The All-Important Stone Part I 1 Peter 2:4-12

the world we live in, there are structures all over the place.

We have homes, small buildings, larger buildings.

If you go down to Minneapolis and St. Paul, we have these tall skyscrapers that make the

Tower of Babel look like an ant. And as beautiful as these structures are, the part that is most visible is not the most important part.

The part that is most important is not visible to the eye as you look at it from the outside.

The most important part is the foundation. With a faulty foundation, the whole structure is in danger of falling apart.

And if there is a faulty foundation, eventually the building will be condemned. What is interesting is that Jesus compares faithfulness to the

Lord as being like a house that is built on a strong foundation. And an unfaithful life to the

Lord is like a house with no foundation or a very weak foundation. As he says in Matthew 7 verses 24 through 27, everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock.

And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.

And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.

So the call for our lives is to build our lives on the solid foundation of Jesus Christ.

Now as we read what Jesus just said, we learn that in ancient times structures were built on foundations just as they are today.

Of course that's obvious. You can't build something unless there's a sturdy foundation at the bottom.

You cannot reinvent the wheel when it comes to foundations. A house built on soft ground will never stand the test of time no matter what era it is built.

But while a strong sturdy foundation is important no matter when a structure is built, there are different ways to build a strong foundation.

In ancient times there was a particular stone that was the most important stone of the structure.

In Old Testament prophecy, the Messiah is described as this all -important stone.

And the text we are going to look at this morning, the Apostle Peter, references this stone in relation to Jesus.

So this morning as we continue our sermon series through 1 Peter, we are going to see why Jesus is described as this stone, how this stone is a problem for many, and how his people are referred to in Scripture as many stones being built up.

So this time I encourage you to turn with me to 1 Peter chapter 2. It's going to take two Sundays to get through this.

Some of this will focus more on next Sunday. Some of it will focus more on today. But 1 Peter chapter 2 verses 4 through 12.

If you do not have a Bible, we have the Red Bibles and the Pews. And this sermon is titled, The All -Important

Stone. The All -Important Stone. And I'm going to begin by reading the whole text.

Like I said, we won't get through every verse today, but I am going to read through this straight through here. 1 Peter 2 verses 4 through 12.

As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men, but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves are living stones 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. Here's our big idea, what this

Two Sunday Sermon is calling you to do. Know that Jesus is the stone that demands a response.

Know that Jesus is the stone that demands a response.

A response from the whole world. He is the center of it all, as we will see.

We're going to see four ways how over the next two Sundays. But before we jump in, let me give you a little recap of where we were one

Sunday ago. We looked at 1st Peter chapter 1 verses 22 through chapter 2 verse 3.

And in this passage, we looked at the power of the Word of God. The Word of God is far more powerful than you can imagine.

We saw five manifestations how this is so. First, the Word of God gives new birth.

This is to be born again, to be regenerated. Second, it sanctifies you.

That is, it makes you holy as the Spirit works in your life. Third, one of the ways the power of the

Word works in your life is through strengthening you to love fellow believers through affection and deed.

Fourth, the Word of God is lasting. While the things on earth come and go, the Word stands and those who live by this eternal

Word live on forever. Lastly, the power of the Word of God is manifested by showing the goodness of God.

Taste and see that the Lord is good. Now, this leads us to our text this morning that we've already read, but now we're going to zero in on.

And we're going to begin zeroing in on verse 4, where once again, Peter writes, as you come to him a living stone rejected by men, but in the sight of God chosen and precious.

In this verse, we see the first mention of the word stone. The word stone is used five times in verses 4 through 12.

Verse 4 describes Jesus as the living stone. This is, of course, a metaphor. A metaphor is a figure of speech that describes someone or something was something known from the world we live in.

Scripture does it all the time. We know these things from our daily experience, and then it's tied to some spiritual truth.

And we know about stones. Stones are a rock that is solid.

In this world, we have things that are soft, and we could punch our hands through those things. But then there's things that if you tried to punch your hand through them, you're going to regret it, right?

You can't punch your hand. If you go outside this church building, it's built of brick. If you punch your hand through that, it's not going to go well for you, right?

