Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Peter 2:4
To whom coming, [as unto] a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, [and] precious,
4. To whom coming, as unto a living stone ] The whole imagery changes, like a dissolving view, and in the place of the growth of babes nourished with spiritual milk, we have that of a building in which each disciple of Christ is as a “living stone” spontaneously taking its right place in the building that rests on Christ as the chief corner-stone. The new imagery is connected in St Peter’s mind with its use in Psa 118:22 and Isa 28:16, but it is not without significance to note that we have the same sequence of the two metaphors in 1Co 3:1-2; 1Co 3:10-11. It may be noted also that the Greek is bolder in its use of the image than the English, and has no particle of comparison, to whom coming, even to a living stone. The term “living” is used in its fullest sense, presenting the paradox of connecting the noun with the adjective which seems most remote from it. The lower sense of the word in which Latin writers applied the term saxum vivum to rocks in their natural form as distinct from those that had been hewn and shaped, is hardly admissible here.
disallowed indeed of men ] The verb is the same as the “rejected” of Mat 21:42. We cannot forget that the thoughts on which St Peter now enters had their starting-point in the citation of the Psalm by our Lord on that occasion. In the substitution of the wide term “men” for the “builders” of the Psalm, we may trace the feeling that it was not the rulers of the Jews only, nor even the Jews only as a nation, but mankind at large, by whom the “head of the corner” had been rejected. Here again we see in the Epistle the reproduction of the Apostle’s earlier teaching (Act 4:11).
but chosen of God, and precious ] More accurately, but with God (i.e. in God’s sight) chosen, precious (or, held in honour). The two words emphasize the contrast between man’s rejection and God’s acceptance. Both are taken from the LXX. of Isa 28:16.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
To whom coming – To the Lord Jesus, for so the word Lord is to be understood in 1Pe 2:3. Compare the notes at Act 1:24. The idea here is, that they had come to him for salvation, while the great mass of people rejected him. Others disallowed him, and turned away from him, but they had seen that he was the one chosen or appointed of God, and had come to him in order to be saved. Salvation is often represented as corning to Christ. See Mat 11:28.
As unto a living stone – The allusion in this passage is to Isa 28:16, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. See the notes at that passage. There may be also possibly an allusion to Psa 118:22, The stone which the builders disallowed is become the headstone of the corner. The reference is to Christ as the foundation on which the church is reared. He occupied the same place in regard to the church which a foundation-stone does to the edifice that is reared upon it. Compare Mat 7:24-25. See the Rom 9:33 note, and Eph 2:20-22 notes. The phrase living stone is however unusual, and is not found, I think, except in this place. There seems to be an incongruity in it, in attributing life to a stone, yet the meaning is not difficult to be understood. The purpose was not to speak of a temple, like that at Jerusalem, made up of gold and costly stones; but of a temple made up of living materials – of redeemed people – in which God now resides. In speaking of that, it was natural to refer to the foundation on which the whole rested, and to speak of that as corresponding to the whole edifice. It was all a living temple – a temple composed of living materials – from the foundation to the top. Compare the expression in Joh 4:10, He would have given thee living water; that is, water which would have imparted life to the soul. So Christ imparts life to the whole spiritual temple that is reared on him as a foundation.
Disallowed indeed of men – Rejected by them, first by the Jews, in causing him to be put to death; and then by all people when he is offered to them as their Saviour. See the notes at Isa 53:3. Psa 118:22; Which the builders refused. Compare the Mat 21:42 note; Act 4:11 note.
But chosen of God – Selected by him as the suitable foundation on which to rear his church.
And precious – Valuable. The universe had nothing more valuable on which to rear the spiritual temple.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
1Pe 2:4-5
To whom coming, as unto a living stone.
Coming-always coming
The Christian life is begun, continued, and perfected altogether in connection with the Lord Jesus Christ. Sometimes when you go a journey, you travel so far under the protection of a certain company, but then you have to change, and the rest of your journey may be performed under very different circumstances, upon quite another kind of line. Now we have not so far to go to heaven in the guardian care of Jesus Christ, and then at a certain point to change, so as to have somebody else to be our leader, or some other method of salvation. No, He is the author and He is the finisher of our faith. We have not to seek a fresh physician, to find a new friend or to discover a novel hope, but we are to look for everything to Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and forever. Ye are complete in Him.
I. Here is a complete description of the Christian life. It is a continuous coming to Jesus. Notice that the expression occurs in connection with two figures. There is one which precedes it in the second verse, namely, the figure of a little child fed upon milk. Children come to their parents, and they frequently come rather longer than their parents like; it is the general habit of children to come to their parents for what they need. Just what your children began to do from the first moment you fixed your eyes on them, and what they have continued to do ever since, that is just what you are to do with the Lord Jesus Christ. You are to be always coming to Him-coming to Him for spiritual food, for spiritual garments, for washing, guiding, help, and health: coming, in fact, for everything. You will be wise if, the older you grow, the more you come, and He will be all the better pleased with you. If you will look again at your Bibles, you will get a second illustration from the fourth verse, To whom coming as unto a living stone, etc. Here we have the figure of a building. A building comprises first a foundation, and then the stones which are brought to the foundation and are built upon it. This furnishes a very beautiful picture of Christian life.
II. Now to answer the question, what is the rest way of coming to Christ at first?
1. The very best way to come to Christ is to come with all your needs about you. If you could get rid of half your needs apart from Christ, you would not come to Jesus half so well, for your need furnishes you with motives for coming, and gives you pleas to urge. Suppose a physician should come into a town with motives of pure benevolence to exercise the healing art. What he wants is not to make money, but to bless the townsmen. He has a love to his fellow men, and he wants to cure them, and therefore he gives notice that the poorest will be welcome, and the most diseased will be best received. Is there a deeply sin-sick soul anywhere? Is there man or woman who is bad altogether? Come along, you are just in a right condition to come to Jesus Christ. Come just as you are, that is the best style of coming.
2. If you want to know how to come aright the first time, I should answer, Come to find everything you want in Christ. I heard of a shop some time ago in a country town where they sold everything, and the man said that he did not believe that there was anything a human being wanted but what he could rig him out from top to toe. Well, I do not know whether that promise would have been carried out to the letter if it had been tried, but I know it is so with Jesus Christ; He can supply you with all you need, for Christ is all.
3. The best way to come to Christ is to come meaning to get everything, and to obtain all the plenitude of grace which He has laid up in store and promised freely to give.
III. What is the best way to come afterwards? The answer is-Come just as you used to come. The text does not say that you have come to Christ, though that is true, but that you are coming; and you are to be always coming. The way to continue coming is to come just in the same way as you came at first. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Christ a living stone
I. Christ the sure foundation. Without Christ the Bible is meaningless, the world hopeless, heaven charmless. You might as well have a summer without a gleam of light, without the smell of flowers, or the song of a bird, as have a life without Jesus Christ. You might as well have a year without a summer, nothing but barrenness and death, as to have a life without Jesus Christ. You might as well have a night without a morning, as to live in this world, and die, and be buried without Jesus Christ. You might as well speak of the astronomy of the world and leave out the sun, as speak of history, philosophy, and creation, and leave out Jesus Christ. In Christ, and in Him alone, the real and the ideal meet. Christ was the perfect, the symmetrical Man, the true centre of redeemed humanity.
II. Christ rejected by many. He reveals character; He makes men declare themselves; He is the touch stone that draws worth and develops worthlessness. Come near to Christ, and if you have the elements of nobility you will be drawn toward Him; if you are worth less you will hate Him.
III. A startling contrast-Gods judgment of Christ as compared with that of men: Chosen of God, and precious. God knew Him, and He knew God as it is impossible for men to know Him; and this is the judgment which God here gives.
IV. In order to receive the blessing of Christs life, we must come to him. Gods promise includes Gods condition. (R. S. MacArthur.)
The living stone
I. The church or spiritual temple in its foundation.
1. Jesus Christ is here set forth as the foundation of the Christian Church.
2. The apostle here seems to violate the rules of rhetoric and elegant composition by attributing life to a stone. Gods thoughts were so infinite that the laws of grammar stood in constant need of expansion to receive them.
3. Disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God. This Divine choice does not refer primarily, if at all, to Gods eternal election of His Son to be the foundation of the Church, but to His choice of Him in consequence of His holy life and atoning death. The disallowing by men and the choosing by God were simultaneous processes. God chose Him, not arbitrarily, but on account of fitness after trying Him.
II. The Church or spiritual temple in its superstructure.
1. What then is the first step you should take to be built into the walls of this spiritual edifice? This-you must come to Jesus Christ. To whom coming; or, as the words might be rendered, To whom coming close up, to whom coming very near-so near as to be in personal contact with Him, nothing whatever intervening. You must remove all the earth and brush away every grain of sand, and build your house on the clean face of the rock, with nothing whatsoever between.
2. To whom coming close up, as unto a living stone, then it follows that ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house. The word for stones here suggests-I do not say it positively means, but it suggests stones dressed, smoothed, and polished, fitted to their place in the walls of the spiritual edifice-the root of the English word lithograph. Young people, and old, you will not do to be built into the walls of this temple in the rough, as you come from the quarry of the world. The Holy Spirit alone can prepare you for this.
III. The Church or spiritual temple in its service.
1. A priesthood. So there is a priesthood in the Christian Church. The whole body of believers forms the Christian priesthood.
2. An holy priesthood. A learned priesthood? No. An educated priesthood? No. No; an holy priesthood.
3. To offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Spiritual sacrifices: what are these? Singing? Yes. Praying? Yes. Preaching? I am glad to believe it. Under the law material sacrifices were required-oxen, sheep, doves; but under the gospel only those sacrifices which proceed from a regenerate heart, and which testify to the gratitude and devotion of an emancipated spirit. God condescends to accept the offering for the sake of the love which inspires it. What else is necessary? That we present all by, or, as in the Welsh, through Jesus Christ. Our sacrifices must ascend to the throne through Him; and as they go through Him they are beautifully filtered and refined. (J. C. Jones D. D.)
Disallowed indeed of men.–
Christ disallowed
Disallowed lie was, indeed, of men: they called Him the carpenters Son, a Samaritan, winebibber, deceiver; they would have no other king but Caesar; with them Barabbas was meeter to live than He. What was the cause? They looked for one that should come as an earthly prince, to deliver them out of the hands of the Romans; but His kingdom was not of this world. They looked also for one that should have upheld their customs, laws, and traditions; but the date of them was out. Again, how came they to this height of disallowing Him? At the first of ignorance and blindness, but after of malice; so men grow (when they desire not to amend and see the truth) from one degree of wickedness to another. (John Rogers.)
Ye also, as lively stones, are built up.–
Living stones
Religious art finds its culmination in the temple of the ancients and the cathedral of the moderns. Higher than this it cannot reach. That the temple made a profound impression upon the minds of the apostles, that its association interpenetrated their religious life and coloured their teaching, we have unmistakable evidence. In his Epistle to the Ephesians Paul seizes hold of the idea to illustrate the stability, the growth, and the grandeur of the Church. It is precisely the same idea which Peter had in his mind. The idea is a grand one, and it has had a fascination for more than one of the great men of the Church. To mention only one instance, it has given to us the immortal work of John Howe, The Living Temple. Let us look at it. Rising slowly in the midst of the world, noiselessly and unobserved by the majority of men, are the fair proportions of a temple in comparison with which the grandest conceptions of man are but blurred and broken lines of beauty. Century after century has contributed its quota to the pile, and during the unborn ages it will continue to increase in symmetry and perfection, until with the last man the edifice will be complete. The text reminds us that believers are the living stones of this living temple. Let us pay a visit to the temple, and look upon the stones that are being built into it.
I. As soon as we approach our attention is arrested by some huge, unshapely blocks of stone, sharp angled, and disfigured here and there with mud. We glance hastily up at the superb building before us, re-examine the stones, and then in some wonder ask our guide, What possible use can these be put to? Touching the stone tenderly with his fingers, the master builder replies that there is no better material built up in the whole fabric than this. Despite their roughness and shapelessness, these stones, he says, possess a nature which yields readily to the tools and skill of the workmen. Do we understand the teaching? Have we not in our Church fellowship met with men and women freshly hewn from the worlds quarry, with such angularities of character, with such imperfect knowledge, with such lack of grace, that we have begun to question if such rough material could be used for anything but stumbling blocks in the cause of Christ? It may have been, even, that we have treated them with indifference, if not with contempt, and denied them the assurance of a brothers sympathy. Forgetting the hole of the pit from whence we have been digged, we have despised these little ones for whom Christ died. Let us be consistent with ourselves. We profess to believe in spiritual capacities and capabilities, and we cry each day out of the depths of our weakness and ignorance, Lord, help us. In what lies the difference between us and them? Are not their souls endowed with the satire faculties, the same capabilities, spiritually, as ours? But if we have seen anything of the operation of Divine grace upon the heart, we surely have seen enough to lead us to the belief that there is no limit to its power, that it can fashion the roughest into symmetry and grace. The tinker of Elstow is transformed into the immortal dreamer. Ah, surely bitter must be our humiliation if by our spiritual pride we mar the beauty and usefulness of our Christian life, and see those whom we have despised outstripping us in service, and bearing more vividly upon them the imprint of Divine favour. Proceeding in our examination of the stones, we have one pointed out to us as being of great importance.
II. Examining it we find that while it bears evident marks of the workmens tools, it is only a large plain block of stone, with no pretension to ornament whatever. We acknowledge at once its solidity, but have to ask an explanation of its use. We are led to a part of the building where the first stones are being laid in the freshly excavated earth, and there we are told that these plain blocks of stone are used for the wall foundations. What! we exclaim, are they to be hidden out of sight, and their worth never to be appreciated? True, replies our guide, they are hidden, and the thoughtless dream not of them; but the architect knows their value. They serve a grand purpose; upon them depends the strength, aye, and the beauty of the building, too. Unspeakable comfort this to many a lonely, toiling Christian. Look at that mother, the object of her childrens lavish affection-their most trusted adviser in times of difficulty and doubt. But she is unknown to the world and fame. Men do not know that the strength and nobility of character which they have been accustomed to admire in her son, has a foundation in her life and heart. Let us take courage, therefore, and labour on in the dark a little while longer. We cannot pass by these pillars without stopping a minute or two to admire their strength and various beauty.
III. In these pillars we see grace, strength, and utility combined. To be a pillar in the Temple of God is the highest honour to which we can reach. Do we covet their position, their fame, or their worth? Then we must drink of the cup they have drank of, and be baptized with the baptism they were baptized with. That the Church has had such pillars, and will continue to have them, is her strength and hope. Ah! more ornamental than useful, we exclaim, as we are called to look at some stones covered with filigree work, or highly finished carving. A judgment somewhat hasty and thoughtless, replies the architect. See, this stone you have despised because of its ornament is fashioned for a keystone, and its utility will be enhanced by its beauty. This other, with all its marvellous delicacy of carving, has a sound core, and is fashioned for the capital of one of these pillars. It will add grace to the pillar, and will sustain part of its load. Hasty and thoughtless judgments are, alas! too frequent among professing Christians. By some zealous workers the men and women of culture are despised as being necessarily more ornamental than useful. They are not seen to be enthusiastic in the service of the Master, and forthwith, without a moments calm thought, they are spoken of rather as hindrances than helps in the cause of righteousness. Have we been tempted to think so of anyone? Let us see to it that we have not been doing great injustice to a keystone or a capital in Gods Temple-living stones, perchance, not only more beautiful than we, but vastly more useful also. Some of the most zealous and humble Christian workers are to be found among the men and women of culture today. And not only is it so, but they do a work that the less cultured cannot do. Like the carved capital or keystone, they can catch the eye of the careless or sceptical men of culture and compel them, by the force of their intrinsic worth, to investigate the claims of religion. How beautiful is the polish on this stone! How it reveals the beauty of the granite! How it flashes back the sunlight! Such is our exclamation over a stone which our guide regards with a look of mingled tenderness and delight. Very beautiful, he replies, but at what cost! and then he explains to us the hard pressure, the constant friction, and the other processes to which it had been subjected before it took on this lustrous beauty. Just so. We have a friend in whose Christian life there is a sparkle, a heavenly beauty, as exceptional as it is delightful. Would we know the secret? Then let us look into his past life. Sorrow came to his heart suddenly, overwhelmingly. Made perfect through suffering! How difficult the lesson! Instinctively we shrink from pain. Truly, pain is a mystery. Hold, hold! cries the stone to the polisher when the cold water and rough sand are thrown upon it, and the heavy polishing plane passes over it for the first time. Hold, hold! Why this rough treatment? What wrong have I done? Have I not already suffered at the hands of workmen? Peace, foolish stone, cries the polisher. Dost thou not know that there are yet roughnesses in thy nature to be rubbed down, and wilt thou grudge the pain? Dost thou not know that I will bring to light thy hidden beauty by this process? Thou wilt become a mirror to catch the faintest smile of heaven if thou wilt but suffer it to be so now.
IV. What mean these quantities of small stones lying here and there? Is it possible that they can be used in the great building? To which question our instructor replies, The temple could not be built without them. There is not only a place for them, but there are places which nothing but they can fill. Unseen by the eye, these small stones supplement the deficiencies of the larger ones, and there would be many an interstice through which the wind and rain would penetrate were it not for these insignificant-looking stones. Little children living stones in Gods temple! Sweet thought! What parent does not clutch at it with unspeakable joy? The fact may well fire the zeal and intensify the love of every parent and teacher of the young in pouring out their souls labouring for their weal. We would do well to ponder-
1. In the first place, it is quite possible for the living stones to be deceived with regard to their position and importance.
2. In the second place, a true view of our own hearts, as well as of the importance of Christian service, will lead us to cast ourselves at the Masters feet, saying, Choose my place for me. (W. Skinner.)
