A Spiritual House, 1 Peter 2
Updated: Aug 25
1 Peter 2
The most beautiful church building that I have ever been in is a church in Colorado. It's
outside of Estes park and Allen's Park. And it. In some ways, it has no name because it has
three names.
It's the Church of St. Catherine of Siena. It is also sometimes called the Church of Saint
Malo, or Chapel on the rock. And a little over 120 some years ago, 130 years ago, there was
a Catholic monsignor who was there, and he was standing on a rock underneath Mount
Meeker, and he just looked at the ground and he thought, on this rock, I'll build my church.
Kind of thinking of the passage of. Of Jesus, talking about the church being built on Peter's
confession of him, and he said, a church ought to be built here.
So for 20 years, they mined stones in that area and built up a church. You can take a look at
the picture. The church is this magnificent stone building. It's relatively small, hanging
under the view of the mountain. And you go inside with a group of people and you.
You sing, and the harmonies just bounce off the walls. Yeah, let's put the picture up there.
It. It's. It's magnificent.
It's this small chapel, but you go inside and you begin singing. And the harmonies, the
harmonies just bounce off the walls. And it is a magnificent place of worship. Now, I will say
something about that building. The stones in that building are special.
And you could take any stone out, or you could look at any stone on the hillside there, and
you could say, is there a glory in those stones? And you say, yeah. I mean, God made them.
There's a certain glory in them, but nothing that compares to the glory of when those stones
are put together and they house the presence of God in this sanctuary in this church building. And I bring that up because we're walking through first Peter in a series called Elect Exiles, coaching us on how to live as foreigners here in this world.
And Peter is going to give us an image today that we are living stones collected in to build a
spiritual house. He's going to give us an image that as that spiritual house, we have the
presence of God inside of us collectively. It's a beautiful thing. So I'm going to read through
the passage, and then we'll go back through the passage and kind of walk through it and
draw some principles out. As I read through the passage, I want you to think, who is the you
in the passage?
What defines the you in the passage? Just to whet the appetite, I'm going to Read verse five.
And verse nine is kind of preludes. Listen to verse five. 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.
Who. Who is the you? You yourselves. You yourselves, like living stones. Who is the you in
verse nine?
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his possession
that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his
marvelous light. Who is the you? Now I'm going to go back and read the whole passage. I'm
going to start in verse two. And ask yourselves who the you is.
All the way through, like newborn infants long for 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 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. So we're going to walk through this passage. It's a
traditional 12 point sermon that we're going to navigate today. 12, one for each of the
apostles.
There's like 15 sermons in this passage. Well, that's the problem is we're going to walk
through a 12 point sermon. We're going to leave so much on the cutting room table, in fact,
we would encourage you. This is like the perfect passage to walk back through this week
and to dig into all of the Old Testament references here, all of the inner biblical references
here, and just press in to see what God has for you even deeper than what we have over the
next 30 minutes. So 12 points.
First point, each one a definition of what you is, of who you is. Definition number one, you is
Plural, you is plural. Over these nine verses, you occurs again and again and again, and
every single time you is plural. I'll begin with the end. I'll begin with the final verse, verse 10.
Four instances of you. In that passage, all are plural. It says this, once you were not a
people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you,
plural, have received mercy. There is something profound about God's work in the
corporate.
In the plural, you. The Southerners have a version of that. Right, y' all or all y'? All. I kind of
like even the last one better.
All y'. All. Right. Like every one of you. And this is the language of scripture, that God does
something glorious in the individual.
Absolutely. Let's go back to that picture. We have this glorious setting with the lake. You go
along on the shore of that little lake there, and you could pluck up any stone. Could you say,
does this stone have God's glory in it?
Absolutely. And I could pluck up any individual Christian and say, does this Christian have
the spirit of God, the glory of God in him or her? Absolutely. But is there something more
glorious about the stone in the structure? Scripture says yes.