The bricks will be standing and your hand will be hurting. But a stone is one of those things, like a brick, that is rock solid.

That's the saying, right? Sometimes we describe something in life as rock solid, and sometimes we say someone's faith is rock solid, right?

We know this from our experience. Rocks and stones are solid. So it's appropriate to use this metaphor to describe

Jesus. Now we know that rocks don't have life. They are not like humans, animals, or even plants.

I mean, I think the greatest insult you can give someone is that this person has the intelligence of a rock, right? They don't have life.

The second greatest, this one's a little bit lesser, they have the intelligence of plant life. Okay, a little bit better, but still an insult.

Rocks are not like humans, not like animals, not like plants. They don't have any life.

There's no DNA in them. So when Peter describes Jesus as a stone, he's not focusing at all on the fact that rocks are lifeless, but he's focusing on the solid nature of rocks.

And Peter is saying that this stone Jesus is as solid as can be.

And he is living. He is a living, solid stone.

As we go through this text, we're going to see Peter describe the significance of this description. Now what

Peter writes in verse four is that while some come to this living stone, it is important to understand that most of the world does not.

And that is the sobering reality of life. You know, you drive down the road, and we go across these cemeteries.

And these are people who once lived, like you and I. A majority of the people laid to rest there did not receive

Jesus Christ. And how do I know that? Well, because the Bible says that. Many, many travel down the path of destruction.

It's a wide path. Lesser, few traveled on the narrow path that leads to life.

This is the sobering reality of life. A majority of the world does not believe in the

Creator. Now in the Greek here, in the beginning of verse four, where it says, as you come to him, come is describing an intimate relationship with Jesus, never to leave him.

This is what happens when you believe in Jesus. You are invited to have this intimate fellowship with him forever.

But most of the world does not want this sweet, intimate, eternal fellowship with the living stone.

As Peter writes in the first half of verse four that Jesus is a living stone rejected by men.

Before Jesus' crucifixion, he told his disciples in John 15 verses 18 through 19.

And every Christian must understand this. He says, if the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.

If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

This is something that we must understand. The world does not love you, but it does love its own.

I remember when the famous musician Prince died. Of course, he was born and raised in Minnesota, born and raised in Minneapolis.

His studio was actually in Chanhassen, which was not too far from Mound, where I grew up.

I remember when he died, it seemed like people just couldn't let go. It was like a funeral, another funeral, another funeral.

And all the outpouring of support he got. The world loves its own.

That's just the reality of it. I remember Elvin Mattson. Some of you don't know Elvin because Elvin passed away one year ago.

Elvin was in this church for almost 93 years. Elvin's like, what's with the obsession with Prince?

And that's what came to mind as I heard that. The world loves its own.

But this is not how it is for the Christian. The world loves its own, but not you.

Because you're not one of them. Jesus is the author of life, as Acts 3 .15

says, and the very world he created, largely speaking, does not love him.

This world does not give him the honor that he is due. People do not live their lives for him, but rather for themselves.

Like Isaiah 53 says, all we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone to his own way.

But those who reject Jesus were predicted to do so long ago. Peter describes this in the second half of verse 7 and verse 8, where he writes, the stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.

So the unbelievers reject the stone as was predicted in Psalm 118 verse 22 and 23, and they are offended by the rock and trip over him as was predicted in Isaiah 8 .14.

What is interesting about Psalm 118 verses 22 and 23 is that this psalm was likely written by Moses, the old prophet, the one called by God to lead the

Israelites out of the land of Egypt. Throughout the Old Testament, what's interesting is that as you read the

Old Testament, there are types in there. And these types point ahead to spiritual realities, and typically these types point ahead to Jesus.

And Moses is one of those types. Several times in the New Testament, this is made clear.

John 3 .14, just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so must the

Son of Man be lifted up. In Deuteronomy 18 .15, Moses proclaimed, the

Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers.

It is to him you shall listen. So this prophet, like Moses, would be the

Messiah, Jesus. So when we talk about types, what this means is how a person is described in the

Old Testament. And what that person went through matches up with the

Messiah who would later come. I mean, you see this, for example, in Psalm 22 where David says, my

God, my God, why have you forsaken me? So David is a type. His experience would be similar to the experience of Jesus, the

Messiah. And so it is with Moses. In Psalm 118 verses 22 and 23,

Moses is describing his experience when he writes, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.