The Church the temple of God
I. It is organised after a divine plan.
1. This is the leading plan in the worlds history.
2. This plan, though unknown by men, is being worked out by them.
II. It is compacted together into a necessary unity. Supreme love for a common Father, unbounded confidence in a common Christ, life consecration to a common cause, are the indissoluble bonds of union. This union is-
1. Independent of local distances.
2. Independent of external circumstances.
3. Independent of ecclesiastical systems.
4. Independent of mental idiosyncrasies.
III. It is the special residence of the eternal spirit. There is more of God to be seen in the true Church than anywhere else under heaven. In nature you see His handicraft, in saints you see His soul. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
Living stones
The only idea which I think can be legitimately connected with purity of matter, is this of vital and energetic connection among its particles; and the idea of foulness is essentially connected with dissolution and death. Thus the purity of the rock contrasted with the foulness of dust or mould is expressed by the epithet living, very singularly given the rock in almost all languages; singularly I say, because life is almost the last attribute one would ascribe to stone but for this visible energy and connection of its particles; and so of water as opposed to stagnancy. (J. Ruskin.)
Cohesion in Gods spiritual house
The apostle assumes, as a matter of course, that if one is in Christ, one is also in His Church. Detached stones are mere rubble. There is contact, cohesion, mutual attachment and support in these living stones of Gods spiritual house. Based on the living stone, the bedrock of the Church, they grow together into Gods glorious human temple. (G. G. Findlay.)
Mind the temple is not built without you
Travellers sometimes find in lonely quarries, long abandoned, or once worked by a vanished race, great blocks squared and dressed, that seem to have been meant for palace or shrine. But there they lie, neglected and forgotten, and the building for which they were hewn has been reared without them. Beware, lest Gods grand temple should be built up without you, and you be left to desolation and decay. (A. Maclaren.)
Living stones
Tyndall, speaking of the frozen crystals in snowflakes, says: Surely such an exhibition of power, such an apparent demonstration of a resident intelligence in what we are accustomed to call brute matter, would appear perfectly miraculous. If the Houses of Parliament were built up of forces resident in their own bricks, it would be nothing intrinsically more wonderful. (Hours of Exercise on the Alps.)
An holy priesthood.–
The priesthood of the laity
Christians are a royal priesthood; they are united together in the Church to be a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ: the joy of priesthood should be the tasted joy of every member of the Church of Christ. True it is that in its fullest sense there is but one priest-Jesus, the anointed of the Father. No other priest can be, since He ever lives and ministers in His priesthood. But He ministers as priest under two conditions-in heaven in His glorified human body: on earth in His mystical body-the Church. When He was on the earth in the days of His flesh, He ministered to men through His natural body. In it He interceded for them with God, and instituted and offered the holy Eucharistic sacrifice. By it He spake to them Gods words, and did among them Gods works. But when His body was taken up into heaven, it could not be the instrument of His priesthood on earth. So He created His mystical body-the Church. Thus the Church, as the mystical body of Christ, is the extension of His natural body, and so is the fulness of Christ, As, then before His ascension, Christ ministered on earth in His natural body, since His ascension He ministers on earth in His mystical body. Hence His Church is a sacerdotal society. It is a kingdom of priests, because its members are the ministers of Christs priest hood. Its priesthood is not one existing side by side with, nor is it supplemental to, the one priesthood of Christ. It is not the delegated representative of an absent Lord fulfilling priestly ministries on His behalf; it is the organism of a present Lord. It is the organism whereby Christ intercedes with God for men in prayer and Eucharist on earth, and by which He teaches men Gods faith, and ministers to them Gods grace. This sacerdotal vocation and character is not the exclusive possession of any one section of the mystical body of Christ-it is common to all Christian men. Each member of the mystical body of the Great High Priest is himself a priest unto God. But he is a priest called on to minister in the unity and in the order of that mystical body. Each member in it is placed in his position in its structure to fulfil the ministry proper to him as the organ of the whole body. The priestly character is common to all, but all are not called to the same measure of priestly ministries or gifts. The priesthood of the laity is recognised by the Church in confirmation. Christians are born to priesthood in the sacrament of regeneration as sons of the second Aaron, just as Aarons sons were born to the priesthood of Israel. But as in Israel of old those thus born were at a given age solemnly consecrated and commissioned to execute the priests office; so in the Church of Christ the regenerate are consecrated, commissioned, and dowered, for the lay priesthood in the sacrament of confirmation. This priesthood of the laity has, as priesthood always has, a two-fold aspect-Godward and manward. The Church, as a sacerdotal society, has primarily to minister to God-to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The first duty of the lay priesthood is by cooperation with the consecrated ministers of the Church to offer to God continual worship in Christian sanctuaries. Closely allied with the ministry of worship is the ministry of intercession. He whose soul ascends to God and rests in God in adoration will share with God His love to men, and, sharing this love, he will breathe it out in intercession. Moreover, as Gods priest, the layman is called to minister to man for God in active service. He has his place in that great mediatorial system by which God wills to give to men the two great gifts of truth and grace. Each Christian Churchman is here in a position of grave responsibility. All wealth is a trust held by each for all. And, in addition to this, as the priest of God, the layman is called on to do what he can to bring his fellow men into the knowledge of the truth as he knows it, and with those gracious conditions of life in which he is privileged to live. He must be an evangelist-the bearer to others of the good tidings in the joy of which he is privileged to live. Let me conclude with two cautions bearing on this question of lay priesthood.
1. Avoid individualism in its exercise. Priesthood is an official status; it exists in the body of Christ, and can only be rightly exercised according to the will of God in the unity of that body. All its ministries must be performed decently and in order. God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, in all churches of the saints, and peace is, as St. Gregory of Nyssa teaches us, the harmony of ordered union.
2. The one motive of the layman in his priesthood must always be to reveal to men and to bring them to submit to the One Priest, the Lord Jesus Christ, as He ministers in and through His Church. No one can rise to the realisation of his lay priesthood except he be one who, in the unity of the Church, tastes and sees the goodness of the Lord. (Canon Body.)
The Church the priesthood of God
I. The persons of whom this priesthood is composed. The apostle is here writing, not to Church officers, but to individual Christians scattered throughout the world. Why should they be represented as a priesthood?
1. On account of their entire devotedness to Divine service.
2. On account of their free access to the Divine presence (Eph 2:18; Heb 10:19-22).
II. The character by which this priesthood is distinguished. Holy. Moral holiness is resemblance to Christ-the spirit of supreme love to the Father and self-sacrificing love for man.
III. The service to which this priesthood is consecrated.
1. The sacrifices are spiritual.
2. Mediatory. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
The Christian priesthood
The priesthood of the law was holy, and its holiness was signified by many outward things, by anointings, and washings, and vestments; but in this spiritual priesthood of the gospel, holiness itself is instead of all these, as being the substance of all. The children of God are all anointed and purified, and clothed with holiness. There is here the service of this office, namely, to offer. All sacrifice is not taken away, but it is changed from the offering of those things formerly in use to spiritual sacrifices. Now these are every way preferable; they are easier to us, and yet more acceptable to God. How much more should we abound in spiritual sacrifice, who are eased of the other! But though the spiritual sacrificing is easier in its own nature, yet to the corrupt nature of man it is by far the harder. He would rather choose still all the toil and cost of the former way, if it were in his option. A holy course of life is called the sacrifice of righteousness (Psa 4:6; and Php 4:18; so also Heb 13:16), where the apostle shows what sacrifices succeed to those which, as he hath taught at large, are abolished. In a word, that sacrifice of ours which includes all these, and without which none of these can be rightly offered, is ourselves, our whole selves. Now that whereby we offer all spiritual sacrifices and even ourselves, is love. That is the holy fire that burns up all, sends up our prayers, and our hearts, and our whole selves a whole burnt offering to God-and, as the fire of the altar, it is originally from heaven, being kindled by Gods own love to us, and the graces of the Spirit received from Christ, but, above all with His own merits. The success of this service; acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The children of God delight in offering sacrifices to Him; but if they could not know that they were well taken at their hands, this would discourage them much; therefore this is added. He accepts themselves and their ways when offered in sincerity, though never so mean; though they sometimes have no more than a sigh or a groan, it is most properly a spiritual sacrifice. No one needs forbear sacrifice for poverty, for what God desires is the heart, and there is none so poor but hath a heart to give Him. But meanness is not all. There is a guiltiness on ourselves and on all we offer. Our prayers and services are polluted. But this hinders not, for our acceptance is not for ourselves, but for the sake of one who hath no guiltiness at all, acceptable by Jesus Christ. In Him our persons are clothed with righteousness. How ought our hearts to be knit to Him, by whom we are brought into favour with God and kept in favour with Him, in whom we obtain all the good we receive, and in whom all we offer is accepted! In Him are all our supplies of grace and our hopes of glory. (Abp. Leighton.)
The true priesthood, temple and sacrifice
I. First, all those who are coming to Christ, daily coming nearer and nearer to Him, are as living stones built up into a temple.
1. They are called a spiritual house in opposition to the old material house in which the emblem of the Divine presence shone forth in the midst of Israel, that temple in which the Jew delighted, counting it to be beautiful for situation and the joy of the whole earth. When we become holy, as we should be, we shall count all places and all hours to be the Lords, and we shall always dwell in His temple because God is everywhere.
2. We are a spiritual temple, but not the less real. The Lord has a people scattered abroad everywhere, whose lives are hid with Him in God, and these make up the real temple of God in which the Lord dwelleth. Men of every name and clime and age are quickened into life, made living stones, and then laid upon Christ, and these constitute the true temple, which God hath built and not man, for He dwelleth not in temples made with hands; that is to say, of mans building, but He dwelleth in a temple which He Himself hath builded for His habitation forever, saying, This is My rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have desired it.
3. This temple is spiritual, and therefore it is living. A material temple is dead, a spiritual temple must be alive; and so the text tells us, Ye also as living stones.
4. We are a spiritual house, and therefore spiritually built up. Peter says, Ye are built up-built up by spiritual means. The Spirit of God quarries out of the pit of nature the stones which are as yet dead, separating them from the mass to which they adhered; He gives them life, and then He fashions, squares, polishes them, and they, without sound of axe or hammer, are brought each one to its appointed place, and built up into Christ Jesus.
5. We are a spiritual house, and therefore the more fit for the indwelling of God who is a Spirit. It is in the Church that God reveals Himself. If you would know the Lords love and power and grace you must get among His people, hear their experiences, learn from them how God dealeth with them, and let them tell you, if ye have grace to understand them, the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, for He manifesteth Himself to them as He doth not to the world. Hath He not said, I will dwell in them and walk in them?
II. In addition to being a temple, Gods people are said to be a priesthood. Observe that they are spoken of together, and not merely as individuals: they make up one indivisible priesthood: each one is a priest, but all standing together they are a priesthood, by virtue of their being one with Christ.
1. This stands in opposition to the nominal and worldly priesthood.
2. This priesthood is most real, although it be not of the outward and visible order; for Gods priests become priests after a true and notable fashion.
3. We are priests in the aspect of priesthood towards God. You are to speak with God on mans behalf, and bring down, each of you, according to the measure of your faith, the blessing upon the sons of men among whom you dwell.
4. And you are priests towards men also, for the priest was selected from among men to exercise necessary offices for mans good. The priests lips should keep knowledge, and if ye be as ye should be, ye hold fast the faith once delivered to the saints.
5. This is to be your function and ministry always and in every place. You are a holy priesthood; not alone on the Lords day when ye come into this house, but at all times.
III. Consider the sacrifices which we offer-spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
1. We offer spiritual sacrifices as opposed to the literal.
2. This sacrificing takes various forms. I beseech you, brethren, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice. You are to present yourselves, spirit, soul, and body, as a sacrifice unto God. You are also to do good and to communicate, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. To Him also you are to offer the sacrifice of praise continually, the fruit of your lips giving glory to God. To the Lord also you must present the incense of holy prayer; but all these are comprehended, I think, in the expression, I delight to do Thy will, O God. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The doctrine of sacrifice
The theory of sacrifice seems to be intuitively inherent in all religions. The sacrifice of the life and death of Christ is the one essential foundation of every acceptable offering which can be made to God. God never requires what we cannot offer. He never asks a sin or trespass offering from us. You and I could not offer that. But He asks what we can give, a sweet-savour offering, as a testimony of our gratitude and love. Not a sin offering. As far as Christs work was propitiatory, it stands absolutely alone: He offered one sacrifice for sin. But though no sufferings, no work, no worship, no service of ours can propitiate, God still requires from us offerings of another character. These are called spiritual sacrifices, which we are ordained to offer. There is no more attractive form in which a devout life can appear than that of a constant oblation to God, of all that we are, have, or do. Let the thought of sacrifice be inwoven into the texture of your life. Study to turn, not your prayers alone, but your whole daily course and conversation, into an offering. Surely the thought that God will accept it if offered in union with the merit of His Son, is enough to give stimulus to the sacrifice; to open purse, and hand, and heart. You can please Him if you give, strive, work in His name. To please God. What a privilege to lie open to us day by day, and hour by hour! What a condescension in our heavenly Father, when we consider the strictness of His justice, the impurity of our hearts, and our manifold falls, to admit of our pleasing Him, or to leave any room for our touching His complacency. We may have this dignity if we offer all in Christ. We need not go far to seek the materials of an acceptable offering; they lie all around us; in our common work; in the little calls of providence; in the trivial crosses we are challenged to take up; nay, in the very recreation of our lives. If work be done (no matter how humble) in the full view of Gods assignment of our several tasks and spheres of labour, and under the consciousness of His presence, it is a sacrifice fit to be laid upon His altar. If we study the very perversity of our enemies with a loving hope that we may find something of God and Christ about them yet, which may be the nascent germ of better things; if we try to make the best of men, and not the worst, treating them as Christ treated them, we may thus redeem an hour from being wasted, and sanctify it by turning it into a sacrifice to God. If you should obey an impulse to divert some trifle meant for self and luxury to Christs poor and charity, here, again, is a sacrifice, sweet smelling before God, which will buy the better luxury of His smile and love. And if you regard time as, next to Christ and the Holy Spirit, the most precious gift of God; if you gather up its fragments and put them into Gods basket by using them for holy things and thoughts-this, too, grows into a tribute which God will accept. It is the altar which sanctifieth the gift. Apart from Christ and Christs sacrifice, no offering of ours is redolent of the sweet savour, For our best gifts are flecked and flawed by duplicity and evil. (A. Mursell.)
Christians are priests
Christians, you are priests. Be like Christ in this,
1. Wherever you go carry a savour of Christ. Let men take knowledge of you, that you have been with Jesus; let it be plain that you come from within the veil, let the smell of your garments be as a field which the Lord hath blessed.
2. Carry a sound of Christ wherever you go. Not a stop, Christians, without the sound of the gospel bell! Even in smallest things, be spreading the glad sound, Edwards says, wherever a godly person enters, he is a greater blessing than if the greatest monarch were entering. So be it with you. (R. M. McCheyne.)
To offer up spiritual sacrifices.–
The Christians sacrifices
1. The offering up of our bodies and souls, and all that is in us to serve God; having neither wit, will, memory, nor anything else, but for the Lords use. It is meet we should offer this sacrifice, for it is His by right of creation, redemption, and continual preservation.
2. The sacrifice of a contrite and broken heart.
3. Prayer and praise.
4. Alms, mercy to all in hunger, thirst, sickness, prison, especially to the household of faith. (John Rogers.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 4. To whom coming, as unto a living stone] This is a reference to Isa 28:16: Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation. Jesus Christ is, in both the prophet and apostle, represented as the foundation on which the Christian Church is built, and on which it must continue to rest: and the stone or foundation is called here living, to intimate that he is the source of life to all his followers, and that it is in union with him that they live, and answer the end of their regeneration; as the stones of a building are of no use but as they occupy their proper places in a building, and rest on the foundation.
Disallowed indeed of men] That is, rejected by the Jews. This is a plain reference to the prophecy, Ps 118:22: The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.
Chosen of God] To be the Saviour of the world, and the Founder of the Church, and the foundation on which it rests; As Christ is the choice of the Father, we need have no doubt of the efficacy and sufficiency of all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of a lost world. God can never be mistaken in his choice; therefore he that chooses Christ for his portion shall never be confounded.
Precious] . Honourable. Howsoever despised and rejected by men, Jesus, as the sacrifice for a lost world, is infinitely honourable in the sight of God; and those who are united by faith to him partake of the same honour, being members of that great and glorious body of which he is the head, and stones in that superb building of which he is the foundation.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
To whom; to which Christ.
Coming; by faith: q.d. In whom believing, Joh 6:35,44,45. The word is in the present tense, the apostle describing here not their first conversion to Christ, but their present state, that they, being in Christ, were daily coming to him in the continued exercise of their faith.
As unto a living; not, only having life in himself, but enlivening those that by faith adhere to him.
Stone; viz. a corner-stone, as 1Pe 2:6. Being about to set forth the church as a spiritual building, he first mentions Christ as the foundation, and corner-stone.
Disallowed indeed of men; rejected, not only by the unbelieving Jews and their rulers formerly, but still by the unbelieving world.
But chosen of God; either chosen to be the foundation of the building, and then it is the same as foreordained, 1Pe 1:20; or chosen is the same as choice, excellent.