Peter says yes. Jesus says yes. God says there's something even more profoundly glorious
about the collection of the you of what I'm doing in y'. All. Not just you individually.
Who is the you? The you is y'. All. We just. This Monday, we had an elders meeting, and we
were kind of just going around, just checking in, and two of our elders gave up their.
Their weeks a few weeks ago to serve as a team leaders for our day camp. And, man, I just
love our elders. And that's just a. That's just one picture of the sacrifice, the heart of our
elders, for kids and for this church. I just love it.
And he was just beaming. He's like, if you weren't there, you missed it. It was amazing. God
was present in so many ways. I can't believe it took me this long to start doing camp.
I love it. And it's true. There's something special. You can't put your finger on it, your name
on it, but when God draws his people together, God does something special in the plural
you. Definition number one, you is plural.
Definition number two, you grows. You grows. Going back to the first verse, we read verse
two. Like newborn infants long for the pure spiritual milk that by it, you, y' all may grow up
into salvation. Is it true that each of us is supposed to yearn for the truths the deeper Things
of God that we would grow up into salvation individually.
Yes. But Peter is actually speaking even past that to the reality is that we need us
collectively to grow up into that depth of maturity. The part of what the body is to do as we
gather together is to exhort us, to push us along, to challenge us, to direct, to call us
forward. Do you long for the things of God in your life? The spirit of God in your life?
Like, we all have those little cravings in our life. If you're like me, they, like, they change
seasonally. Right now, angel discovered these little mochi things. And like, I'm telling you,
like, every, like, 3pm in the afternoon, I'm like, oh, dinner's coming. And that means emoji
balls come explode in your mouth.
You're like, I want one. I want one right now. Right? I do. Like, we all have it.
Do you crave in that way for the work of God in you? The gift of God is that collectively we
grow, we challenge. We crave more together than we do alone. You is plural, and you grows.
I hope you catch the sharp nature of that.
That an individual stone can have the Holy Spirit in them, yes, but never to the fullness of
the stones when they're the collected whole. The house of God, the spiritual home. You as
plural, you is growing. Number three. You enjoys God.
Verse three. If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. If indeed you have tasted that
the Lord is good. This is a reference back to Psalm 34, verse 8. Taste and see that the Lord
is good.
You is a people who experiences God and tastes God. We say it every single week in our
mission statement. We exist to cultivate a community that enjoys God and transforms the
world through the gospel. You say, well, why don't we say glorifies God or worships God or
praises God? Because enjoying him is glorifying him.
You cannot glorify him without enjoying him. It is meant to be partaken of God says, taste
and see. My goodness. Experience me. So we have all kinds of traditions in my home that
revolve around food.
I'm not sure. Like, I think that's just what it is to be human. We all have these food
traditions. One in our home is cherry pies. So cherry pie is kind of the regular, special treat
of my house.
And Deborah will make these cherry pies. And they are like. It was maybe 20 years ago that
she finally, you know, finally hit this. This recipe, this. And I looked at her, I said, freeze right
there.
Don't change it. Don't do anything. If I go from this day until I die, and this never changes. I
die a happy man. This is it.
We've arrived. The cherry pie. And my son and I, Sam specifically, have the deepest hunger
for this cherry pie. My son, he gets it all. It's like a monthly thing in his life.
He gets the pie all the time. You ask Sam to do a favor. Hey, Sam, could you help out with.
Sure. For a pie.
It's just his response. Hey, can I use this in a sermon? Sure, for a pie. He's got a pie coming
just from this. Now, I don't mind it because I get to partake.
But I will say this. When the cherry pie is made, it doesn't sit on the counter. You don't just
smell it from a distance. You don't look at it and say, ooh, that's a good looking pie. Ooh,
that looks so good.
Or that smells. No, you cut a slab of that baby into your bowl with the ice cream on top and
you taste it and you go, ah, yes. God has a people called you, and they experience him and
they partake in Him. You is plural, you is growing. And you enjoys God.
