as foreigners in this land. we don’t get involved in the depravity and habits of this world because we belong to a different place
Group Questions:
What spiritual Sacrifices do we offer to God?
Have you experienced someone who was offended by what you believe? How did you handle it?