And precious: a different expression of the same thing. Here seems to be an allusion to those stones which men count precious, and have in great esteem; and Christs being precious in the sight of God, is set in opposition to his being disallowed of men, to intimate, that their unbelief, and rejecting Christ, doth not make him less valuable in himself, when his Father so much honours him.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
4. comingdrawing near(same Greek as here, Heb10:22) by faith continually; present tense: not having come oncefor all at conversion.
stonePeter(that is, a stone, named so by Christ) desires that allsimilarly should be living stones BUILTON CHRIST, THE TRUEFOUNDATION-STONE; compare his speech in Ac4:11. An undesigned coincidence and mark of genuineness. TheSpirit foreseeing the Romanist perversion of Mt16:18 (compare Mt 16:16,”Son of the LIVINGGod,” which coincides with his language here, “the LIVINGstone”), presciently makes Peter himself to refuse it. He hereinconfirms Paul’s teaching. Omit the as unto of EnglishVersion. Christ is positively termed the “living stone”;living, as having life in Himself from the beginning, and asraised from the dead to live evermore (Re1:18) after His rejection by men, and so the source of life tous. Like no earthly rock, He lives and gives life. Compare 1Co10:4, and the type, Exo 17:6;Num 20:11.
disallowedrejected,reprobated; referred to also by Christ Himself: also by Paul; comparethe kindred prophecies, Isa 8:14;Luk 2:34.
chosen of Godliterally,”with (or ‘in the presence and judgment of‘) Godelect,” or, “chosen out” (1Pe2:6). Many are alienated from the Gospel, because it is noteverywhere in favor, but is on the contrary rejected by most men.Peter answers that, though rejected by men, Christ is peculiarly thestone of salvation honored by God, first so designated byJacob in his deathbed prophecy.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
To whom coming, as unto a living stone,…. Christ here, as often elsewhere, is compared to a “stone”; and Peter, by the use of this metaphor, shows that he is not the rock, but Christ is the rock on which the church is built, and he is the foundation stone on which every believer is laid; and it is chiefly with respect to the usefulness of a stone in building, that Christ is compared to one, who is the foundation and cornerstone, as well as for strength and duration; and he is called a “living” one, because he has life in himself, as God, as Mediator, and as man; and communicates life to others, as natural life to all creatures, and spiritual and eternal life to his people, whose great privilege it is to come to him: and by coming to him is meant believing in him; and it does not design the first act of faith on Christ, or a soul’s first coming to Christ, but an after and continued exercise of faith on him; and it supposes Christ to be come at, notwithstanding he is in heaven, and saints on earth, for their faith and hope can enter into, and reach him within the vail, and notwithstanding their many transgressions and backslidings; it supposes life in them, or they could not come; and a sense of their need of him, of his righteousness to justify them, of his blood for pardoning and cleansing, of his fulness to supply their want of food, rest, peace, comfort, and salvation in him; and a persuasion of his ability and willingness to relieve them: and they are encouraged to come to him under the above considerations, as a stone, a foundation stone; believing that he is laid as a foundation, and that he is the only foundation, and therefore they lay the whole stress of their salvation, and build all their hopes of happiness on him; and as a living stone, deriving grace, life, and strength from him; exercising faith on him for all the mercies, blessings, and comforts of a spiritual life, and looking to his mercy for eternal life.
Disallowed indeed of men; by the Jewish builders, high priests, Scribes, and Pharisees, and the body and bulk of that nation; who rejected him as the Messiah, and stone of Israel, refused him as a foundation stone, and left him out of the building; and laid another foundation, even their own works of righteousness, on which sandy foundation they built themselves, and directed others to do so likewise; and set him, at nought, as a living stone, would not come to him for life, but sought it in the law, the killing letter, and among their dead works; but though Christ was thus disallowed and disesteemed of by men, yet was he highly valued and esteemed by God:
but chosen of God, and precious; his human nature was “chosen” from among, and above all other individuals of mankind; to be united to the Son of God; as God-man and Mediator, he was chosen to that high office, to be the head of the church, and the Saviour of the body; to be the foundation in the spiritual building, and to be the author and giver of spiritual and eternal life to as many as were given him. Moreover, this phrase denotes the superior excellency of Christ to angels and men in the account of God; being the brightness of his glory, the express image of his person, the Son of his love, in whom he was always well pleased, and in whom he took infinite delight, considered both as his Son, and the surety of his people; and to whom he was
precious, and by him highly honoured, made higher than the kings of the earth, than the angels in heaven, than the heavens themselves, being set down at God’s right hand, and a name given him above every name in this world, or that to come; and who is precious to the saints too, more so than rubies, or any precious stones, or any thing or creature whatever; his person is precious, and so are his name, his blood, his righteousness, his truths, his ordinances, and his people.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
| The Living Stone; Cautions against Sensuality. | A. D. 66. |
4 To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, 5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. 6 Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded. 7 Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, 8 And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed. 9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light: 10 Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. 11 Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; 12 Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles: that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.
I. The apostle here gives us a description of Jesus Christ as a living stone; and though to a capricious wit, or an infidel, this description may seem rough and harsh, yet to the Jews, who placed much of their religion in their magnificent temple, and who understood the prophetical style, which calls the Messiah a stone (Isa 8:14; Isa 28:16), it would appear very elegant and proper.
1. In this metaphorical description of Jesus Christ, he is called a stone, to denote his invincible strength and everlasting duration, and to teach his servants that he is their protection and security, the foundation on which they are built, and a rock of offence to all their enemies. He is the living stone, having eternal life in himself, and being the prince of life to all his people. The reputation and respect he has with God and man are very different. He is disallowed of men, reprobated or rejected by his own countrymen the Jews, and by the generality of mankind; but chosen of God, separated and fore-ordained to be the foundation of the church (as ch. i. 20), and precious, a most honourable, choice, worthy person in himself, in the esteem of God, and in the judgment of all who believe on him. To this person so described we are obliged to come: To whom coming, not by a local motion, for that is impossible since his exaltation, but by faith, whereby we are united to him at first, and draw nigh to him afterwards. Learn, (1.) Jesus Christ is the very foundation-stone of all our hopes and happiness. He communicates the true knowledge of God (Matt. xi. 27); by him we have access to the Father (John xiv. 6), and through him are made partakers of all spiritual blessings, Eph. i. 3. (2.) Men in general disallow and reject Jesus Christ; they slight him, dislike him, oppose and refuse him, as scripture and experience declare, Isa. liii. 3. (3.) However Christ may be disallowed by an ungrateful world, yet he is chosen of God, and precious in his account. He is chosen and fixed upon to be the Lord of the universe, the head of the church, the Saviour of his people, and the Judge of the world. He is precious in the excellency of his nature, the dignity of his office, and the gloriousness of his services. (4.) Those who expect mercy from this gracious Redeemer must come to him, which is our act, though done by God’s grace–an act of the soul, not of the body–a real endeavour, not a fruitless wish.
2. Having described Christ as the foundation, the apostle goes on to speak of the superstructure, the materials built upon him: You also, as living stones, are built up, v. 6. The apostle is recommending the Christian church and constitution to these dispersed Jews. It was natural for them to object that the Christian church had no such glorious temple, nor such a numerous priesthood; but its dispensation was mean, the services and sacrifices of it having nothing of the pomp and grandeur which the Jewish dispensation had. To this the apostle answers that the Christian church is a much nobler fabric than the Jewish temple; it is a living temple, consisting not of dead materials, but of living parts. Christ, the foundation, is a living stone. Christians are lively stones, and these make a spiritual house, and they are a holy priesthood; and, though they have no bloody sacrifices of beasts to offer, yet they have much better and more acceptable, and they have an altar too on which to present their offerings; for they offer spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Learn, (1.) All sincere Christians have in them a principle of spiritual life communicated to them from Christ their head: therefore, as he is called a living stone, so they are called lively, or living stones; not dead in trespasses and sins, but alive to God by regeneration and the working of the divine Spirit. (2.) The church of God is a spiritual house. The foundation is Christ, Eph. ii. 22. It is a house for its strength, beauty, variety of parts, and usefulness of the whole. It is spiritual foundation, Christ Jesus,–in the materials of it, spiritual persons,–in its furniture, the graces of the Spirit,–in its connection, being held together by the Spirit of God and by one common faith,–and in its use, which is spiritual work, to offer up spiritual sacrifices. This house is daily built up, every part of it improving, and the whole supplied in every age by the addition of new particular members. (3.) All good Christians are a holy priesthood. The apostle speaks here of the generality of Christians, and tells them they are a holy priesthood; they are all select persons, sacred to God, serviceable to others, well endowed with heavenly gifts and graces, and well employed. (4.) This holy priesthood must and will offer up spiritual sacrifices to God. The spiritual sacrifices which Christians are to offer are their bodies, souls, affections, prayers, praises, alms, and other duties. (5.) The most spiritual sacrifices of the best men are not acceptable to God, but through Jesus Christ; he is the only great high priest, through whom we and our services can be accepted; therefore bring all your oblations to him, and by him present them to God.
II. He confirms what he had asserted of Christ being a living stone, c., from Isa. xxviii. 16. Observe the manner of the apostle’s quoting scripture, not by book, chapter, and verse for these distinctions were not then made, so no more was said than a reference to Moses, David, or the prophets, except once a particular psalm was named, Acts xiii. 33. In their quotations they kept rather to the sense than the words of scripture, as appears from what is recited from the prophet in this place. He does not quote the scripture, neither the Hebrew nor LXX., word for word, yet makes a just and true quotation. The true sense of scripture may be justly and fully expressed in other than in scripture–words. It is contained. The verb is active, but our translators render it passively, to avoid the difficulty of finding a nominative case for it, which had puzzled so many interpreters before them. The matter of the quotation is this, Behold, I lay in Zion. Learn, 1. In the weighty matters of religion we must depend entirely upon scripture–proof; Christ and his apostles appealed to Moses, David, and the ancient prophets. The word of God is the only rule God hath given us. It is a perfect and sufficient rule. 2. The accounts that God hath given us in scripture concerning his Son Jesus Christ are what require our strictest attention. Behold, I lay, c. John calls for the like attention, John i. 29. These demands of attention to Christ show us the excellency of the matter, the importance of it, and our stupidity and dulness. 3. The constituting of Christ Jesus head of the church is an eminent work of God: I lay in Zion. The setting up of the pope for the head of the church is a human contrivance and an arrogant presumption Christ only is the foundation and head of the church of God. 4. Jesus Christ is the chief corner-stone that God hath laid in his spiritual building. The corner-stone stays inseparably with the building, supports it, unites it, and adorns it. So does Christ by his holy church, his spiritual house. 5. Jesus Christ is the corner-stone for the support and salvation of none but such as are his sincere people: none but Zion, and such as are of Zion; not for Babylon, not for his enemies. 6. True faith in Jesus Christ is the only way to prevent a man’s utter confusion. Three things put a man into great confusion, and faith prevents them all–disappointment, sin, and judgment. Faith has a remedy for each.
III. He deduces an important inference, v. 7. Jesus Christ is said to be the chief corner-stone. Hence the apostle infers with respect to good men, “To you therefore who believe he is precious, or he is an honour. Christ is the crown and honour of a Christian; you who believe will be so far from being ashamed of him that you will boast of him and glory in him for ever.” As to wicked men, the disobedient will go on to disallow and reject Jesus Christ; but God is resolved that he shall be, in despite of all opposition, the head of the corner. Learn, 1. Whatever is by just and necessary consequence deduced from scripture may be depended upon with as much certainty as if it were contained in express words of scripture. The apostle draws an inference from the prophet’s testimony. The prophet did not expressly say so, but yet he said that from which the consequence was unavoidable. Our Saviour bids them search the scriptures, because they testified of him; and yet no place in those scriptures to which he there refers them said that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. Yet those scriptures do say that he who should be born of a virgin, before the sceptre departed from Judah, during the second temple, and after Daniel’s seventy weeks, was the Messiah; but such was Jesus Christ: to collect this conclusion one must make use of reason, history, eye-sight, experience, and yet it is an infallible scripture–conclusion notwithstanding. 2. The business of a faithful minister is to apply general truths to the particular condition and state of his hearers. The apostle quotes a passage (v. 6) out of the prophet, and applies it severally to good and bad. This requires wisdom, courage, and fidelity; but it is very profitable to the hearers. 3. Jesus Christ is exceedingly precious to all the faithful. The majesty and grandeur of his person, the dignity of his office, his near relation, his wonderful works, his immense love–every thing engages the faithful to the highest esteem and respect for Jesus Christ. 4. Disobedient people have no true faith. By disobedient people understand those that are unpersuadable, incredulous, and impenitent. These may have some right notions, but no solid faith. 5. Those that ought to be builders of the church of Christ are often the worst enemies that Christ has in the world. In the Old Testament the false prophets did the most mischief; and in the New Testament the greatest opposition and cruelty that Christ met with were from the scribes, pharisees, chief priests, and those who pretended to build and take care of the church. Still the hierarchy of Rome is the worst enemy in the world to Jesus Christ and his interest. 6. God will carry on his own work, and support the interest of Jesus Christ in the world, notwithstanding the falseness of pretended friends and the opposition of his worst enemies.
IV. The apostle adds a further description, still preserving the metaphor of a stone, v. 8. The words are taken from Isa 8:13; Isa 8:14, Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself–and he shall be for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence, whence it is plain that Jesus Christ is the Lord of hosts, and consequently the most high God. Observe,
1. The builders, the chief-priests, refused him, and the people followed their leaders; and so Christ became to them a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, at which they stumbled and hurt themselves; and in return he fell upon them as a mighty stone or rock, and punished them with destruction. Matt. xii. 44, Whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder. Learn, (1.) All those that are disobedient take offense at the word of God: They stumble at the word, being disobedient. They are offended with Christ himself, with his doctrine and the purity of his precepts; but the Jewish doctors more especially stumbled at the meanness of his appearance and the proposal of trusting only to him for their justification before God. They could not be brought to seek justification by faith, but as it were by the works of the law; for they stumbled at that stumbling-stone, Rom. ix. 32. (2.) The same blessed Jesus who is the author of salvation to some is to others the occasion of their sin and destruction. He is set for the rising and fall of many in Israel. He is not the author of their sin, but only the occasion of it; their own disobedience makes them stumble at him and reject him, which he punishes, as a judge, with destruction. Those who reject him as a Saviour will split upon him as a Rock. (3.) God himself hath appointed everlasting destruction to all those who stumble at the word, being disobedient. All those who go on resolutely in their infidelity and contempt of the gospel are appointed to eternal destruction; and God from eternity knows who they are. (4.) To see the Jews generally rejecting Christ, and multitudes in all ages slighting him, ought not to discourage us in our love and duty to him; for this had been foretold by the prophets long ago, and is a confirmation of our faith both in the scriptures and in the Messiah.
2. Those who received him were highly privileged, v. 9. The Jews were exceedingly tender of their ancient privileges, of being the only people of God, taken into a special covenant with him, and separated from the rest of the world. “Now,” say they, “if we submit to the gospel–constitution, we shall lose all this, and stand upon the same level with the Gentiles.”
(1.) To this objection the apostle answers, that if they did not submit they were ruined (1Pe 2:7; 1Pe 2:8), but that if they did submit they should lose no real advantage, but continue still what they desired to be, a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, c. Learn, [1.] All true Christians are a chosen generation they all make one family, a sort and species of people distinct from the common world, of another spirit, principle, and practice, which they could never be if they were not chosen in Christ to be such, and sanctified by his Spirit. [2.] All the true servants of Christ are a royal priesthood. They are royal in their relation to God and Christ, in their power with God, and over themselves and all their spiritual enemies; they are princely in the improvements and the excellency of their own spirits, and in their hopes and expectations; they are a royal priesthood, separated from sin and sinners, consecrated to God, and offering to God spiritual services and oblations, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. [3.] All Christians, wheresoever they be, compose one holy nation. They are one nation, collected under one head, agreeing in the same manners and customs, and governed by the same laws; and they are a holy nation, because consecrated and devoted to God, renewed and sanctified by his Holy Spirit. [4.] It is the honour of the servants of Christ that they are God’s peculiar people. They are the people of his acquisition, choice, care, and delight. These four dignities of all genuine Christians are not natural to them; for their first state is a state of horrid darkness, but they are effectually called out of darkness into a state of marvellous light, joy, pleasure, and prosperity, with this intent and view, that they should show forth, by words and actions, the virtues and praises of him who hath called them.
(2.) To make this people content, and thankful for the great mercies and dignities brought unto them by the gospel, the apostle advises them to compare their former and their present state. Time was when they were not a people, nor had they obtained mercy, but they were solemnly disclaimed and divorced (Jer 3:8; Hos 1:6; Hos 1:9); but now they are taken in again to be the people of God, and have obtained mercy. Learn, [1.] The best people ought frequently to look back upon what they were in time past. [2.] The people of God are the most valuable people in the world; all the rest are not a people, good for little. [3.] To be brought into the number of the people of God is a very great mercy, and it may be obtained.
V. He warns them to beware of fleshly lusts, v. 11. Even the best of men, the chosen generation, the people of God, need an exhortation to abstain from the worst sins, which the apostle here proceeds most earnestly and affectionately to warn them against. Knowing the difficulty, and yet the importance of the duty, he uses his utmost interest in them: Dearly beloved, I beseech you. The duty is to abstain from, and to suppress, the first inclination or rise of fleshly lusts. Many of them proceed from the corruption of nature, and in their exercise depend upon the body, gratifying some sensual appetite or inordinate inclination of the flesh. These Christians ought to avoid, considering, 1. The respect they have with God and good men: They are dearly beloved. 2. Their condition in the world: They are strangers and pilgrims, and should not impede their passage by giving into the wickedness and lusts of the country through which they pass. 3. The mischief and danger these sins do: “They war against the soul; and therefore your souls ought to war against them.” Learn, (1.) The grand mischief that sin does to man is this, it wars against the soul; it destroys the moral liberty of the soul; it weakens and debilitates the soul by impairing its faculties; it robs the soul of its comfort and peace; it debases and destroys the dignity of the soul, hinders its present prosperity, and plunges it into everlasting misery. (2.) Of all sorts of sin, none are more injurious to the soul than fleshly lusts. Carnal appetites, lewdness, and sensuality, are most odious to God, and destructive to man’s soul. It is a sore judgment to be given up to them.