This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. Moses, during his ministry of leading the

Israelites, remember, he was called to lead the Israelites away from Egypt into the

Promised Land, something that he did not finish. But this was his calling, to lead the Israelites. During this experience, he was repeatedly rejected by his own people.

And they would say to him, why did you take us out to the wilderness for us to die? How much better it was to live back in Egypt, where at least we were taken care of.

At least we had a meal lined up. At least we had things set up for us, where our lives were more comfortable.

They preferred being in Egypt than traveling through the wilderness. And they blamed

Moses. He's the head, right? He's the leader. By opposing

Moses, the people of Israel were opposing the Lord, because of course Moses was called by God to do this very thing, to lead them to the land that was theirs.

When Jesus came, the builders of the Jewish nation, the Jewish leaders, this is the

Sanhedrin, which was made up of Pharisees and some of the Sadducees, the

Jewish leaders did not receive him. They rejected the stone, the living stone.

In the case of Jesus, the stone that the builders rejected is referring to his crucifixion.

That was where his ultimate rejection took place. And the resurrection pointed ahead to him being the cornerstone.

I'll explain the significance of the cornerstone next Sunday. But you know where I'm going with that, because I already alluded to it in the introduction to this two

Sunday sermon. So Moses as a type of Christ was rejected, and Jesus as the

Christ was also rejected by his own people, the people of Israel. But it is not just Israel in the

Old Testament and the Jews in the first century who reject God's messengers.

This describes most of the world, Jews and Gentiles. God sends his people, and guess what happens?

They get rejected. And this is such an encouragement to you and I. In the Sermon on the

Mount, in Matthew chapter 5, verses 10 through 12, this is what

Jesus said. He said, Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

And then in Luke, in Luke chapter 6, Jesus tells the people, he tells them, they praised the false prophets, but they hated the true prophets.

This is just the experience. The stone the builders reject. The world rejects not only

Christ, but also his messengers. The unbelieving world hears the truth of God's word, but they don't want it.

And so Jesus is like a rock in the middle of a road. Imagine a giant rock in the middle of the road and someone is driving down the road.

They don't see the rock. They drive over it and they fly off their bike. Their car veers off the road.

That's what Jesus is like. He's like the stone in the middle of the road where most of the world rejects him.

Isaiah 8 14 predicted this. He's a rock of stumbling. Peter writes at the end of verse 8 that unbelievers stumble over him by disobeying the word as the

Bible predicted they would. Christ is either savior or judge and for many, many, he becomes judge as they go their own way, disobeying the message of salvation and following him.

As John chapter 1 verses 9 through 11 describes the true light, which gives light to everyone was coming into the world.

He was in the world and the world was made through him. Yet the world did not know him.

He came to his own. The Jews and his own people did not receive him.

And then John chapter 3 verses 19 and 20 also says this is the judgment. The light has come into the world and people love the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.

For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light lest his works should be exposed.

It's interesting as a pastor, once you introduce yourself as a pastor, people, I don't want to talk to this guy, you know, and they don't know how, they don't know the sin in my life that I deal with, but you're just, you represent

Jesus where you go. And as a Christian, you experience that. Unbelievers, they find out you're a Christian, they flee.

Lest their works should be exposed. The world, largely speaking, does not love

Jesus. And we see this. Drive to downtown Minneapolis. What you will find is that most of them do not love

Jesus. Do they have a praise of the Lord month? No. But we know what they celebrate.

Drive to downtown St. Croix Falls. You will find the same. In Polk County, we have about 45 ,000 people who live here.

How many of these people are going to church this morning to worship Jesus? It's a small percentage.

This is the world we live in. Don't be fooled by it. Don't be fooled by the apparent righteousness of the people that you know.

Think about this. You can have a friendly conversation with most people, as long as you don't go too deep.

You can talk about the weather. You can talk about your grandchildren or your children. You can talk about how the twins or the brewers are doing, whatever fan you are in this room.

