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October 25, 2009
“Stones, Priests, and a Nation”
I Peter 2: 4-12
Sunday, October 25, 2009
The week before last, I had a rolled-up oriental rug in my family room at home. We had unrolled it to decide where we would like to place it and then rolled it up again and left it in the family room. I eventually took it back upstairs to one of the spare rooms because I kept tripping over it in the family room and I was afraid I might hurt myself.
So I have a recent experience that is similar to what is described in what I like to call the legend of the keystone. One of the less frequent but important themes that runs throughout the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the Epistles is the reference to the stone that was rejected by builders but was placed in the most prominent place in the structure God was building.
This theme seems to begin in the Psalms and was used later by the prophet Isaiah. In the gospels (as we saw in our first reading this morning) Jesus refers to himself as this stone, and in the Epistles, the Apostles consider Jesus to have been the stone referred to in the Psalms and Isaiah.
The legend of the stone seems to have come from an incident that occurred in the building of the first Temple under King Solomon. It had been specified by God that there was not to be the sound of hammers or other loud construction sounds on the sacred temple site. So all of the stones, were cut to size and given their final dressing at the quarry. Some of the stones that were required for the Temple were of odd configurations, so these stones were made from suitable raw stones when an odd shaped hunk of stone was brought to the dressing site. There was one odd shaped stone that was dressed early and used much later in the building process. Because of its odd shape, it did not stack well with the other stones that had been brought to the temple site and although it was put in various places on the construction site it kept getting in the way and people kept tripping over it. One day, they finally got to the location for that stone. It was the keystone or the stone that was at the head of the arch over the main door into the temple. As Worshippers would later climb the steps into the courtyard, looking up to the front wall of the temple, this was the most prominent stone they would see. The stone that had been stumbled over and been the subject of some cursing, had now been elevated to a glorious position. This stone became a symbol for the Messiah whom God was expected to send.
Jesus claimed to be that stone, and the Apostles writing in some of the Epistles also claimed Him to be that stone. But Peter, writing about him thusly in this passage took the symbolism a little further. He referred to Jesus as a living stone, the keystone in God’s new temple, the one he was building of people on earth. That Temple is the Church, the body of Christ on earth.
Peter also wrote that Christians were to see themselves as living stones comprising a part of the new Temple of God. Take a look at verses 5 and 6. He wrote that we are to “Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
But in the light of our passage last week where we looked at the fact that Jesus is our High Priest, I want you to notice what Peter wrote about all Christians being priests. He wrote that like living stones built into God’s spiritual house, we are also to be the priests in that spiritual house. Through this and other NT passages it is made clear to us that we Christians are all to be priests in God’s new temple. But it probably is not at all clear to 21st century Protestant Christians what that means because we are not familiar with the duties of God’s priests in the OT.
Peter helps us here in his epistle when he says that we are “to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ”. The Old Testament priests offered sacrifices to God for themselves and the people who came to them. These sacrifices were mostly animals which were slaughtered and of which certain parts were burned on the altar in the temple courtyard. These sacrifices were offered as atonements for sins, and as recognition of God’s blessing upon the worshipper, or as a sign that God had revealed his closeness to the worshipper.
Within 40 years after Peter wrote these words, the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and the offerings on the altar there ceased. But we, as priests of God in his spiritual temple are still supposed to offer sacrifices to God for ourselves and for others, but they are to be “Spiritual Sacrifices” not animal sacrifices. So what constitutes a Spiritual sacrifice?
Well, since it is a sacrifice it should cost us something of our time, energy, money, or be costly in some other way. Time to read scriptures, time to participate in the life of the church, time and money to help others, time to pray, and many other things are spiritual sacrifices.
Priests in the OT offered sacrifices for themselves, as atonements for their own sins and in appreciation for God’s blessings in their lives. But they also offered sacrifices for the sins of others and for the blessings of God on others.
We Christians need to make sacrifices on behalf of others, to take our time and money and energy to help others understand that there is a God who loves them. We need to make an effort to make friends with those who are not Christians so we might have the chance to present God to them and to present them to God.
The Old Testament Priests acted as a mediator between God and his people. They prayed for the people to God. Do you pray for others? Do you pray that they will believe in Christ and have their sins forgiven? Do you pray that they will be punished or that they will be forgiven?
The Old Testament priests represented God. There may be times in your life when you are the only Christian in some place. You are there to represent God’s blessings and his standards and his love for the others who are present. There may well be times when you will be God’s representative to the others in your family. Call them to obedience and to forgiveness and love.
The Old Testament priests were also called to a higher level of morality than the average people. As God’s representatives in our world and in our culture, we are called to a higher standard of morality than the rest of the people of this world. We are called to live by God’s rules and the standards of conduct that are specified in the bible. In verses 11 and 12 Peter exhorts his readers to “abstain from the desires of the flesh that wage war against the soul” and to “Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles…”
As Peter wrote about Christians being priests, he used a peculiar phrase. In the 9th verse he says that we are “A Royal Priesthood”. That doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense here in this context, but remember what the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews wrote about Jesus being a High priest of the order of Melchizadek? Melchizadek is described as being a High priest and a King. We serve under the Hi Priesthood of Jesus, who is a High Priest and a king. We are more than Priests, we are Royal Priests.
Peter wrote that Christians, in addition to being living stones and Priests were a chosen race and a holy nation. In the Old Testament times, the Jews were called to be God’s Chosen Race and His Holy Nation, but now we Christians have been called from many nations and races to become the new Chosen and Holy Race in this world.
This Saturday Evening will mark the 492nd anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. It was on October 31st 1517 that Martin Luther nailed the 95 Theses to the door of the chapel in Wittenberg. One of the doctrines that became focused on by the reformers was that of the Priesthood of all believers. That is why we Reformed Protestants do not refer to our Clergy as Priests. We believe that all Christians are Priests serving God under the High Priesthood of Jesus. In the name of our Jesus our High priest I send you out into the world and into the church to perform your priestly duties. Amen
Pastor David Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906
Posted by faithpres at October 25, 2009 04:04 PM