VI. He exhorts them further to adorn their profession by an honest conversation. Their conversation in every turn, every instance, and every action of their lives, ought to be honest; that is, good, lovely, decent, amiable, and without blame: and that because they lived among the Gentiles, people of another religion, and who were inveterate enemies to them, who did already slander them and constantly spoke evil of them as of evil-doers. “A clean, just, good conversation may not only stop their mouths, but may possibly be a means to bring them to glorify God, and turn to you, when they shall see you excel all others in good works. They now call you evil-doers; vindicate yourselves by good works, this is the way to convince them. There is a day of visitation coming, wherein God may call them by his word and his grace to repentance; and then they will glorify God, and applaud you, for your excellent conversation, Luke i. 68. When the gospel shall come among them, and take effect, a good conversation will encourage them in their conversion, but an evil one will obstruct it.” Note, 1. A Christian profession should be attended with an honest conversation, Phil. iv. 8. 2. It is the common lot of the best Christians to be evil spoken of by wicked men. 3. Those that are under God’s gracious visitation immediately change their opinion of good people, glorifying God and commending those whom before they railed at as evil-doers.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Unto whom ( ). The Lord, carrying on the imagery and language of the Psalm.
Coming (). Present middle participle masculine plural of ( in the Psalm) agreeing with the subject of .
A living stone ( ). Accusative case in apposition with (whom, the Lord Christ). There is apparent an intentional contradiction between “living” and “stone.” Cf. “living hope” in 1:3 and “living word” in 1:23.
Rejected indeed of men ( ). Perfect passive participle of , old verb to repudiate after test (Lu 9:22), in the accusative case agreeing with .
But with God ( ). “By the side of God,” as he looks at it, in contrast with the rejection “by men” ( ).
Elect (). From Isa 28:6 as in (precious, for which see Lu 7:2) rather than (proved) expected after as meaning far more in God’s sight, “a pre-eminence of position with” (Hort).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Coming [] . Indicating a close [] and an habitual (present participle) approach and an intimate association.
A living stone [ ] . Omit as unto. So Rev. The words are in apposition with whom (Christ). Compare Peter’s use of the same word, stone, in Act 4:11, and Mt 21:42. It is not the word which Christ uses as a personal name for Peter [] ; so that it is not necessary to infer that Peter was thinking of his own new name.
Disallowed [] . Rev., rejected. See on the simple verb, ch. 1 7. The word indicates rejection after trial.
Of God [ ] . Of in the A. V. is equivalent to by; but para has a stronger sense, implying the absolute power of decisive choice which is with God. Render, as Rev., with God; i e., God being judge; and compare Mt 19:26; Rom 2:11.
Precious [] . At ch. 1 19 (precious blood) another word is used [] , denoting essential preciousness. The word here indicates the preciousness as recognized or held in honor.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “To whom coming” (Gk. proserchomai) approaching of one’s own volition, one’s own will, or accord — voluntarily moving forward, moving out in obedient service toward Christ as Lord and Master.
2) “As unto a living stone.” (Gk. lithon zonta) a stone of living kind or nature that stone is Jesus. 1Co 3:11; Act 4:11-12.
3) “Disallowed indeed of men,” or having been rejected, cast aside, thrown aside of men Psa 118:22 – The smitten stone (rock) was Christ. Exo 17:6; 1Co 10:4; Joh 1:11-12.
4) “But chosen of God and precious.” (Gk. de theon) on the other hand of God (Gk. eklekton) elected or chosen (Gk. entimon) precious or honored highly.
a) This Christ is the foundation of redemption.
b) He is the rock – stone from whom the Spirit and water of life flows. Joh 4:13-14; Joh 7:37-39.
c) He is the Foundation (solid support) on which the church is built, Eph 2:20.
d) He is to be recognized as the “Stone cut out of the mountain” (world government order) “without hands,” Virgin born – appearing in the Judean and Galilean area of the Gentiles, under Roman Rule, that is to smite the image of the Beast” the restored one world Gentile government at His return – in which state He shall crush (with judgment) all unbelievers and unholy religious and irreligious orders – as prophecied Dan 2:34; Dan 2:44-45; Mat 1:23; Mat 4:13-16.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
To whom coming, is not to be referred simply to God, but to him as he is revealed to us in the person of Christ. Now, it cannot be but that the grace of God must powerfully draw us to himself and inflame us with the love of him by whom we obtain a real perception of it. If Plato affirmed this of his Beautiful, of which a shadowy idea only he beheld afar off, much more true is this with regard to God.
Let it then be noticed, that Peter connects an access to God with the taste of his goodness. For as the human mind necessarily dreads and shuns God, as long as it regards him as rigid and severe; so, as soon as he makes known his paternal love to the faithful, it immediately follows that they disregard all things and even forget themselves and hasten to him. In short, he only makes progress in the Gospel, who in heart comes to God.
But he also shews for what end and to what purpose we ought to come to Christ, even that we may have him as our foundation. For since he is constituted a stone, he ought to be so to us, so that nothing should be appointed for him by the Father in vain or to no purpose. But he obviates an offense when he allows that Christ is rejected by men; for, as a great part of the world reject him, and even many abhor him, he might for this reason be despised by us; for we see that some of the ignorant are alienated from the Gospel, because it is not everywhere popular, nor does it conciliate favor to its professors. But Peter forbids us to esteem Christ the less, however despised he may be by the world, because he, notwithstanding, retains his own worth and honor before God.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
1Pe. 2:4.The figure is now changed, and the apostle deals with the Christian Church rather than the Christian individual. Two things were present to his mindthe material Jewish temple and the spiritual Jewish dispensation. He makes the one help to the understanding of the other. The Christian Church is like a new temple, built up from its very first foundation-stone. It is like a new dispensation, only instead of the new religious nation being represented by an order of priests, it is a kingdom of priests, represented only by one great High Priest. To whom coming.In order to make a beginning in building the spiritual house. Living stone.Not here natural rock, as distinguished from stone shaped by the mason; but spiritual foundation of a spiritual house. Chosen of God.The rejection of Christ by the Jews is a historical fact: the acceptance of Christ by God is the spiritual fact implied in our Lords resurrection. Precious.Or honourable. The assumed criminality of the crucifixion deceived neither God nor good men. No matter what Christ seemed to be, He was holy, harmless, undefiled.
1Pe. 2:5. Lively.Better, living, with the same idea as above. Men quickened with a spiritual life, therefore spiritual men; stones to match Christ, the living stone. (Perhaps the sentence should read, Build yourselves up.) Spiritual house.The Christian Church, thought of as the spiritual reproduction of the Jewish Temple. Holy priesthood.In old days the true spiritual temple was the nation of devout worshippers; it was represented by the tribe (twelfth part of itself), which was wholly devoted to the Temple ministry. The Christian Church is the new spiritual temple, every member being a priest, and all together offering up spiritual sacrifices. The blending of figures is sometimes puzzling; the priests who sacrificed in the true temple were themselves the stones of which that temple was built. R.V. has a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood. Spiritual sacrifices.No longer material sacrifices, but the spiritual thingsthankfulness, love, devotion, etc.which they represented. By Jesus Christ.Who offered the model spiritual sacrificewho offered Himself.
1Pe. 2:6. In the Scripture.Not precisely quoted from either Heb. or LXX. of Isa. 28:16. The apostle evidently wrote from memory. In Sion.The Temple was built on Moriah. Corner-stone.With possible allusion to the corner of the Temple area that was built right up from the valley. But one of the stones in the foundations of ancient buildings was usually spoken of as the foundation-stone. Elect.Better, selected. Precious.Counted honourable. Confounded.The idea given by the rendering in the LXX. Building on this foundation, we build securely; do not find our confidence misplaced.
1Pe. 2:7. Precious.Still the same idea, held in honour or in confidence. Such is your esteem that you have no hesitation in building on this foundation. Disobedient.Involving unbelief finding expression in active rebellion. Disallowed.Left in the quarry as unsuitable and unworthy. Head of the corner.Is put in the most honourable position.
1Pe. 2:8. Stone of stumbling, etc.See Isa. 8:14. Their stumbling implies the judicial punishment of their rejection of Messiah. They hurt themselves in stumbling over the corner-stone. Appointed.The Jewish mind always regarded what did happen as what God had arranged should happen. No doubt the reference here is to the prophecies which had so plainly anticipated the rejection as well as the acceptance of Messiah. Those who stumbled by disbelief were marked out by prophecy as men who would stumble. But prophecy refers to a class, not to individuals.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.1Pe. 2:4-8
The Spiritual House.The figures of this paragraph are precisely adapted to those who were familiar with the associations of Judaism, and more especially with the material tabernacle and the Temple, and the outward religious system associated with them. The material house of Judaism is contrasted with the spiritual house of Christianity. It is the contrast that is so fully elaborated in the epistle to the Hebrews. That was a material house, in which earthly men fulfilled prescribed temporal duties, and carried out a ritual and ceremonial system. This is a living, spiritual house, of living, spiritual men, who offer in it living, spiritual sacrifices. And yet St. Peter recognises that there was a spiritual within that old material. The spiritual had always been revealed to the spiritually-minded. The spiritual could now be more fully apprehended, and the old material building may now fade away, or be removed, as scaffolding is removed, when the Temple is complete. Or, using another figure, St. Peter says, the people of Israel were separated, consecrated people; the whole people were a holy priesthood, devoted to the service of God. This fact was represented, and so kept ever before their minds, by the separation of one tribe entirely to the priestly service. St. Peter sees that truth concerning Israel carried over into Christianity, and spiritually realised. The Church wants no delegation of any portion of itself for priesthood, because spiritually every member is a priest, and the entire Church makes up the holy priesthood. Fixing attention on the Spiritual House, notice three things:
I. Its foundation.It is a living manthat is, a spiritual man. Unto whom coming, a living stone. It is the spiritual, Divine man, the Lord Jesus Christ. Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, even Christ Jesus. The figure of the foundation stone is doubtless taken from that corner of the Temple-area which was built up from the valley with gigantic masonry. The figure of a foundation is somewhat difficult for us to apprehend, because our buildings do not in any sense rest upon a single stone. The right thought may come to us through the schools of philosophy, systems of theology, or other religions. We speak of Socrates as the founder or foundation of the Socratic School; of Calvin as the founder or foundation of the Calvinistic system of theology; of Mohammed as the founder or foundation of the Mohammedan religion. In each case we mean that on one mans thoughts, doings, teachings, rests the house of thought or truth which has been reared. Christianity is the house of truth and life reared upon the thoughts, doings, teachings, sufferings, of the Lord Jesus; and it is a spiritual house, because the spiritual is the range of Christ. What He thought, did, felt, taught, were the spiritual things on which the spiritual house was reared.
II. The stones of the building.Living menthat is, spiritual men. Living in the sense in which Christ is spoken of as living. Connect with the idea of being begotten again, born again, quickened with the new, the spiritual life. St. John is the apostle of this new life. He conceives of religion as consisting in the immediate personal relation of the soul, to God or to Christ. It begins with an impartation from God. To be born of God means to receive from Him a communication of spiritual life, whereby the soul is more and more transformed into Christ-likeness. The stones of the building must be of the same nature as the foundation. Of material stones build the old Temple, on a foundation of stone from the quarry. Of spiritual stonesmen alive unto Godbuild the spiritual temple, on a foundation of the spiritual stone, the man alive unto God, the spiritual man Christ Jesus. But another idea is suggested by the term lively or living. A living thing is a moving, acting thing, and the stones of the spiritual house are living men in their activity. It is a difficult association for us, but Eastern minds delight in involved and mixed metaphors. It may at least suggest to us that we give ourselves to Christ as living ones, living sacrificesthose who serve.
III. The service within the building.To offer up spiritual sacrifices. The building is a temple. And this is true whether we think of a single life or of the corporate Church. Within the temple of the individual life spiritual sacrifices have to be offered. Within the temple of the Church must be kept up the holy ministries. What the spiritual sacrifices are we may learn from the services of the older and material Temple. Find what was at the heart of the old ritual, and that, without the ritual, is the spiritual sacrifice of the new dispensation. Illustrate, from the inner significance of the primary form of sacrifice, the burnt-offering. That was the giving of a mans whole self to God, represented by the giving of an entire animal. That giving of the whole self to God is the spiritual sacrifice which we can now offer as quickened, living men. And spiritual sacrifices include acts of praise, thanksgiving, trust; include everything that can fitly find expression for the new and spiritual life. That is the one and essential condition of acceptance. The new life must be in everything we say or do in the living temple. Formalities are of no value now, save as they are instinct with Divine life. One law applies to the whole service of the spiritual temple,it must express the life of men who are born of God.
Note by Dean Plumptre on the words through Jesus Christ, 1Pe. 2:5.In the addition of these words, we have at once the sanction for the Churchs use of that form of words in connection with all her acts of prayer and praise, and the implied truth that it is only through their communion with Christ as the great High Priest, and with His sacrifice, that His people are able to share His priesthood, and offer their own spiritual sacrifices.
SUGGESTIVE NOTES AND SERMON SKETCHES
1Pe. 2:5. The Spiritual Temple.This passage suggests that the Tabernacle and Temple were types and symbol of the true Church of God and even of the individual believer. Here the terms of communion with God are set forth in the altar of burnt offering, and the laver; one signifying expiation by blood, and the other the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Place, with its three articles of furniture, the golden candelabra, the table of shew-bread, and altar of incense, typifies the forms of communion, as Prof. Moore of Virginia beautifully phrases it. Here we are taught first the duty of a burning and shining testimony for God; secondly, of consecrated and constantly renewed offerings; thirdly, of unceasing prayer and heart-worship. The Holiest Place, with its cherubim, mercy seat, and shekinah, may represent heavenly and complete fellowship, in the immediate presence of the glory of God, where a redeemed and glorified humanity, reconciled to God and in perfect harmony with all created being, the Law of God perfectly enshrined in the heart, communes immediately and within the veil with Jehovah!Anon.
The Worshippers and the Temple the Same.It is obvious, then, how fit, how essential it was that there should be a temple of stone for the partial dispensation; the presence of God in Christ for the transition state, when it was yet partial, but preparing to be extended; and for this last dispensation, which was to embrace all the world, what temple would have been sufficient but a temple co-extensive and identical with the worshippers themselves? As in the true Atonement there was no victim worthy of the priest but He who combined both in His own person, so, in the true worship, there could have been no adequate temple, unless the worshippers and the temple had been the same.Bishop Hinds.
The Christian Temple, or Spiritual House.St. Paul, in his epistle to the Corinthians, speaks of the Christian Church under the symbol of a temple, but he uses the wordnowhere else, and St. Peter never uses it at all. There can be no doubt, however, that when he wrote these words the idea was in his mind, and that he thought of the Temple of Jerusalem, in contrast with which he calls believers a spiritual houseof which the Lord Jesus is the foundation, or the corner-stone.
I. The foundation of this Temple,
1. It is Christ Himself. St. Peter was a stone laid upon the foundation-stone, as also were each of the apostles. They were the first layer of the Temple, next to the foundation; but the foundation itself is Christ and none other. He is called the living stone; He has life, and gives life, spiritual and eternal, to all who trust in Him. A stone is hard, cold, and rigid, but this Stone lives and imparts life to every other stone of which the Church is built.
2. Its excellence is set forth by a contrastrejected, indeed, of men, but chosen of God and honoured. St. Peter had said, before the Sanhedrin, This is the Stone set at nought by you builders (Act. 4:11). Christ is still rejected of men. The sceptic rejects Him. The rationalist rejects Him. The worldling rejects Him. God honours Him. Believers count Him precious, honourable.
3. The results of its being laid. Unto you, therefore, which believe in the honour of belonging to the Stone, and of being united to the building of which it is the foundation. Such is the import of 1Pe. 2:7.
II. Look, at the superstructure.Ye also as living () stones are built up a spiritual house.
1. The materials are living stones. Such are Christian believers. Drawn out of natures quarry, they are cut and polished by the Spirit of the living God, and are then prepared for the place they are to occupy in the temple of the Lord of hosts. Of such materials must Gods house be built.
2. Composed of such materials, this temple is called a spiritual house. God has had three temples on earththe temple of stone, the temple of Christs body, and the living temple of the Church. The first was destroyed and swept away; the second was removed, and is now in heaven, the third remains; and will continue to grow until the top-stone be brought forth with shoutingsGrace unto it! In the temple of stone the shekinah dwelt; in the temple of Christs body dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead; in the temple of the Church the Spirit dwells, filling all its courts with the light and glory of the Lord.
3. In this spiritual house there is a holy priesthood. Every living stone in this temple is also a consecrated priest, and has access by faith into the holiest of all by the blood of the everlasting covenant.
4. A temple implies sacrifices, and they are offered here. The sacrifices of God always were, and still are, spiritual sacrificesthe sacrifice of a broken and contrite heart; the sacrifice of earnest prayer and faith; the sacrifice of a holy and devoted life.Thornley Smith.