This is the experience that you can have. But the moment you go a little bit deeper and you start talking about the things of the

Lord, that's when the conversation ends a lot of times.

Sometimes it ends. Sometimes there's hostility, even. Why would you even talk about him? We need to remember what this world did to Jesus.

The world crucified him. They rejected the living stone. We also need to understand what the world has done to followers of Jesus over the last 2 ,000 years.

Down through history, Christians have been persecuted. In some countries, to be a Christian is a death penalty.

In this country, you will have all kinds of evil words thrown at you. And it's only a matter of time where you will get in trouble with the law for being a

Christian. This is the world we live in. It's a world where Jesus was rejected.

So here's our first point. Know that Jesus is the stone that demands a response.

And the first way how is through receiving rejection from the world.

The second way how you are to know that the stone Jesus demands a response is through receiving delight from the

Father. So Jesus is rejected by the world, but he's not rejected by everyone.

In fact, he's not rejected by the most important one. Let's look at this in the second half of verse 4.

I'm going to read the whole verse here. The Jewish leaders looked at the

Old Testament passages that described the Messiah reigning in power, and that is who they believed the

Messiah was going to be in full. But they overlooked Isaiah 53 and other passages which described the

Messiah coming in weakness and having to suffer. Isaiah 53 said that Jesus would be despised and rejected by men.

And this is a reminder that we aren't supposed to believe some of the Bible.

We're supposed to believe the whole thing. We aren't supposed to pick the things out we like and leave out the stuff we don't.

That's what most people do. To understand God's revelation fully, we need to look at all of the material that has been given to us from Genesis to Revelation.

What we learn from a proper understanding of the Bible is that the

Messiah would reign in power, yes, but he would also need to suffer.

In fact, first he would have to suffer. This was described in the Old Testament, but made even more clear through further revelation when the

New Testament was written. The Messiah needed to humble himself and suffer. The first coming was his humiliation.

The second coming will be his triumph. He needed to pay for the sins of the world, and anyone who believes in him would have their sins paid for and receive eternal life.

And my prayer is that everyone in this room would have that saving relationship with Jesus Christ.

He needed to do this in the future kingdom.

It's going to be full of people who are redeemed. It's going to be populated with those who have been rescued by him and made new in him.

But when Jesus came to the world, the Jewish leaders, and many common

Jews even, did not like him. He was not what they envisioned.

Remember Isaiah 52 at the end, right before Isaiah 53, it says that his appearance was not anything that people would be drawn to.

He wasn't this big, strong, tall, handsome guy. He was just an ordinary guy.

People were not drawn to him until they heard him talk. And obviously when some people heard him talk, they ran from it.

But when some people heard him talk, they were drawn to him. And what is so amazing is that even though the

Jews rejected him, the only one that matters received him and loved him and affirmed him.

Before the foundation of the world, the Father, the first person of the

Trinity, had a sweet, eternal fellowship with the second person of the

Trinity, the Son. The Son has always pleased the Father. And the

Father sent Jesus to be the ruler of this world. Peter writes this in the second half of verse 4,

While Jesus does not meet the credentials of what a king should look like in the eyes of the world, to the

Father he is the true king. He is exactly what the king of the world should be.

Jesus loves people. He truly loves them, cares for them. And when he rules in the future, he will judge with perfect justice.

He's the king we've always longed for. True believers, that is. He's the king the world needs.

His future reign is described in Isaiah 40, verses 1 -4, He will bring forth justice to the nations.

He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice or make it heard in the street. A bruised reed he will not break.

In a faintly burning wick he will not quench. He will faithfully bring forth justice.

He will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth.

And the coastlands wait for his law. This is coming.

This is coming. And we need to remember this in the world we live in. We live in a dark world. 20 years ago seems nice compared to this.

20 years ago people were saying we live in a dark world. Of course it was dark. It's just gotten darker. The coastlands wait for his law.

He's coming. This is what is coming in the future, but most of the world doesn't want him to reign.

This morning in Sunday School we started our second book, The Voyage of the

Dawn Treader. We did The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in Chronicles of Narnia last year.

And in this story, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, the witch pretends to be the ruler of Narnia.

She calls herself a queen. She is the Satan figure in the story.