Number four. You comes to him. You comes to Him. Verse four. As you come to Him, a
living stone rejected by men.
But in the sight of God, chosen, precious, you comes to him. We come to Jesus. We seek
out Jesus. We look for Jesus. We are built on Jesus.
Now, a beautiful part of this passage is. This is a profoundly significant passage for showing
the deity of Christ. Because you could say, who is him as you come to Him? There is no
question in the passage that him refers back to the lord of verse three. And you go back to
Psalm 34, verse eight, taste and see that the Lord is good.
You'll notice in that verse, taste and see that the Lord is good. That the word Lord is in
capital letters, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D. That's because that's the name
Yahweh. And anytime the Old Testament is translated in English, every time the name
Yahweh, I am, that I am from the burning bush comes up, anytime that name is mentioned,
it's spelt Lord in all capital letters. So there's no question that him is Yahweh. And there's
also no question that him is Jesus.
As you come to Him, a living stone rejected by men. But in the sight of God, chosen and
precious, who is the living stone rejected by men? Jesus. Jesus is God. And you comes to
him, drawn to him, built on him, even back to that church, the chapel on the rock.
It's a chapel on the rock. It started because you take the rock out of that foundation, all the,
all the stones of that building, they just crumble down. In fact, put the picture back up
there. You look at this building, you go to that area of Colorado, there is not a single
structure anywhere near it that has lasted even the last 120 years. There has been a flood
there, there's been an earthquake there, and there have been multiple fires there.
And there's only one building that has withstood that test of time. Because it's on the rock.
Because it's on the rock.
You as a people who exist because of the rock. We exist because of Jesus Christ. You is
plural. You is growing. You enjoys God.
And you, you comes to him. Jesus, I love that. Do you want to be part of something lasting?
But the kingdoms of this world, they come and they go. Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, Rome,
gone.
The kingdom of God endures forever because of the rock. Because of the rock. Number
five, you is a spiritual house. You is a spiritual house. Verse 5 says this.
You yourself, like living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house. God purposes to
build us up. You think of that lake and the individual rocks on that lake. The purpose of
Jesus was not merely to come and bless the rocks and leave them as they are, but to build
them up into a spiritual house. You know, our culture, by and large, is a culture that's
spiritual but not religious.
I do my own thing with God, but I don't do that corporate thing with God.
And what you hear here is this very clearly stated. God's thing for you is a corporate thing. It
is a together thing. You know that word for Jesus. Most of us grow up learning.
Jesus was a carpenter. Perhaps he was a carpenter. He was a technon, a skilled craftsman,
which is likely, more likely a mason, one who built up stone structures. And that mason
came to build a structure. He the foundation of that structure.
We the living stones of that structure. He came with a calling, with a purpose, to build a
structure. And in that structure, the glory of him was made manifest. The spiritual house of
God glorifies him. And can we just be honest?
Like, when we think of that, hey, what are some of the most profound spiritual moments of
your life? I think for many of us, we think of the time alone, the time maybe on that hike,
looking at the vista, jaw dropped at the glory, the majesty of God. And absolutely is God
meeting you there 100%. But what we're hearing here is that there's something special that
God has for us in community where God meets us in the spiritual house of God. You is a
spiritual house.
Number six, you is a holy priesthood. Verse five continues. You yourself, like living stones,
are being built up as a spiritual house. To be a holy priesthood. To be a holy priesthood.
Can I just pause and reflect? If you've been with us over these weeks, these three weeks,
now that we've begun navigating Peter, do you notice something about what Peter is doing?
He is layering into our hearts, into our lives, into our minds, these truths of who we are, our
identity in Jesus. He starts with it. You're elect, you're exiles.
He continues, you're holy. And all of these things in a sense are true individually. But this,
he just whammies us with all of these truths about our identity that are connected to the
corporate reality of who we are. Your identity is connected to the church, the people of
God. You, who you are in Jesus Christ is a spiritual house.