1Pe. 2:7. The Preciousness.The alteration made in the R.V., which reads, For you therefore which believe is the preciousness, is less serious than at first sight it appears to be. It in no way changes the sentiment, it only alters the form in which it is expressed. It keeps in the line of the figure which the apostle is usinga characteristic figure for him who had himself been called a stone; the rock-man, on whose witness for Christ the Church was to be founded. St. Peter had spoken of coming to the Lord, the Lord Christ, as unto a living stone, that could be the foundation-stone on which to raise the temple of a holy life. He was not writing of the first coming of the soul to Christ, with the burden of sinthe coming for forgiveness and renewalbut of the coming of the believer when he proposes to make the endeavour to build a godly life. As Christ is the foundation of our hope, so He is the foundation of our life of character. Build a character upon nothing, and it sways with every wind, and is overthrown with the first storm. Build a character upon the self of resolve and human wisdom, and it is as the house upon the sand, which keeps fair enough under the summer rains, but is undermined and imperilled when the winter floods surge around it. Build a character upon the rock of Christ; let the foundation be His Divine claim and His model humanity, as held in the grasp of our faith; and then let life bring round what storms and floods of trial and temptation that it may, the house of character which we build may be weathered and worn, but it will not fall; it cannot be shaken. It is founded upon a rock: that rock is the Rock of Ages. That is the living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious. It is contained in Scripture, Behold I lay in Zion a chief corner-stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on Him shall not be put to shame. The Temple of Solomon is evidently present to the mind of the apostle, and suggests his figure. That Temple was built upon the living rock of Mount Moriah; but the summit of the mount was not sufficiently large or level to permit the full size and proper shape of the Temple court. On the one side the ground dipped suddenly, and to complete the form of the required area, a corner-piece had to be raised, in heavy masonry, right up from the valley to the Temple level. It was a stupendous work for the age in which it was accomplished. It came to absorb attention rather than the rock of the hill itself. It was the national pride. It seemed as if the Temple was really built on that corner; as if that were its real foundation-stone. Every believer has a temple to raisethe temple of a Christly character, the temple of a holy life. There is the natural rock of disposition and heredity on which every man builds his house of character; but the believer wants something more than this. He needs a completion of its incompleteness and insufficiency by the laying of a chief corner-stone. That alone can make the foundation area satisfactory: that alone can be trusted to bear the full weight of the building; and that alone can give noble character to the building. And that chief corner-stone of the temple of a godly life God has provided for every man. It is Jesus the Lord, elect, precious: the tried stone, the precious corner-stone. But St. Peter points out that, though the corner-stone foundation is actually provided, and available for all, it must be individually accepted and individually used. And so it becomes the test of every professor. Where there is no actual, practical faith, giving tone to the daily endeavour to live the godly life, that corner-stone is neglected; it may even be a stone of stumbling and rock of offence. But where there is practical, living faith, there the stone is valued, held honourable; the grace of its provision is recognised, its uses are understood, and the life of holiness is so raised upon it that every part of the life feels the strength and support of that foundation. It is the interest which the man of faith has in the chief corner-stone, on which he wants to build every part of his spiritual house, which St. Peter suggests to us in this passage. And it does not matter whether we keep to the figure of the stonean impersonal thingand say, Unto you therefore which believe is the preciousness; or, seeing who it is that is meant by the stonethe personal, living Lord Jesus, our Saviour and Sanctifiersay, Unto you that believe, He is precious. As we may, however, gain a little freshness in the form and setting of very familiar truth thereby, we will take advantage of the impersonal figure preserved for us by the R.V., and let our text mean
I. By the believer the preciousness is discerned.It will not be possible to deal wisely with this or the other points to be brought before us unless we first understand clearly who is meant by the believer. It cannot be too often asserted that the epistles are not written to unconverted persons as persuasions to a saving belief. However unworthy of the Christian name those addressed in the epistles may be, the assumption is that they do all bear the Christian name; they have all accepted Christ as their Saviour and Lord; they are all believers. The distinction is not sufficiently recognised between the act of faith and the life of faith. The act of faith is the beginning of a life of faith, and it has no effective value unless it is followed up by such a daily faith. The apostle expresses the belief in which we are just now interested when he says, The life that I live in the flesh is a life of faith on the Son of God. The act of faith ought to establish an attitude of faith, and that attitude should be a permanent attitude. It is by that daily and permanent attitude of our souls that the preciousness of Christ is discerned. To use the figure of the photographer, we may say that the act of faith renders the whole plate of the soul sensitive to particular things, sensitive to spiritual things; and they make their due impressions according as, day by day, their sensitiveness is maintained. There is a school of thought which exaggerates the importance of the act of faith. Salvation is regarded as the Divine response to that act; and a daily renewal of the act is required only as keeping up the daily right to the salvation. But our salvation is a much larger thing than the setting us in a new relation with God; it includes getting that relation rightly toned. And what we need to see so much more clearly, and to feel so much more adequately, is that our daily believing is a power of discernment, and a power of receptivity, and a secret of growth and sanctifying. Constantly, therefore, must believers be urged to believe. It may even be pressed upon us that the maintenance of the attitude of trust is the condition of all joy, and of all growth in the Divine life. It is not of chief importance to ask, Have you believed unto the salvation of your soul? It is most important, and it is most searching, to ask, Are you believing unto the sanctification of your whole life and relationships? To that life of faith the mystery of Christ is revealed: by that permanent daily mood of belief, of living trustfulness, the preciousness of Christ is discerned. In the Song of Solomon the lover is taunted with the words, What is thy be loved more than another beloved? He is all the more to her by what her love discerns in him; and Christ is all the more to us by what our faithour trust, which is simply our faith with love in itcan discern in Him. Here is the figure of Christ presented in the gospels; here is the estimate of Christ formed by His apostles; here are the accumulated sentiments concerning Christ of saintly souls through all the ages. And yet, do most men, with all this help, discern the preciousness of Christ? They admire Him, it may be; they write about Him, it may be; they wrangle over Him, it may be; but they cannot discern His sweet secret. That comes only to the man of faith; that is the discovery of the trustful soul. It is hid from the wise and prudent, who think they know; it is revealed unto babes, who can only trust. Is it not a simple fact that these who are living lives of faith do see in Christ more, and more precious things, than any one else can see? It is no wonder at all that men should accuse us of extravagance when we speak of our Divine Lord. They cannot see in Him what we see, and they never will while they keep in their present conditions. To us He is the chiefest among ten thousand, the altogether lovely. The older prophet shows the difference that a true discernment can make in Messiah and in His mission. We did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. This daily faith is the quickening of new powers, and that will partly explain our keener and fuller discernment. There are spiritual powers. They lie dormant until faith quickens them. The man who believes in Jesus finds himself possessed of unexpected powers; and what is so remarkable about the new powers is that they are ever enabling him to discern more and more of the preciousness of Jesus. And the daily life of faith is ever training and culturing those new powers to a higher efficiency. Keep up the daily soul trust, and the spiritual eyes will be ever gaining quicker, keener vision; the spiritual ears will be ever gaining subtler sensitiveness to every sound of the Divine voice; and the spiritual hands will be ever gaining firmness to grasp the duties which are set before us by the Divine will. And what is it that the cultured powers will discern in Christ? What of His preciousness does stand out clear to those who live the life of faith? The answer can but be a series of hints. They see Jesus Himself, but Jesus in all His varying moods, graciously adapted to all their moods. Always in direct and helpful relations to them. Just the Jesus they need when the sunshine is all about them, and seems to have got into their souls. Just the Jesus they need when the clouds hang low over them, earth toil seems hard, and heaven far to go. Yes, that is the preciousness of Jesus which the man of faith discerns. His real and abiding presence, involving His relativity to all our changing need: Jesus, vestured as no worldly eye ever beheld Him, practically helpful in every endeavour of our godly life. There is a certain Eastern character in the figure of the text that makes it sound somewhat strange to us, but we can catch the idea it suggests. Let the stones, quick with a living faith, be put on the living stone, the corner foundation-stone, and there surely will be the thrill of life into life. The Living Stone will, as it were, bind and keep all the stones, and there will be the Life ever present in every stone, keeping in place all the spiritual house. Unto you that believe there is that preciousness of discernment. You can see how much He is to you who is your Living Stone, your sure foundation. But keep near to heart and thought, that the power of discernment must always depend on the believing, on the life of faith. Here, as in so many things, the law holds good, According to your faith it shall be unto you.
II. By the believer the preciousness is enjoyed.We only derive pleasure from things that answer to us, things with which we have affinity. And so the things that give pleasure to men are manifold, and vary from the trifling to the sublime. A diamond is no more precious to a child than any prettily coloured stone, or shining bit of stone. Only when trained to appreciate it can the precious stone be enjoyed. As we are cultured, as mental faculties, and moral sentiments, and religious interests, are developed, directed, and enlarged, we find our pleasure in ever higher, and nobler, and purer things. The merely material ceases to satisfy us, the moral and the spiritual prove able to provide ever-increasing enjoyment. We begin with pleasure in things, we advance to pleasure in truth, and in character; we attain our apprehension of the very highest pleasure when we find our joy in God. Christ is no personal interest, no source of ever-satisfying pleasure, to the great mass of men. When they see Him there is no beauty that they should desire Him. Why is this? He is what He is, but what He is is nothing to them. It is that they do not believe; the souls power of trust has never been awakened; the great gratitude of the sinful soul to its all-sufficient Saviour has not awakened the eyes to discern the transcendent loveliness of that Saviour. Only those who are living the life of faith can ever enjoy His preciousness. Everything depends on the mood of the mind. And it is singular to notice how the joy of the soul in Christ goes up and down with the varying moods of its faith. Cannot we make this a test of our spiritual state?Unto you that believe He is precious. Do not ask, Are you full of admirations of Christ? Can you recognise His Divine fitness as the Saviour of the world? Be more searching than that. Ask yourself, Am I personally enjoying Christ? Does He fully satisfy me? In the love of Him do I find my souls rest? Is the dearest spot on earth to me that where I meet with Him? When I think of the beautiful does He seem to me more beautiful still? When I yearn for happiness do I find myself running right in to the shadow of His all-comforting love? Is He, indeed and in truth, my joy and my crown? Can I walk earths highway with a song in my soulHis song, I have loved thee with an everlasting love? And do I turn from all the glory and bliss of heavenly scenes to fix all eye and heart on Him that sitteth on the throne, the Lamb as it had been slain? Then surely by us the preciousness of Jesus is enjoyed; and it must be that, in some measure at least, we are living that life of faith. Is there any test of Christian standing bettermore searching and more satisfyingthan this? What think ye of Christ? Nay, rather, What is Christ to you? How do you feel towards Him? For unto you that believe is the preciousness. Our cherished sentiments concerning Christ keep pace with the daily faith that brings Him ever into the field of our soul-vision and our touch.
III. By the believer the preciousness is responded to.It is not that he only sees it; it is not that he only enjoys it; it is that he meets it, he answers to it. It becomes the holiest of forces moving him, the sweetest of constraints upon him. It presses him to all loving obediences, to all loyal services, to the constant endeavour to attain the likeness of the beloved one, and to a life of virtues and sweet charities as the only life well-pleasing to Him. The Christian life has its sentiments, and nourishes them; but the sentiments are impulses and inspirations; they are active powers; they give tone to conduct; they help the holy living. Let faith glorify Christ, and keep Him ever near, the object of unceasing admirations, the source of undying satisfactions, and then the soul will surely have its perpetual prayer, Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? And the life will be one prolonged endeavour to do what the loved one would have done. We know in our every-day relations what a sweet and powerful constraint the enjoyment of our loved ones is. Who among us is not a better man or woman day by day because the preciousness of our loved ones is so fully discerned and enjoyed. Life for us is the sweet response we make to those whom we fully trust, whom we deeply love, whose fellowship we so much enjoy. And yet in the earthly spheres we are only learning Divine things. Away even from the earthly spheres and relations we soar into the regions of the spiritual. There, with the power of our faithour trust, which is faith with love in itwe discern the preciousness of Jesus, our tried cornerstone, our sure foundation. There we feel the sweet fascination of Jesus, and enjoy the fellowship and all-embracing love, and find it heaven begun to sit at His dear feet. There we feel ourselves caught and held in His restraints, bound by love-cords to His service, and perfectly willing, gladly willing, to be just what He would have us be, go just where He would have us go, and do just what He would have us do.
1Pe. 2:7. Our Honour in Christ.Unto you therefore, the believers, belongs the honour. So said in reference to His being called a stone elect, honoured, taken in conjunction with shall not be ashamed. Both the Hebrew and the Greek word rendered precious may, with equal propriety, be translated honoured, and this contrasts better with the shame just spoken of. Thus Dr. Lightfoot takes it. The argument is this: God has selected Jesus for special honour, and has promised that all who trust in Him, instead of scorning Him like the Jewish rulers, shall have no cause to blush. Now, you do trust in Him, therefore to you belongs the promise, and the honour bestowed by God on Him reflects on you. You, like Him, are made parts of the Divine imperishable architecture.Ellicotts Commentary.
Christ a Precious Saviour.
I. To whom is He precious? To them that believe.
II. Why is He precious to believers?
1. Because recognised as the medium of all earthly blessings; and
2. As the source of all spiritual blessings.
III. When is He thus precious?
1. In certain frames of mind, as when the soul hungers after righteousness.
2. In certain duties, as in secret prayer, worship, etc.
3. In certain seasons, as times of danger, bereavement, sickness, trial.J. M. Sherwood.
Christ All in All.Christ is all in all to His people. He is all their strength, wisdom, and righteousness. They are but the clouds irradiated by the sun, and bathed in its brightness. He is the light which flames in their grey-mist and turns it to a glory. They are but the belt and cranks and wheels: He is the power. They are but the channel, muddy and dry; He is the flashing life which fills it and makes it a joy. They are the body, He is the soul, dwelling in every part to save it from corruption, and give movement and warmth.
Thou art the organ, whose full breath is thunder;
I am the keys beneath Thy fingers pressed.
A. Maclaren, D.D.
The Christ of Experience.This is one of the undertones of Scripture, heard in all the pauses of its history or its argument. It is a recognition of the practical religious value of the Christ, of what He is to those who have put Him to experimental tests. Such recognitions make the New Testament the religious book of mens practical life. Peter was a man far less profound and intentional than John, more realistic, more under the power of externalism and of mere ethics. He moves upon a lower plane of spiritual conception and Christian life. And yet how the fervency of his heart of religious love breaks forth! Here he is, setting forth the great value of Christianity as a source of strength and comfort and hope in the trials of human life. A stricter rendering of the text would be, Unto you who believe is the honour. So far from making you ashamed, trust in Him will be your highest honour; for through your trust in Him you will attain to all that constitutes the salvation of a man, the noblest life here, and everlasting glory hereafter. What is the estimate of Christ which they form who have tried Him? who have submitted their minds to His ideas, their hearts to His claims, their lives to His control? He is precious. The fundamental idea is value. In the commercial sense of the term, a precious thing is a priceful thing, a thing which fetches a price. Three things constitute value:
1. Rarity.
2. Beauty;
3. Serviceableness. All the qualities that constitute preciousness are in Christ, in a degree of excellence that imagination cannot overcolour, that even love cannot exaggerate. In respect of serviceableness, of personal beneficial relations to men, as their Redeemer from sin, His preciousness transcends all our words or thoughts. This is the form of the apostles thought. He speaks of the experimental value of the ChristHis preciousness to those who have practically come to Him as the living foundation stone; through whose vitalising properties they have been quickened into living stones of the spiritual Christian temple.
1. We might apply a comparative test, and put the preciousness of Christ into comparison with all other possessions of our human life. Or we might subject Him to a comparison with other good men.
2. Our estimates are largely influenced by the judgments of others. Think, then, of the estimates put upon Christs character and work by other moral beings. It is significant of His excellence that He attracts the most readily, and attaches the most profoundly, the holiest and noblest natures? Christ is never rejected because His moral teaching is false, His moral character defective, His moral inspirations corrupting.
3. The conclusive appeal is, however, to the conscious experience of our own religious souls. In personal experience we find our chief grounds for a high estimate of Christ.
I. Christ is precious when we grope and stumble at the mystery of God.
II. Christ is precious when the sense of sin is quickened within us.When we awaken to the grave culpability of its guilt, when we realise its essential antagonism to the Divine holiness.
III. Christ is precious in our struggle with practical evils.As we fight with lusts, resist temptation, overcome worldliness, subdue selfishness, or mourn over failures and falls.
IV. Christ is precious to us in times of great sorrow.
V. Christ is precious in our own mortal conflict.It is not a question of notions or beliefs about Christ, but of living experience of Him, practical appropriation of the grace that He brings, practical quickening by the life that He is.H. Alton, D.D.
The Verse a Quotation.The words of this passage are quoted directly from the LXX., and properly represent the Hebrew. Almost all the best modern critics consider the psalm from which this verse is cited to be a late psalm, written subsequent to the return from Babylon, in which case it is most probable that the composer was directly thinking of the prophecy of Isaiah above quoted. The Messianic interpretation of the psalm would be no novelty to the Hebrews who received this epistle (see Mat. 21:9), though probably they had not perceived it in its fulness.A. J. M.
A Christian Test.One of the testing passages, which help us to gain assurance of our Christian standing. Uncertainty about our personal religious condition may be neither right nor necessary, but it is felt by all Christians at times. Two other tests may be suggested.
1. Tenderness of conscience about sin.
2. Manifest difference in the things we now love and choose. In the text we have.
I. A description of the Christian.You that believe. That fits precisely into apostolic preaching. In Acts we find St. Peter calling upon men to believe in Christ as Messiah, proved to be by His resurrection. Belief is more than, other than, knowledge, and indicates the Spirits power. Christians are they who in the teaching of the Spirit have come to believe, with a soul-reliance on Christ.
II. A test of the Christian.He is precious. The word is honour, preciousness.
1. Christ is honoured. Occupies the highest place of respect; the Divine place of worship. He who can speak lightly of Christ is no Christian.
2. Christ is valued. Precious, in the sense of costly. Involving a right estimate
(1) of Christs person;
(2) of Christs work.
3. Christ is loved. Those are precious to us whom we love. We love to think of His salvation, to realise His presence, and to do His will. In this way the testing of our spiritual condition is put in its most gentle, persuasive, and attractive forms.
1Pe. 2:8. Appointed unto Stumbling.When St. Peter says that these unhappy Jews were appointed to stumble, he primarily means that the clear prophecies of the Old Testament which he has quoted marked them for such a destiny. It was no unforeseen, accidental consequence of the gospel. It had never been expected that all who heard the gospel would accept it. Those who stumbled by disbelief were marked out in prophecy as men who would stumble. Still, in fairness, we must not shirk the further question which undoubtedly comes in at this point. It cannot be denied, that, in a certain sense, it was God Himself who appointed them to stumble. There is no reference to condition after death. God does put men sometimes into positions, where, during this life, they almost inevitably reject the truth. These things remain unexplained, for the trial of faith.Ellicotls Commentary.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(4) To whom coming.The word used is that which gives rise to the name of a proselyte. (Comp. Note on 1Pe. 2:2.) It is also strangely used in something of the same sense in 1Ti. 6:3. Joining Him therefore as proselytes. Not that St. Peter has any notion of a mere external accession. The Apostolic writers do not contemplate the possibility of a difference between the visible and invisible Church. From this point the regeneration-idea, which coloured the whole of the preceding portion of the Epistle, suddenly disappears. The thought is no longer that of a spiritual seed instead of a carnal seed, but of a spiritual Temple instead of the stone temple at Jerusalem.