She comes across one way at first, but she is really another. Eventually she reveals who she really is.

The true king is Aslan, the lion. Everyone in Narnia needs to ally themselves with one or the other.

In the real world, we too live in a world of two kingdoms. Satan's kingdom and God's.

God delights in Jesus as the king. He has chosen him as his king.

He is the son of God and he alone is worthy to have this throne. But Satan wants that throne for himself and deceives people into following him.

But just as Aslan was coming and the witch feared, so Christ is coming and Satan fears.

Satan lies to himself. He lies to everybody, but he also lies to himself.

He lies to himself believing that he can have the throne forever. I once thought that Satan knows that his days are numbered until I heard something my professor said in seminary.

He said that Satan really thinks he can win. Deep down he probably knows, but he lies to himself.

He really thinks he can pull this off. As irrational as that is. How can a creature defeat the creator?

It's impossible. But one thing we must understand about sin is that sin makes one irrational.

And the most sinful creature in the universe, in all of reality, is Satan. He's irrational.

He actually thinks he can pull this off. He lies to himself and right now we see him doing whatever he can on this earth to build his kingdom.

He's doing well. And at one point it's going to get so dark, it's going to look like he is going to win.

But he won't. Just as we sing in the song, This is My Father's World, though the wrong seems all so strong,

God is the ruler yet. We know how the story ends. Jesus will come to this world to take his throne and the world largely rejects him.

But the only one whose opinion matters, the Father, chooses

Jesus for the role as the king of the world. He is chosen and precious in his sight.

As the second half of verse four says, In the sight of God, chosen and precious.

The Father chose him and delights in him and by allying yourself with him, you are aligning yourself with the true king of this world.

As the Father gives him honor and glory, so too do you. The greatest way to anger true

Christians is to insult the true Jesus. Sometimes you're around people and they might say, Jesus Christ, but they don't say it as a praise, they say it as a swear word.

And we should be deeply offended when someone does that. We should say, please stop doing that. You're insulting my

Lord. If someone insults Jesus, it ought to bring great offense to Christians, more offense than anything else.

And anytime someone goes after biblical morality, they're going after Jesus.

They're going after his character because morality reflects his character. And we should be deeply offended.

The world doesn't believe that he is precious, but we do.

And you might say, well, doesn't most of the world, you know, see Jesus as the spiritual figure that should be followed?

And the answer is they pick and choose what they like about Jesus and they redefine it.

They don't love the biblical Jesus. They love a Jesus of their own making. And this we must understand.

And so we need to ally ourselves with the right side, right? With the good side, with the true king and be residents of the true kingdom in the future.

I mean, we live under the kingdom of darkness right now in this world, but a true kingdom is coming where Jesus is going to come to this earth.

He's going to establish his throne and his people are going to reign with him forever.

And we will be those. And if you belong to him right now, you are one of those who sees

Jesus as chosen and precious. And along with the father, you praise him.

And my prayer is that everyone here would be in that number. Know that Jesus is the stone that demands a response.

And the second way how is through receiving delight from the father. And may that delight also come from us as well.

Okay, so this is the message today. I was planning on doing this whole thing in one

Sunday. I'm like, this is going to be way too much. And there's way too much in this text. We want to do justice to what is here.

So next Sunday we will be doing points three and four.

We're going to be focusing on the cornerstone, what that exactly is and how

Jesus is the cornerstone. We'll be focusing on that next Sunday. And then lastly, we'll be focusing on what it looks like for us to live as believers in this world.

Because the fourth point is, we are going to be displaying transformed people to the world.

And that's in the last two verses. So next Sunday I look forward to looking at that with you. But this time, let's bow our heads in prayer.

Father in heaven, indeed Jesus does demand a response from the world.

No one in this world can be indifferent toward him. Father, you are not indifferent toward him.

You give him praise. You give him honor. You love your son. And the world,

Lord, does show their hatred toward him in different ways. But you are raising up people all over earth who will reign with Christ in the future.

Who give him the honor that he is due. And my prayer, Lord, is that in this room, everyone would be in that number.

And that we would give him the praise and the honor and the glory. That Jesus the

Messiah is due. And it's in his name we pray.