Who you are in Jesus Christ is a holy priesthood. Now what does that mean, a priesthood?
Now you might have grown up in a tradition where Greg and I would have been called
priests. In fact, I get called priests from time to time. That's fine.
We are priests. You are also a priest, which is why we don't bear that title. We are all priests
in Jesus Christ. What is a priest then? A priest is simply someone who brings God to people
and people to God.
A mediator between God and people. Well, what role then do we serve? As a holy
priesthood. This rule, you are purposed by God to be sent into your school, into your home,
into your neighborhood, into your family, into your workplace as one who is bringing God to
people. God has placed you in a world surrounded by people who are far from him, to bring
them to him.
Because there's going to be that time when that co worker of you, as they learn to trust you,
will open up to you and share just how hard their marriage is, how afraid they are of the
cancer diagnosis that their daughter just got. And here's what you get to do as a holy priest.
You get to bring them to God in a holy moment. You say, can I pray for you and this person
who doesn't know how to pray. You get to stand on their behalf and bring them to a holy
God and not just say, I will pray for you, but can we pray right now?
You, a holy priest of God, bring them together in, I think, one of the most powerful
evangelistic acts we have as Christian because you are A holy priesthood. Number seven.
You offers spiritual sacrifices. Back to verse size. 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,
you offers spiritual sacrifices. Not just sacrifices, spiritual sacrifices. You can positive.
Well, like, what's a spiritual sacrifice? Here's a question.
Is this a spiritual sermon? I hope so, Greg. I hope so too. It's possible to give a sermon
without it being a spiritual sermon. You can study the word of God, you can know it
academically, and you can be a great orator and proclaim the word of God as an orator and
never touch the Holy Spirit.
Coming to church? You, you come to church? Are you spiritually coming to church? It's
possible to attend a worship service and just zip in and zip out and not connect to anyone
in the body.
Or a spiritual offering to God, connecting with people and engaging in encouragement and
affirmation with others. We talk about it in all kinds of acts we know from Jesus own stories.
Two people can come and give to God. One could give $10,000 and another one could give
one penny. And that one penny could be significantly more spiritual as an offering than the
$10,000.
You offer spiritual offerings. There's a spiritual way to parent, a spiritual way to be a
husband or a wife. A spiritual way to be a friend, a co worker, a neighbor. Past just
functioning in these roles, doing so in the Holy Spirit to his worship and the good of those
around him. You offers spiritual sacrifices.
Number eight. You is a chosen race. Skipping down to verse nine. But you are a chosen
race. A chosen race.
Like we gather in this room and we're red, yellow, black and white. We have different
ethnicities. And those ethnicities don't disappear. They're a part of who we are. In fact,
twice this week people have teased me in a fun way about being Jewish.
So one, I was just eating my yogurt. I have yogurt. Almost every day I'm eating my yogurt and
evidently at the end I'm like going to it with my spoon, cleaning out every nook and corner of
the Tupperware that had my yogurt in it. At home I would use a squeegee. Most people call
them spatulas.
Spatulas are what you flip a burger. Spatulas. No, no, you flip things with spatulas. You
squeegee things with squeegees. So I use a squeegee and I clean the yogurt and you don't
leave it.
I'm not wasting. I paid for it. I'm not wasting a single drop. So I'm digging away with my
spoon and my yogurt and someone said so I hope I can say this appropriately, but that is
the most Jewish way to eat yogurt I have ever seen. And I took that as a profound
compliment.
Now hear me. Our ethnicities don't disappear. But do you hear what Peter's saying? It is
strong enough that we become a new race, a race called Christian, with the blood of Jesus
Christ flowing through our veins. That God is our father, Jesus is our firstborn brother, and
we are an actual race of people, a race of people called Christians that makes red, yellow,
black and white pale in comparison as just some earthly trifling thing.