A living stone.The very structure and order of the sentence puts Jesus Christ first. Foundation first, building afterwards. It is a pity to insert as unto with our version; it takes off from the striking, attracting effect of the sudden metaphor. St. Peter is fond of explaining his metaphorse.g., inheritance . . . in heaven, tested genuineness . . . more precious than of gold, gird up . . . loins of your minds: so here, living stone. It is more than doubtful whether St. Peter, in what follows, had before his mind the giving of his own surname. The word which he here uses is neither petros, nor petra, but lithos; and indeed the whole idea of the relative position of the Church to the petra and to the lithos is quite different. Neither petros nor petra could possibly be used of the squared wrought stone, but represent the native rocky unhewn substratumpart, or wholewhich pre-exists before any building is begun, even before the chief corner-stone would be placed. (Comp. Mat. 7:24.) Here, therefore, the idea is quite different: the substratum is not thought of at all; and Jesus Christ is a carefully selected and hewn stone (lithos), specially laid as the first act in the work of building. The only thing, therefore, which is, in fact, common to the two passages is the simple thought of the Christian Church being like a building. Our present verse gives us no direct help towards finding how St. Peter understood the famous name-passage. All we can say for certain is that he did not so interpret it as to suppose an official connection with his own person to be the one essential of the true Church, or else in again using the metaphor of building the Church (though in a different connection) he could hardly have omitted all mention of himself. He is, apparently, thinking only of the Messianic interpretation of Old Testament sayings as expounded by our Lordthe unsophisticated milk of the word of 1Pe. 2:2.
Disallowed indeed of men.A direct reference to the passage (Psa. 118:22), which is quoted below in 1Pe. 2:7. It here says men, rather than builders, in order to contrast them more forcibly with God. The word disallowed, or rejected, implies a form of trial or probation which comes to an unsatisfactory conclusion. The human builders examine the stone, inspect all its qualifications, and find it unsuited to the edifice which they have in hand, and refuse it not only the place of honour, but any place at all, in their architecture. St. Peter wishes to bring out strongly the absolute opposition between God and the Jews.
But chosen of God, and precious.Literally, but with God elect, honoured. This is a direct allusion to the passage, Isa. 28:16, which is quoted in 1Pe. 2:6. While the human builders saw the qualities of the stone, and rejected it because of its not fitting in with their ideal, on the other hand, with God, i.e., in Gods counsel and plan, it was elect, i.e., choice had been laid upon it, it had been selected for Gods building purposes; and not only elect (for this might be equally said of all the living stones; see 1Pe. 1:2, where the word has precisely the same meaning), but also honoured, which is further explained to mean, singled out for the place of honour, i.e., for that of corner-stone. The designation of this stone as elect, brings out again what we have had in 1Pe. 1:11; 1Pe. 1:20, viz., the eternal predestination of Jesus to the Messiahship.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
4. The same lesson is now enforced by representing Christian growth under the figure of building.
Coming Daily and continually, by faith.
A living stone The reference is to Isa 8:14-15; Isa 28:16; Psa 118:22; combined by the apostle. Christ is not here compared to a living stone: he is himself the living stone, the foundation stone of the spiritual edifice, the church; nay, he is the corner stone, binding together its walls. See note on Eph 2:20. He is called living, having full life in himself, and being the fountain of all life to his followers.
Disallowed Rejected by the Sanhedrin, the official representatives of the nation and builders of the Church, and cast aside as a vile blasphemer; but chosen out of all possible stones by God, as in his sight the most perfectly fitted to be the foundation of the Church.
Precious Better, honoured, that is, with this high dignity.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘To whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious,’
For if they have truly tasted that the Lord is gracious they will come to Him as the One Who is the ‘living’ cornerstone described in the Scriptures, rejected by men, but chosen by God and precious, the One Who is the ‘living’ stone around which their lives are to be built, the One Whose words provide a solid foundation (Mat 7:24; Mat 16:18). They are to become one with His life and to share with Him in a holy union. The basic picture is taken from Isa 28:16 as cited in 1Pe 2:7, but Peter also emphasises the fact that the stone, when thought of in terms of Jesus, is vibrant with life and is life-giving. It is emphasising that he is not speaking of Jesus as an example that we can follow from the past, but as One Who is alive and with whom we are to be connected because we have received life from Him. The idea of a ‘stone’ is of a dressed stone of large proportions usable in building.
To Peter this picture was especially vivid. For he had heard this stone (the word indicates a dressed stone) spoken of on the lips of the Lord Himself (Mat 21:42), in the context of the wicked tenants who had slain the only Son (Mat 21:33-41), and he had even cited it himself in Act 4:11. And he had seen men reject Jesus throughout His ministry (Joh 6:66) and had watched in helplessness His final rejection at the hands of the Jewish leaders. He had known in experience what it meant for the stone which God had provided to be rejected, and it had made an indelible mark on his heart. But at the same time he had known in his heart that Jesus really was God’s true and living cornerstone, the One Who was chosen and precious to God, the One Who offered life (‘Lord to whom shall we go, for you have the words of eternal life’ – Joh 6:68). It had been a belief which had faltered for a time towards the end, but which had been finally re-established by His resurrection. And now he was full of it.
His description of Jesus as ‘a living stone’ brings out the vibrancy of life in his illustration, tying in with chapter 1 where being begotten to life through the resurrection and the living word has been paramount (1Pe 1:3; 1Pe 1:23). He wants his readers to recognise that above all what he is describing is Someone Who is alive and gives life. Peter no doubt carried in his heart Jesus’ words, ‘as the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son also to have life in Himself’ (Joh 5:26; compare 1Jn 5:12-13), and he could not think of Him in terms of a mere stone, even a chief cornerstone. Rather He saw Him as a living and life-giving stone. None were more aware that Jesus was alive, than those who had gone through the agonies of His death, and had then experienced the resurrection appearances. There may well also here be the implication of the indwelling of the Spirit of life and of Jesus’ heavenly nature, for he would remember how Jesus had connected the idea of ‘living water’ with life through the Spirit in Joh 4:10-14; Joh 7:37-39, and even more of how Jesus spoke of Himself as ‘the living bread Who had come down from Heaven’ (Joh 6:51). To him Jesus was the living One Who gave men and women life from Heaven. Compare the living hope in 1Pe 1:3.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Sanctification: Spiritual Service (Peter Draws a Picture of a Spiritual Church from the Analogy of the Old Testament Priesthood and Temple Service) Now, just as God called the children of Israel out of Egypt to be a holy nation unto Him, as Peter implies from quoting Lev 11:45, so does the Lord require the Church to be set apart and holy in its lifestyle. Thus, Peter calls the Church out to be a separate people in 1Pe 2:4-10. Just as Peter’s revelation and acceptance and confession of Jesus as the Son of God resulted in Jesus separating him and calling him by the name “Peter,” “a rock,” so does Peter then use this same analogy for his readers in 1Pe 2:4-8 by calling them “living stones.” We as “living stone” corporately makes up a spiritual temple, and we serve God in a holy priesthood. We find this analogy first alluded to by Jesus when He gave Simon his surnamed as Peter, meaning “rock” (Mat 16:18). Thus, we can see how important these Old Testament quotes must have meant to Peter when he read and understood them by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Mat 16:18, “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
Peter then uses a number of Old Testament phrases to describe the Church as a holy nation set apart to serve God (1Pe 2:9-10).
As we partake of His Word (1Pe 2:1-3), we come into a deeper understanding of how we are a chosen people of God with a purpose (1Pe 2:4-10). Thus, in 1Pe 2:4-10 Peter draws a picture of what a mature Church looks like when the believers corporately grow into spiritual maturity through the Word of God, which he exhorts in 1Pe 2:1-3. Spiritual maturity is inseparable from communal identification, being joined to the community of believers in a unified love for one another.
Peter will then give practical examples of our “spiritual sacrifices” in the lengthy passage of submission. We are to do good works as a testimony to the Gentiles (1Pe 2:11-12) by submitting to those in authority over us, believers to government (1Pe 2:13-17), slaves to their masters (1Pe 2:18-25), wives to husbands (1Pe 3:1-6), and husbands honoring wives (1Pe 3:7). This love walk will mean persecution and suffering (1Pe 3:8-17), but Christ serves as our example (1Pe 3:18-22).
Rejection by the Jews and the Grafting in of the Gentiles – We find in 1Pe 2:4-10 quotes from Isaiah, Psalms and Hosea prophesying of the Jews rejected their Messiah who was born of the stock of Israel while the Gentiles and some Jews received Him as the Son of God. 1Pe 2:4-8 discusses how Christ Jesus was the chief cornerstone laid in Zion and rejected by the Jews. Then in 1Pe 2:9-10 Peter refers to the grafting in of the Gentiles as a result of Jesus’ rejection by the Jews. Peter can quote from Isaiah and Hosea in the same passage because their themes are the same. The theme of Hosea supports the theme of Isaiah. While Isaiah emphasizes the redemptive work of Christ Jesus at His first Coming, Hosea includes the calling of the Gentiles as a result of this redemption.
1Pe 2:4 To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious,
1Pe 2:4
1Pe 2:6, ““ , .” ( UBS 3)
1Pe 2:5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
1Pe 2:5
1Pe 2:5 “are built up a spiritual house” Comments – This spiritual house is the Church. Paul uses the same analogy to describe the Church as a house. Note:
Eph 2:20-21, “And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord:”
1Ti 3:15, “But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.”
Heb 3:2-6, “Who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house. For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God. And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after; But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.”
1Pe 2:5 “an holy priesthood” Comments – Jesus Christ said that His house shall be called “a house of prayer for all nations.” This speaks of intercession for all peoples on earth.
Isa 56:7, “Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.”
Mar 11:17, “And he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.”
God’s people are a people of prayer and intercession. They are a people of spiritual warfare as discussed in Eph 6:10-20. Thus, they are a holy priesthood as stated in 1Pe 2:5.
1Pe 2:5 “to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” Comments These spiritual sacrifices are praise (Heb 13:15), good works and giving (Heb 13:16), and prayer.
Heb 13:15-16, “By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name. But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.”
These spiritual sacrifices are also when we offer our bodies in service to the Lord
Rom 12:1, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”
Kenneth Hagin explains that these “spiritual sacrifices” include the way that we offer ourselves during a worship service, by yielding to the Holy Spirit and allowing the gifts of the Spirit to be manifested through our bodies, such as the gifts of utterance or revelation, dancing in the Spirit, etc. [90]
[90] Kenneth Hagin, Plans Purposes and Pursuits (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c1988, 1993), 139.
Spiritual sacrifices also include the renewing of the mind. It takes effort and time to renew the carnal mind.
Rom 12:2, “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”
At this point in Peter’s discussion we begin to find very clear comparisons between Paul’s writings in his epistles and Peter’s phrases. Peter’s discussion of spiritual sacrifices and a building of God (1Pe 1:13 to 1Pe 2:11) can also be found in Paul’s epistles, such as Rom 12:1-3 and Rom 12:4-5 with 1Co 3:9. In fact, Peter uses several Greek words and phrases in his first epistle that can only be found here and in Rom 12:1-2. For example the Greek word (G4964) (to be conformed) is used only two times in the New Testament, being found in Rom 12:2 and 1Pe 1:14. The Greek word (G3050) (spiritual, reasonable) is also used only two times, being found in Rom 12:1 and 1Pe 2:2. The phrase “spiritual sacrifice” in 1Pe 2:5 can be compared to “living sacrifice” in Rom 12:1.
Thus, it is very likely that Peter was familiar with Paul’s epistle to the Romans and was borrowing his thoughts in Rom 12:1-2 and further expounding upon them in his epistle. In fact, Peter refers to his knowledge of Paul’s epistles in 2Pe 3:15-16.
2Pe 3:15-16, “And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; As also in all his epistles , speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.”
1Pe 2:5 Comments – These Jewish Christians understood this type of literal description for the nation of Israel. Here, Peter is applying it symbolically to the spiritual Israel, the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Peter will again use such Jewish language in 1Pe 2:9.
1Pe 2:6 Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.
1Pe 2:6
[91] Edward Mack, “Corner-stone,” in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, ed. James Orr (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., c1915, 1939), in The Sword Project, v. 1.5.11 [CD-ROM] (Temple, AZ: CrossWire Bible Society, 1990-2008).
1Pe 2:6 Comments God is the subject of the sentence. He lays the chief cornerstone in Zion. In other words, He is the one that will perform this work of redemption.
The city of Sion, or Zion, represents Jerusalem. The city of Jerusalem represents the nation of Israel. Thus, this phrase is telling us that God sent the Saviour of the World to be born among the people of Israel. He would be a Jew chosen and exalted by God and not by man. Remember when the Jews tried to make Jesus their king when He made His triumphant entry into Jerusalem? Jesus chose the Cross, which was the path that God had called Him to follow rather than being crowned by men as a King. Had not Satan not already tempted Jesus in this area of ruling over nations during His forty days of temptation in the wilderness? Jesus Christ the Messiah laid the foundation of the Church in the midst of the Jews with His twelve Jewish disciples. Thus, He is called the cornerstone of this foundation. His disciples, primarily Paul the apostle, laid the rest of this foundation by establishing the doctrine and order of the Church.
1Pe 2:6 Old Testament Quotes in the New Testament – This quote in 1Pe 2:6 comes from Isa 28:16.
Isa 28:16, “Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.”
Also, note similar verses in the New Testament:
Eph 2:20, “And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;”
Heb 3:4, “For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God.”
1Pe 2:7 Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner,
1Pe 2:7
Psa 118:22, “The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.”
Peter quoted this same verse in his sermon to the Sanhedrin.
Act 4:11, “This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner.”
1Pe 2:8 And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.
1Pe 2:8
Isa 8:14, “And he shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.”
1Pe 2:9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:
1Pe 2:9
Isa 43:20, “The beast of the field shall honour me, the dragons and the owls: because I give waters in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen .”
We also find the concept of God’s chosen in Deu 7:6; Deu 10:15.
Deu 7:6, “For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.”
Deu 10:15, “Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.”
“a royal priesthood” – Peter very likely took the phrase “a royal priesthood, an holy nation” from Exo 19:6 or Exo 23:22 ( LXX).
Exo 19:6, “And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation . These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.”
Exo 23:22, “If ye will indeed hear my voice, and if thou wilt do all the things I shall charge thee with, and keep my covenant, ye shall be to me a peculiar people above all nations, for the whole earth is mine; and ye shall be to me a royal priesthood, and a holy nation : these words shall ye speak to the children of Israel, If ye shall indeed hear my voice, and do all the things I shall tell thee, I will be an enemy to thine enemies, and an adversary to thine adversaries.” ( Brenton) ( LXX)
We also find the concept of priesthood in Isa 61:6.
Isa 61:6, “But ye shall be named the Priests of the LORD: men shall call you the Ministers of our God: ye shall eat the riches of the Gentiles, and in their glory shall ye boast yourselves.”
“a peculiar people” Peter very likely took the phrase “a peculiar people” from Exo 19:5; Exo 23:22 ( LXX), Deu 4:20; Deu 7:6; Deu 14:2 or Isa 43:21.
Exo 19:5, “Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine:’
Exo 23:22, “If ye will indeed hear my voice, and if thou wilt do all the things I shall charge thee with, and keep my covenant, ye shall be to me a peculiar people above all nations, for the whole earth is mine; and ye shall be to me a royal priesthood, and a holy nation: these words shall ye speak to the children of Israel, If ye shall indeed hear my voice, and do all the things I shall tell thee, I will be an enemy to thine enemies, and an adversary to thine adversaries.” ( Brenton) ( LXX)
Isa 43:21, “ This people have I formed for myself ; they shall shew forth my praise.”
Deu 4:20, “But the LORD hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be unto him a people of inheritance , as ye are this day.”
Deu 7:6, “For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.”
Deu 14:2, “For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.”
“that ye should shew forth the praises of him” This phrase in 1Pe 2:9 very likely was taken from Isa 43:21. We find a similar phrase in Isa 42:12.
Isa 43:21, “This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praise .”
Isa 42:12, “Let them give glory unto the LORD, and declare his praise in the islands.”
“who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light” We do not find this exact phrase in the Old Testament Scriptures. However, the concept of God’s people coming out of darkness into His light is mentioned in Isa 9:2
Isa 9:2, “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.”
1Pe 2:9 Comments – These Jewish Christians understood this type of literal description for the nation of Israel. In 1Pe 2:9 Peter is applying it symbolically to the spiritual Israel, the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Peter has just used such Jewish language in 1Pe 2:5.
1Pe 2:10 Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
1Pe 2:10
Hos 2:23, “And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Lively stones built up on Christ:
v. 4. To whom coming, as unto a living Stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious,
v. 5. ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
v. 6. Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief Corner-stone, elect, precious; and he that believeth on Him shall not be confounded.
v. 7. Unto you, therefore, which believe, he is precious; but unto them which be disobedient, the Stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the Head of the corner,
v. 8. and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense, even to them which stumble at the Word, being disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed. This entire paragraph refers to the Lord, of whom St. Peter had spoken in verse 3. Making use of a new figure or picture, the apostle writes: To whom coming, to that living Stone, rejected indeed of men, but chosen on the part of God, precious. The Christians have become partakers of the new spiritual birth, they are children of God. Mindful, therefore, of the sacred obligations and privileges which their new state lays upon them, they will come to the Lord, they will be joined to Him, they will range themselves on His side. They know that their Lord, Jesus, Christ, is the living Stone, Psa 118:22; Isa 28:16, the Source of all spiritual life, and that they can retain their own life only in proportion as they remain in fellowship with Him. This living Stone, Jesus the Messiah, was indeed rejected by the builders, by the leaders of the Jewish nation, by men in general, for most of them concur with the Jews in rejecting the Savior. But the judgment of God does not agree with that of the blinded world, for He has chosen this Stone as a most precious stone, as the Headstone of the corner, Isa 8:16. This fact, that Christ, although scorned and despised by the children of the world, is given such great honors in the sight of God, should encourage the Christians at all times to set aside the scornful attitude of the world and accept the judgment of the Lord instead.
With the reference to Christ as the living Stone agrees the description of the believers: And yourselves like living stones be built up as a spiritual house, unto a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices that are well-pleasing to God through Jesus Christ. In order to remain in fellowship with the Corner-stone, Christ, it is necessary that the believers partake of His nature, be filled with His life. It is then, and then only, that they can be built up as a spiritual house, their faith sinking deeply and ever more deeply into this unshakable foundation of His eternal love, their mutual faith uniting them in mutual love, connecting them in one vast organization. In this way the Christians are built up as a spiritual house, built up on Christ and in Christ, unto a holy priesthood. The apostle is here describing the holy Christian Church, the communion of saints, the sum total of all the believers in Christ, an edifice of living persons filled with the Spirit of God. Every member of this Church is incidentally a priest of God in the sacred edifice which is erected upon Christ. Whereas in the Old Testament there was a special hierarchy, composed of members of the house of Aaron, of the tribe of Levi, Heb 5:1, there is now, by virtue of the vicarious action of Christ, a general priesthood of believers. Every Christian has direct and free access to God, because the sin which formerly divided between us and God has been removed by Christ. Of this priestly dignity the believers should always be conscious; they should keep their relation toward God intact and ever draw more closely to the heavenly throne. At the same time, all these spiritual priests should be active in offering to the Lord such spiritual sacrifices as are well-pleasing to God. The entire life of a Christian, all his thoughts, desires, and deeds, are such sacrifices, because it is the Spirit of God that lives in them and teaches them to be duly grateful to the Lord for the gifts of His salvation, both in hymns of praise and in good works, Rom 12:1.
In Support of these statements the apostle does not quote an Old Testament passage outright, but makes it the basis of an explanation in which he uses also other texts: For it is contained in the Scripture, Behold, I lay in Zion a Stone, a Corner-stone, chosen, precious; and he that believes on Him shall not be brought to shame. See Isa 28:16. Note that the reference is to a book which is a definite, well-known entity, which went by the name “Scripture” and was generally conceded to be the Word of God. The gist, or tenor, of the passage in Isaiah is given. In Zion, in His Church of the New Testament, the Lord places or appoints a Corner-stone, one that is at the same time a Rock of Salvation. For not one person that puts his trust in Him will be found ashamed on the last day. The congregation of believers that is built up on this Stone shall not be overcome even by the portals of hell.
The apostle now makes his application of the prophetical passage: To you, then that believe He is preciousness; but as for the unbelievers, the Stone which the builders rejected, this has become the Corner-stone, and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, who stumble at the Word, being disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed. See Psa 118:22; Isa 8:14. In the case of all believers, in which number Peter pointedly and emphatically includes his readers, the living Stone, Jesus Christ, the Rock of Salvation, is preciousness; they partake of the wonderful value of this Stone, and should properly appreciate the honor which is thereby conferred upon them. Altogether different is the case with the unbelievers. To them that prophecy of the rejection of the Corner-stone applies, for they follow the Jews in their blind foolishness, in scorning the one way of salvation, through the redemption of Christ Jesus. And therefore they, who should have been built up with the saints, in their blind enmity stumble over this Stone, trip over this Rock, since they refuse to be obedient to the Word, to accept the truth of the Gospel. They stumble, they fall, they perish in the destruction which their stubborn refusal of salvation has brought upon themselves. They harden their own hearts against every effort of the Spirit to reveal the Savior to them. And thus the judgment is carried out in their case; their unbelief condemns them. They come under that terrible sentence of God according to which those that harden their hearts in spite of all calling of the Lord are finally appointed to that lot that the Word of Salvation becomes to them a savor of death unto death. It would hardly be possible to warn against the sin of unbelief in a more emphatic way.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
1Pe 2:4-5. To whom coming, as unto a Living Stone, &c. By coming unto Christ is meant the joining oneself to him as a part of this spiritual building, or embracing his religion with the heart unto righteousness. The reason why St. Peter compares Jesus Christ to a stone was, because he had, under the Spirit of God, his eye upon those passages of the Old Testament which he quotes in the following verses. Plants and animals are alive, as long as there is a proper communication of nourishment through their several vessels; so likewise rocks and stones are said to be alive, as long as they are not cut out of the quarry, but continue to partake of that nourishment which circulates from vein to vein; so long as they grow to it, and have the most close and firm union. Milton, however, has an image, which may further illustrate this of St. Peter’s:
“Anon out of the earth a fabric huge “Rose, like an exhalation; with the sound “Of dulcet symphonies, and voices sweet; “Built like a temple; where pilasters round “Were set, and Doric pillars overlaid “With golden architrave.” PAR. LOST, b. 1 : 50: 710, &c.
For though the stone here spoken of is supposed to be now in the building, or at the foundation of it, yet it is represented as still alive, and therefore, in much the same way with the image in Milton, St. Peter intended to signify, that from a living stone at the foundation, a temple grows, and that it all partakes of such common nourishment as circulates through the living rock. By such means it has the most intimate union, and is rendered one firm and compact building. See Eph 2:20; Eph 2:22. The image, Dan 2:34-35; Dan 2:45 is somewhat different; but so far it agrees with this, as that the stone cut out of the mountains without the hands of men, is there supposed to be still a living stone, and to grow up itself into a great mountain. Disallowed of men, means “rejected of the chief priests, scribes, and elders, the rulers of the Jews, who were looked upon as master-builders in Israel.” Instead of lively stones, 1Pe 2:5 we should certainly read living stones, as 1Pe 2:4 the word being the same. The Jews used to call themselves the temple of the Lord, because they worshipped at that temple. The Christian church is here called a spiritual house, not as deriving that title from their worshipping in the temple at Jerusalem, in which the Jews so much boasted: that was indeed called the house of God; but it was a lifeless building, compared with this spiritual house, of which Jesus Christ is the foundation, and Christians themselves the superstructure, 1Ti 3:15. Grotius has observed, that among the Hebrews the Levites used to be called the stones to the temple; but this appellation is here applied to all Christians. When all Christ’s disciples are represented as living stones, which ought to be united into one spiritual house or temple, it may put us in mind of that harmony and concord which is requisite to fit Christians into one well-united and complete society. Having, in the foregoing sentence, compared them to the house or temple of God, in the next sentencethe apostle rises somewhat higher, and compares them to the priests of the family of Aaron, who were appointed to minister in the temple. The Jews gloried in such a holy and magnificent building as the temple, and in their chief priests and other sacred persons of the tribe of Levi, who were appointed to perform the temple service; but Christians have among them what is superior to both. In Israel there was only a part of one tribe appointed to be priests, and it was unlawful for the rest of the tribe, or for any person of any other of the tribes, to exercise the priest’s office; nor could the priests offer sacrifices in any place but the temple: but under the Gospel, not the ministers of the gospel only, but all Christians, are represented as a holy priesthood, who are obliged to offer up the spiritual sacrifices of prayer and praise, and who may offer them as acceptably in one place as another. See 1Pe 2:9. The sanctity of this priesthood does not arise from their being anointed with oil, or any solemn instalment; neither does it consist in robes and vestments, or in their observation of rites and ceremonies; but in faith and love, in their holy and righteous lives, in their piety towards God, good-will to men, and wise government of themselves, particularly of their passions and appetites. This is the true sanctity wherewith all Christians should be clothed, as Aaron and his sons were with the holy garments, which were for glory and for beauty. Exo 28:2. Heb 13:15. The allusion to the temple led the apostle of course to speak of the priests; and from the priests it was an easy transition to the sacrifices which they offered in the temple; and so to the spiritual sacrifices of prayer, praise, and obedience, which are all acceptable to God by Jesus Christ, who is the great High-priest over the house of God, and whose intercession alone can recommend to the Father such imperfect services as ours. See Eph 5:2.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
1Pe 2:4-5 . The structure of this new exhortation is similar to that of the previous sentence, to which it belongs in thought, externally ( ) as internally, inasmuch as the imperative ( ) is preceded by a participle ( ), and an adjunct introduced by , defining the subject more nearly.
Starting from the apostle says: ] (elsewhere in the N. T. always construed with the dative) denotes the going spiritually to the Lord; the Christian does indeed already live in union with Christ, but this does not exclude the necessity of becoming united ever more completely with Him (thus also Hofmann). [114] Luther incorrectly: “to whom ye have come,” as if it were the part. praet.; Hornejus well puts it: non actum inchoatum, sed continuatum designat.
] in apposition to ; it is not necessary to supply (Wolf). What follows shows that the apostle had in his mind the stone mentioned in the prophecies, Psa 118:22 and Isa 28:16 (cf. Mat 21:42 ; Act 4:11 ; Rom 9:33 ). The want of the article points to the fact that the apostle was more concerned to lay stress on the attribute expressed in , than to draw attention to the fact that in these passages of the O. T. Christ is the promised . In using this term, Peter had already in view the subsequent . The church is the temple of God, the individual Christians are the stones from which it is built; but Christ is the foundation-stone on which it rests. In order that the church may become ever more completed as a temple, it is necessary that the Christians should unite themselves ever more closely with Christ. The apostle enlarges on this thought with reference to those predictions.
The explanatory adjective is added, as in 1Pe 2:2 , to the figurative ; and by it, on the one hand, the expression is marked as figurative, ne quis tropum nesciret (Bullinger); and, on the other, the nature peculiar to this stone is indicated. is to be taken here as in Joh 6:51 and similar passages. Flacius correctly: dicitur Christus lapis vivus, non tamen passive, quod in semet vitam habeat, sed etiam active, quia nos mortuos vivificat. [115]
] a nearer definition, according to Psa 118:22 . What is there said specially of the builders, is here applied generally to mankind, in order that a perfect antithesis may be obtained to the . The want of the article does not warrant a toning down of the interpretation to mean “by men,” i.e. by some or by many men (Hofmann). The thought is general and comprehensive; the article is wanting in order to emphasize the character of those by whom Christ is rejected, as compared with God (Schott). Believers are here regarded “as an exception” (Steiger).
, ] after Isa 28:16 ; Peter has, however, selected two attributes only; “that is to say, he passes over the characteristics of the stone itself, and its relation to the building, giving prominence only to its value in the sight of God” (Steiger). Both adjects. form the antithesis to .; is neither equal to eximius (Hemming) nor to (Steiger); but: “elect,” i.e. chosen as the object of love; cf. 1Ti 5:21 .
] not: a Deo (Vulg.), but: , coram Deo, Deo judice, “with God.” Worthy of note is the “antagonism between the human judgment and the divine” (Wiesinger), the former given effect to in the crucifixion, the latter in the glorification of Christ. 1Pe 2:5 . ] places the Christians side by side with Christ (Wiesinger inappropriately takes as also applying to the verb .). As He is a living stone, so are they also living stones, i.e. through Him. The explanation: cum lapidibus comparantur homines, qui, quoniam vivant, vivi lapides nominantur (Carpzov, Morus), is inadequate. Further, states the qualities which the readers already possessed, not those which they were to obtain only through the (Schott); that unto which they should be built is stated in what follows.
is, according to the structure of the sentence, not indicative (Hornejus, Bengel, Gerhard, etc.; more recently, Wiesinger, Weiss, Hofmann), but imperative (Beza, Aretius, Hottinger, Steiger, de Wette-Brckner, Luthardt, Schott, etc.). The objection, that the verses following are declarative, may be quite as well used for the imperative force of that which precedes them. [116] If 1Pe 2:4-5 serve as the basis of the foregoing exhortation, this turn of the thought would also be expressed. Several interpreters (as Luther and Steiger) incorrectly regard the verbal form as middle; it is passive: “be ye built up,” i.e. “ let yourself be built up ,” i.e. by Christ, as the foregoing shows. Corresponding with the reading super illum, i.e. Christum, is generally understood; an unnecessary supplement; the thought is: that (not: on which ) the Christians should let themselves be built up, to that, namely, which the following words state.
] In the Rec. without the two conceptions are co-ordinate, both stating the end of the : “ to the spiritual house, to the holy priesthood ;” but if the reading . . . . be adopted, then “ . . is the further result of the being built up to the spiritual house” (Brckner). Hofmann holds that . is in apposition to the subject contained in , and that . alone is directly dependent on ; the former view is, however, more expressive, inasmuch as it prominently shows that the Christians should be built up to a spiritual house, . contains the expression of the passive, . . , on the other hand, that of the active relation of the church to God (Wiesinger, Schott, Brckner). The dissimilarity of the two ideas seems to be opposed to the reading , since an cannot be transformed into a ; but this difficulty disappears if it be considered that the house here spoken of is built of living stones. It is clearly not the case that serves only to facilitate an otherwise abrupt transition to a new idea (de Wette, Wiesinger).
means, in the first instance, “house,” and not “temple;” nor does the attribute mark it as a temple. We must either hold by the conception “house” (Luthardt, Hofmann), [117] or assume that by the house Peter thought of the temple. The latter view deserves the preference on account of the close connection with what follows; comp. the passages 1Co 3:16-17 ; 2Co 6:16 ; 1Pe 4:17 .
is the house raised from “living stones,” in contradistinction to the temple built from dead ones, inasmuch as their life is rooted in the Spirit of God, and bears His nature on it. [118]
is here not the “ office of priest ” ( 2MMal 2:17 ), but the “ priesthood ” (comp. Gerhard: coetus s. collegium sacerdotum); comp. 1Pe 2:9 ; Exo 19:6 ; “not instead of , but including the essential idea of a community” (de Wette). It has unjustly been maintained that if the reading be adopted, must be understood of the priestly office. subjoined to does not mark a characteristic of the of the New as distinguishing it from that of the Old Testament, but one which belongs essentially to the (of course “as ordained by God,” Hofmann) as such. Here, too, there lies in the connection of thought a special emphasis on , inasmuch as without sanctification the priestly calling cannot be truly fulfilled.
] is closely conjoined both in form (see Winer, p. 298 f. [E.T. 399f.]) and purport with what precedes, pointing out as it does the function of the . This consists, as under the Old Covenant, in offering sacrifice. The word , which is never used by Paul, has not indeed in the classics, but in the LXX., in the Epistle to the Hebrews, and in the Epistle of James, the meaning “ to sacrifice ,” strictly speaking “to bring the offering to the altar.”
The which the N. T. priesthood, i.e. the Christian church in all its members, has to offer are called , because they have their origin in the , and bear on them its nature and essence. Calvin says in what they consist: inter hostias spirituales primum locum obtinet generalis nostri oblatio, neque enim offerre quicquam possumus Deo, donec illi nos ipsos in sacrificium obtulerimus, quod fit nostri abnegatione; sequuntur postea preces et gratiarum actiones, eleemosynae et omnia pietatis exercitia. Cf. with this Rom 12:1 ; Heb 13:15-16 .
] (Rom 15:16 ), equivalent to (Rom 12:1 ; Rom 14:18 ; Phi 4:18 , and other passages).
] belongs not to (Beda), but either to . . (Luther: per Christum fit, ut et mea opera a Deo aestimentur, quae alias non culmo digna haberet; Bengel, Steiger, Wiesinger, Hofmann, etc.), or to (Grotius, Aretius, de Wette, Weiss, etc.). [119] No doubt Heb 13:15 might be appealed to in support of the latter construction; but in favour of the former are (1) That the as a priestly function stands in such close connection with . , that it seems out of place to suppose a medium ( . . ) in addition; and (2) With . the idea is substantially completed, . being a mere adjunct, to which therefore . . also belongs.
[114] The single passage, Mal 2:16Mal 2:16 , by no means proves that has in itself a stronger force than . cum dat. (as against Hofmann). According to Schott, by . is meant: “not the individual Christian’s deepening experience of community of life with Christ, but only the conduct of the believer, by which, as a member of the church, he gives himself up to the Lord as present in His church, in fact to the church itself! ”
[115] De Wette (as opposed to Clericus and Steiger) is right in refusing to see here any reference to the conception of the saxum vivum as opposed to broken stones (Virg. Aen . i. 171; Ovid. Metam . xiv. 741). Inappropriate is Schott’s opinion: “that indicates that by the self-unfolding(!) of His divinely human life, Christ causes the church to grow up from Himself the foundation stone.” Hofmann would erroneously exclude the second of the above-mentioned ideas from the , although it is clearly indicated by the very fact that through connection with the stone Christians themselves become living stones.
[116] The structure of the clause is in favour of the imperative, inasmuch as it is thus brought into conformity with the imperative preceding. When Hofmann asserts that the sentence must necessarily be indicative in form, “because the words subjoined to must state that to which the goodness of Christ brings them,” he does so without reason, for the clause may also state that to which they should allow the goodness of Christ to lead them.
[117] Luthardt: “ is not equal to ; nor in the context is a temple alluded to, for the emphasis lies on . is chosen because of : be ye built as a spiritual house! To this is joined: to an holy priesthood.”
[118] Schott finds the antithesis therein , that in the O. T. temple “the indwelling of God was confined to the Holy of Holies, and visible to the eye” (?); whilst, on the contrary, in the Christian church there is “a real and direct indwelling of God.”
[119] Brckner and Schott think it is correct to connect . . not with only, but with the entire thought; but it is self-understood that in the first combination, not the mere , but the . . ., must be considered as effected by Christ.
REMARK.
In this description of the Christians’ calling, the apostle’s first object is not to state the difference between the church of the Old and that of the New Covenant, but to show distinctly that in the latter there is and should have been fulfilled what had aforetime indeed been promised to the former, but had appeared in her only in a typical and unsatisfactory way. The points of difference are distinctly set forth. Israel had an house of God the Christian church is called to be itself that house of God. That house was built of inanimate stones, this of living stones; it is a spiritual house. Israel was to be an holy priesthood, but it was so only in the particular priesthood introduced into the church; the Christian church is called to be a in this sense, that each individual in it is called upon to perform the office of priest . The sacrifices which the priests in Israel had to offer were beasts and the like; those of the Christians are, on the other hand, spiritual sacrifices, through Christ well-pleasing to God.