We are a chosen race. He continues over in verse nine. Let me continue that verse. But you
are a chosen race, a royal priesthood. He doubles down on that one.
We heard that before. A holy nation. A holy nation. You are a holy nation. A place in which,
yes.
Do you respect the land in which you live? Actually, next week we're going to be talking
some about that in which we are called to be good citizens of the land that we live. But our
ultimate allegiance, our first allegiance, is to the King of kings and the Lord of Lords and his
kingdom. We are a nation brought together by united interests, united purpose, united
mission. We are a holy nation.
Greg mentioned this earlier as I was just praying and diving into just the sorrow of the
conflict between Iran and Israel. This week there was a special report on the impact of
Christians in Iran that was really just sobering for me and to be honest, something I hadn't
even thought about.
I thought, those are brothers and sisters. Christ united the blood with a nation far beyond
the nations of this world. We are a holy nation in Christ. Number 10, a people for his own
possession. Verse 9.
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. A people for his own
possession. For his own possession. God looks at you individually, yes, but collectively
even more so. And his heart fills with delight because you're his.
You're his possession. This year or within the last year, my son got his first car. And it's really
fun to see kind of what happens when it's your yours, right? It's his baby. And the squeegee,
the real squeegee comes out often, right?
There was a car wash this, paying his own money for a car wash. Like, why? Because it's my
baby. You're God's baby. You are a people for his possession. So Last week, John did a little
show and tell with stuffed animal that belonged to Soren and a stuffed animal that
belonged to Camille, showing this illustration of just how much God delights in you.
So I didn't want to be left out. I wanted a little show and tell. And I just thought it was a. It
was the sweetest part of the message last week for me. So this is my oldest son's.
He got it when he was nine months old, when he was in the hospital for a heart surgery, and
my aunt gave it to him. And for more than a decade, this thing hung out of his mouth. He'd
free up his hands, but just by chewing it. Essentially, the nose is long. Shotgun.
I mean, it's been, it's been. This head I think would fall off real easy. It. It has been ripped.
Deborah's tried to sew it together.
It is frail because he cared for it. This was his prized possession. He could not like, if you left
this behind on a trip, you're going to get it because he slept with it, not without it. You hear
me?
It is good to know God delights in you. God adores you. God loves you. God prizes you. But
as much as he does that individually, and it's good for us to reflect on that, he does it
corporately for a purpose, people, for that building.
That's why it's filled with the spirit more than any individual stone could. Is communion
more filled with the presence of God than singing a song? Like, on the one hand, God is
everywhere present, but in a way that I can't fully describe or comprehend, God ordained that during communion and during baptism, he would be tangibly present in a special way. In the same way, he's saying, is he with all of us as individual Christians? Yes.
Yes. But is he with the gathered family, community at a heightened level? All the more, yes.
Now, you might be listening to this and, and you're not even a Christian yet. You're.
You're. You're searching things out. Maybe a friend just invited you. Please hear me in this.
There is an invitation to you.
God is experienced and he's real and he's here. And he is inviting you not only into his
presence, but into the presence then of a family, of community. Number 12. Nope.
Number 11.
I jumped ahead. Number 11, you is purposed to proclaim. There is a grand glorious purpose
statement in the middle of this. Back to verse nine. 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.
So that, in other words, there's a purpose behind these you alls. You can't stop it short of
the purpose statement of that. Our mission statement here in a church to cultivate a
community that enjoys God and transforms the world through the gospel. If you cut it short
and say cultivate a community that enjoys God, we might call ourselves a church, but we
would not be followers of Jesus.
If you are a church of Jesus Christ, you carry things through to the end of a purpose
statement to take the gospel and share it as a light to the ends of the earth. We, we are you
all and blessed in all of these blessings and identity markers that we might proclaim the
excellencies of him. Why is it that we have. I'm looking over for Corey. Why is it that we have
Corey and Raven up here praying for a church plant?
Because we cannot get away from the command to multiply. If we lose the task, if we lose
somehow a vision for the fact that Tucson is a lost place and we have neighbors and friends
and there's whole communities of people to take the love of Jesus too. If we lose that
mission, we're not y'. All.
Y' all has a purpose. So the 12th you in this passage, we're going to double down and go to
the first one. You is plural now. You can come back to me later and say, well, you didn't have
12 you's. You only had 11.
You did the one twice. You're right. It's the most fun fundamental truth in the passage. We
can't get away from it. It's the illustration and the picture all the way through that we are
living stones built up into a spiritual house.
We forget that. I have a good friend was a pastor for years, more than a decade. And he and
his family went through some significant church hurt in church. And he left the ministry and
he Left church. Been 15 years, doesn't attend.
His kids do some.
He left.
Is he a Christian? Is he born again? Does he love Jesus? Yeah, he does.
But he is missing out.
Living stones scattered on the side of the mountain. You will never be filled with the Spirit.
At the measure, you could be outside of the community of God's people. You will never
taste and see the glory of God outside as you can in the midst of God's people. We are not
to be individual stones scattered about.
We are built into a beautiful structure, a sanctuary of his presence in a beautiful way. I hope
we. I'll raise my hand. Included all receive a call to go deeper into community. This passage,
Amen.
So can we land this and apply it on one hand? It's pretty easy to do so, you know, I mean,
this is a passage that relates to so many of us. 60% of Americans would say that they're
Christians. 62% is the exact percentage of the most recent poll. 30% of Americans go to
church.
So more than half of those who say they're Christian don't attend church. Number in
Tucson's far less. Actually Tucson, it's below 10%, kind of significantly below 10% of those
who attend church.
There's an invitation. If you've been walking the Christian life, getting out of it what you want
and God is meeting you, we don't deny that you can experience real faith. We don't deny
that. But you're missing out on the mission. The purpose of we invite you to step in.
If you're here at New Life. I'm just going to just begin with some, just real basic things, things
that you hear every week we say and things you might just frankly tune out on every week. If
you come here, you hear this, we'd love to meet you in the lobby at the first step table.
You're like, that's nice for other people. Then you come and in you go, out you go watch
online.
We invite you to do the same thing. Click off. We genuinely mean that. Take a first step. We
want to step into a real relationship with you.
Now. I'm going to just tell you what's going to happen there. You're going to have a real
relationship, a real connection, and there's going to be an invitation to next steps. Next
steps is happening on July 12th. I just had somebody on the way out their gate.
Yeah, John, we heard you. We know. All right. We're finally doing it. When you step in that,
that time is a time where we can sit around tables, we can get to know.
You can get to know real people here in New Life, connect, hear their stories, share your
story and then hear what God is doing at New Life and, and what the giftings where. The
giftings God has given you where, where they, where they fit in this body. We need you.
Maybe you've, you've done that and you haven't taken the step of partnership of just saying,
yes, I'm committed. I'm in.
Maybe there's more creative invitations here for you. An invitation to reach out to someone
like Greg's friend. We all have that friend. We all have many of those friends and invite them
in you're missing out persistently pursuing them and inviting them to be part of the people
of God. Maybe it's an invitation for you to step deeper in hospitality and opening your home
to deeper connection to stepping in a serving role or a connection group but to be part of
the living the spiritual house where the glory of God redounds to the nations.
There's an invitation for each one of us here because Jesus came to build a spiritual house
and we are that house. Pray God we are grateful we are so so grateful for your work. Who
are we that we stones scatter along the edge of the water would become living stones in a
spiritual house for your glory but we are so grateful for your work in us and we ask God that
you would move that you would move us into community and that that would glorify you
bring honor to your name. In Jesus name we pray. Amen Amen.
Let's stand as we respond in worship.