The idea of a universal priesthood, here expressed, is opposed not only to the catholic doctrine of a particular priesthood, but to all teaching with regard to the office of the administration of word and sacrament which in any way ascribes to its possessors an importance in the church, resting on divine mandate, and necessary for the communication of salvation ( i.e. priestly importance).
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
DISCOURSE: 2392
THE TEMPLE A TYPE
1Pe 2:4-5. To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious, ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
AS in the natural life, so in the spiritual, a state of maturity is attained by a slow and gradual progression; but every one should be aspiring after a further growth in grace, in order that he may reach the full measure of the stature of Christ. For this end the Apostle exhorts those who had tasted that the Lord is gracious, to covet the sincere milk of the word; and to come continually to Christ, in order to their more abundant edification in faith and love. His allusions to the material temple are worthy of our attentive consideration: he compares Christ to the foundation-stone, and believers to the other stones built upon it; thereby shewing, that the temple had a typical reference to them,
I.
In its foundation
Christ is here represented as the foundation-stone on which all are built
[When personally considered, Christ is represented as the temple itself, in which dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead [Note: Joh 2:19-21.]: but, as considered in relation to his people, he is the foundation-stone, that supports the whole edifice [Note: Isa 28:16. 1Co 3:11.]. The quality ascribed to this stone is indeed singular; but it is perfectly suited to him of whom it is spoken. Christ is called a living stone, not merely as being of distinguished excellence (as he is also the living bread, and living water) but as having life in himself, and being the author of life to all who depend upon him: a quickening energy proceeds from him, which pervades and animates every part of this spiritual fabric [Note: Joh 5:21; Joh 5:26.].]
In this situation He is precious to all who know him
[He has indeed in all ages been disallowed of men, who, blinded by Satan and their own lusts, neither saw any beauty in him for which he was to be desired, nor would come to him that they might have life. The very persons appointed to build the temple have been the first to reject him [Note: Act 4:11.]: they could not endure that so much honour should be put upon him; or that they should be constrained to acknowledge him as the one source of all their stability. But he was chosen of God from all eternity, as the only Being capable of supporting the weight of this vast edifice; and, so perfectly is he suited to his place, that he is precious to God, and precious to all who are built upon him. If all the angels in heaven were ordered to fill his place but for a moment, the whole building would fall to ruins: but in him there is a suitableness and sufficiency, that at once delights the heart of God [Note: Isa 42:1.], and inspires his people with implicit confidence.]
Nor is the foundation only of the temple typical; there is a typical reference also,
II.
In its superstructure
Believers are the stones of which the temple is composed
[Every man, in his natural state, is as the stones in a quarry, ignorant of the end to which he is destined, and incapable of doing any thing towards the accomplishment of it. But the great Master-builder, by the instrumentality of those who labour under his direction, selects some from the rest, and fashions them for the places which he intends them to occupy in this spiritual building. But, as the temple of Solomon was built without the noise of an axe or hammer, or any other tool [Note: 1Ki 6:7.], so are these brought in a silent manner [Note: Job 33:15-16. Act 16:14.], and fitly framed together for an habitation of God through the Spirit [Note: Eph 2:21-22.].]
By coming to Christ they are gradually built up upon him
[Believers, quickened by Christ, become lively, or living stones, like unto Christ himself: they live by him, yea, he himself is their life [Note: Col 3:4.]. Notwithstanding therefore they have of themselves no power, through his quickening Spirit they become voluntary agents; and though it is true that they are drawn to him by the Father [Note: Joh 6:44.], yet it is also true, that they come to him, willingly and with strong desire. And this is the way in which they are built up a spiritual house: by coming to him they are placed upon him; and by coming to him yet again and again, they derive more abundant life from him; they are more and more fitted for the place they occupy; they are more closely knit to all the other parts of this sacred building, and more firmly established on him as their one foundation. It is thus that the fabric itself is enlarged by the constant addition of fresh materials; and thus that every part of the building groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord.]
A similar view must yet further be taken of the temple,
III.
In its services
The same persons, who before were represented as the stones of the building, are now, by an easy transition, spoken of as the priests officiating in it.
Believers are an holy priesthood
[None could officiate in the material temple but those of the tribe of Levi: but, in the spiritual temple, all are priests, whether Jews or Gentiles, male or female: The chosen generation are also a royal priesthood [Note: 1Pe 2:9.]; who are not only entitled, but bound, to transact their own business with God. This honour also they attain by coming unto Christ: by him they are made kings and priests unto God; and through him they have boldness to enter into the holiest, and to present themselves before the majesty of heaven.]
Nor shall the sacrifices which they offer be presented in vain
[They come not indeed with the blood of bulls and of goats; but they bring the infinitely more precious blood of Christ. On account of his atonement, their prayers and praises, their alms and oblations, yea, all their works of righteousness come up with a sweet savour before God, and their persons as well as services find a favourable acceptance in his sight [Note: Heb 13:15-16.]. Nor though, through the infirmity of their flesh, their offerings be very imperfect, shall they therefore be despised: if only they be presented with an humble and willing mind, God, even under the law, and much more under the Gospel, has promised to accept them [Note: Lev 22:19-23. 2Co 8:12.].]
Let us learn from this subject,
1.
Our duty
[Whatever be our attainments in the divine life, we have one daily and hourly employment, to be coming to Christ: by these means we shall be advanced and established; but, if we neglect them, we shall fall and perish. Nor must the opinions of men be of any weight when opposed to this duty: whoever despise, we must choose him; whoever abhor, we must account him precious: if the whole universe should combine against him, we must be firm in our adherence to him. Nor must we rest in cold uninfluential professions of regard. We must devote ourselves to him, while we build upon him; and present ourselves, and all that we possess, as living sacrifices unto our God and Father.]
2.
Our privilege
[Being brought nigh to God by the blood of Christ, it is our privilege to maintain fellowship with him as our reconciled God. We should banish all doubts about the acceptance of our feeble endeavours; and come, like the high-priest himself, even to his mercy-seat, there to make known our wants, and obtain the blessings we stand in need of. Methinks our state on earth should resemble, in a measure, the state of those in heaven: we should possess the same humble confidence, the same holy joy: and our sacrifices, enflamed with heavenly fire, should ever be ascending from the altar of a grateful heart, that God may smell a sweet savour, and rejoice over us to do us good.
Thrice happy they who so walk before him! Let it be the ambition of us all to do so: then shall we indeed be temples of the Holy Ghost [Note: 1Co 6:19.]: we shall draw nigh to God, and God will draw nigh to us; we shall dwell in God, and God will dwell in us; and the communion, begun on earth, shall be carried on and perfected in glory.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
4 To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious,
Ver. 4. As unto a living stone ] Living and all quickening, as Act 7:38 . Lively, that is, lifegiving oracles. He that hath the Son hath life, 1Jn 5:12 .
Disallowed indeed of men ] For the cock on the dunghill knoweth not the price of this jewel.
And precious ] Far beyond that most orient and excellent stone Pantarbe, celebrated by Philostratus (in Vita Apol.); or that precious adamant of Charles Duke of Burgundy, sold for 20,000 ducats and set in the pope’s triple crown. (Alsted Chron.)
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
4, 5 .] Exhortation to come to Christ the chosen stone, and be built up into a spiritual temple unto God .
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
4 .] To whom (i. e. ) approaching (pres., representing the daily habit of the Christian life, not something to be done once for all. is elsewhere in the N. T. always with a dat. Its signification here is, the approach made by faith, when the Christian closely realizes the presence and seeks the communion of his Lord), a (or, “ the :” the omission of the art. seems to be very frequent in this Epistle, where yet a definite reference is undeniable) stone (“Petrus a petra Christo sic denominatus metaphora petr delectatur, ac suo exemplo docet omnes debere esse petros, h. e., vivos lapides supra Christum fide dificatos.” Gerhard, in Wies. The allusion is to Psa 118:22 and Isa 28:16 . Obs. that no must be supplied before , as is done in E. V. al.: Christ is the stone: we do not come to Him as we come to a stone) living ( points not only to the figure being realized in a higher department of being than its natural one, but also to the fact of the Lord being alive from the dead. It would be unnecessary, were not the idea broached by Steiger, to protest against any allusion being intended to “ saxum vivum ” (n. i. 171: Ov. Met. xiv. 714) as distinguished from broken stones), by men indeed rejected (in Ps. l. c. ), but in the sight of God (with God. “Deo judice, coram Deo”) chosen (not merely “eximius,” but selected, chosen out), had in honour (see below on 1Pe 2:6 ),
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
1Pe 2:4-10 . Passages of scripture proving that Christ is called stone are first utilised, then quoted, and finally expounded. The transition from milk to the stone may be explained by the prophecy the hills shall flow with milk (Joe 3:18 ), as the stone becomes a mountain according to Dan 3:21 f.; or by the legend to which St. Paul refers (1Co 10:4 ); compare also of Isa 43:20 , which is used in 1Pe 2:9 . This collection of texts can be traced back through Rom 9:32 f. to its origin in the saying of Mar 12:10 f.; Cyprian (Test. 1Pe 2:16 f.) gives a still richer form.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
1Pe 2:4 . . from Psa 34:6 , (Heb. and Targum, they looked unto Him ; Syriac, look ye. ). Cyprian uses Isa 2:2 f.; Psa 23:3 f. to prove that the stone becomes a mountain to which the Gentiles come and the just ascend. , a paradox which has no obvious precedent in O.T. Gen 49:24 speaks of the Shepherd the stone of Israel, but Onkelos and LXX substitute thy father for stone . The Targum of Isa 8:14 , however, has a striking stone , for which might be taken as meaning reviving or living stone , if connected with the foregoing instead of the following words. The LXX supports this connection and secures a good sense by inserting a negative; the Targum gives a bad sense throughout. , though by men rejected, yet in God’s sight elect precious . . comes from Psa 118:22 (see 1Pe 2:7 ); . . from Isa 28:6 (see 1Pe 2:6 ). is probably due to Rabbinic exegesis “read not builders but sons of men ”. St. Peter insists upon the contrast between God’s judgment and man’s in the sermon of Act 2 .
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
5
1 Peter
LIVING STONES ON THE LIVING FOUNDATION STONE
1Pe 2:4-5 .
I wonder whether Peter, when he wrote these words, was thinking about what Jesus Christ said to him long ago, up there at Csarea Philippi. He had heard from Christ’s lips, ‘Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build My Church.’ He had understood very little of what it meant then. He is an old man now, years of experience and sorrow and work have taught him the meaning of the words, and he understands them a great deal better than his so-called successors have done. For we may surely take the text as the Apostle’s own disclaimer of that which the Roman Catholic Church has founded on it, and has blazoned it, in gigantic letters round the dome of St. Peter’s, as meaning. It is surely legitimate to hear him saying in these words: ‘Make no mistake, it is Jesus Himself on whom the Church is built. The confession of Him which the Father in heaven revealed to me, not I, the poor sinner who confessed it–the Christ whom that confession set forth, He is the foundation stone, and all of you are called and honoured to ring out the same confession. Jesus is the one Foundation, and we all, apostles and humble believers, are but stones builded on Him.’ Peter’s relation to Jesus is fundamentally the same as that of every poor soul that ‘comes to’ Him.
Now, there are two or three thoughts that may very well be suggested from these words, and the first of them is this:–
I. Those that are in Christ have perpetually to make the effort to come nearer Christ.
Remember that the persons to whom the Apostle is speaking are no strangers to the Saviour. They have been professing Christians from of old. They have made very considerable progress in the Divine life; they are near Jesus Christ; and yet Peter says to them, ‘You can get nearer if you try,’ and it is your one task and one hope, the condition of all blessedness, peace, and joy in your religious life that you should perpetually be making the effort to come closer, and to keep closer, to the Lord, by whom you say that you live.
What is it to come to Him? The context explains the figurative expression, in the very next verse or two, by another and simpler word, which strips away the figure and gives us the plain fact–’in Whom believing.’ The act of the soul by which I, with all my weakness and sin, cast myself on Jesus Christ, and grapple Him to my heart, and bind myself with His strength and righteousness–that is what the Apostle means here. Or, to put it into other words, this ‘coming,’ which is here laid as the basis of everything, of all Christian prosperity and progress for the individual and for the community, is the movement towards Christ of the whole spiritual nature of a man–thoughts, loves, wishes, purposes, desires, hopes, will. And we come near to Him when day by day we realise His nearness to us, when our thoughts are often occupied with Him, bring His peace and Himself to bear as a motive upon our conduct, let our love reach out its tendrils towards, and grasp, and twine round Him, bow our wills to His commandment, and in everything obey Him. The distance between heaven and earth does part us, but the distance between a thoughtless mind, an unrenewed heart, a rebellious will, and Him, sets between Him and us a greater gulf, and we have to bridge that by continual honest efforts to keep our wayward thoughts true to Him and near Him, and to regulate our affections that they may not, like runaway stars, carry us far from the path, and to bow our stubborn and self-regulating wills beneath His supreme commandment, and so to make all things a means of coming nearer the Lord with whom is our true home.
Christian men, there are none of us so close to Him but that we may be nearer, and the secret of our daily Christian life is all wrapped up in that one word which is scarcely to be called a figure, ‘coming’ unto Him. That nearness is what we are to make daily efforts after, and that nearness is capable of indefinite increase. We know not how close to His heart we can lay our aching heads. We know not how near to His fulness we may bring our emptiness. We have never yet reached the point beyond which no closer union is possible. There has always been a film–and, alas! sometimes a gulf–between Him and us, His professing servants. Let us see to it that the conscious distance diminishes every day, and that we feel ourselves more and more constantly near the Lord and intertwined with Him.
II. Those who come near Christ will become like Christ.
‘To Whom coming, as unto a living stone, ye also as living stones.’ Note the verbal identity of the expressions with which Peter describes the Master and His servants. Christ is the Stone–that is Peter’s interpretation of ‘on this rock will I build My Church.’ There is a reference, too, no doubt, to the many Old Testament prophecies which are all gathered up in that saying of our Lord’s. Probably both Jesus and Peter had in mind Isaiah’s ‘stone of stumbling,’ which was also a ‘sure corner-stone, and a tried foundation.’ And words in the context which I have not taken for consideration, ‘disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious,’ plainly rest upon the 118th Psalm, which speaks of ‘the stone which the builders rejected’ becoming ‘the head of the corner.’
But, says Peter, He is not only the foundation Stone, the corner Stone, but a living Stone, and he does not only use that word to show us that he is indulging in a metaphor, and that we are to think of a person and not of a thing, but in the sense that Christ is eminently and emphatically the living One, the Source of life.
But, when he turns to the disciples, he speaks to them in exactly the same language. They, too, are ‘living stones,’ because they come to the ‘Stone’ that is ‘living.’ Take away the metaphor, and what does this identity of description come to? Just this, that if we draw near to Jesus Christ, life from Him will pass into our hearts and minds, which life will show itself in kindred fashion to what it wore in Jesus Christ, and will shape us into the likeness of Him from whom we draw our life, because to Him we have come. I may remind you that there is scarcely a single name by which the New Testament calls Jesus Christ which Jesus Christ does not share with us His younger brethren. By that Son we ‘receive the adoption of sons.’ Is He the Light of the world? We are lights of the world. And if you look at the words of my text, you will see that the offices which are attributed to Christ in the New Testament are gathered up in those which the Apostle here ascribes to Christ’s servants. Jesus Christ in His manhood was the Temple of God. Jesus Christ in His manhood was the Priest for humanity. Jesus Christ in His manhood was the sacrifice for the world’s sins. And what does Peter say here? ‘Ye are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices.’ You draw life from Jesus Christ if you keep close to Him, and that life makes you, in derived and subordinate fashion, but in a very real and profound sense, what Jesus Christ was in the world. The whole blessedness and secret of the gifts which our Lord comes to bestow upon men may be summed up in that one thought, which is metaphorically and picturesquely set forth in the language of my text, and which I put into plainer and more prosaic English when I say–they that come near Christ become as Christ. As ‘living stones’ they, too, share in the life which flows from Him. Touch Him, and His quick Spirit passes into our hearts. Rest upon that foundation-stone and up from it, if I may so say, there is drawn, by strange capillary attraction, all the graces and powers of the Saviour’s own life. The building which is reared upon the Foundation is cemented to the Foundation by the communication of the life itself, and, coming to the living Rock, we, too, become alive.
Let us keep ourselves near to Him, for, disconnected, the wire cannot carry the current, and is only a bit of copper, with no virtue in it, no power. Attach it once more to the battery and the mysterious energy flashes through it immediately. ‘To Whom coming,’ because He lives, ‘ye shall live also.’
III. Lastly:
They who become like Christ because they are near Him, thereby grow together.
‘To whom coming, as unto a living stone, ye also, as living stones, are built up.’ That building up means not only the growth of individual graces in the Christian character, the building up in each single soul of more and more perfect resemblance to the Saviour, but from the context it rather refers to the welding together, into a true and blessed unity, of all those that partake of that common life. Now, it is very beautiful to remember, in this connection, to whom this letter was written. The first words of it are: ‘To the strangers scattered abroad throughout,’ etc. etc. All over Asia Minor, hundreds of miles apart, here one there another little group, were these isolated believers, the scattered stones of a great building. But Peter shows them the way to a true unity, notwithstanding their separation. He says to them in effect: ‘You up in Bithynia, and you others away down there on the southern coast, though you never saw one another, though you are separated by mountain ranges and weary leagues; though you, if you met one another, perhaps could not understand what you each were saying, if you “come unto the living Stone, ye as living stones are built up” into one.’ There is a great unity into which all they are gathered who, separated by whatever surface distinctions, yet, deep down at the bottom of their better lives, are united to Jesus Christ.
But there may be another lesson here for us, and that is, that the true and only secret of the prosperity and blessedness and growth of a so-called Christian congregation is the individual faithfulness of its members, and their personal approximation of Jesus Christ. If we here, knit together as we are nominally for Christian worship, and by faith in that dear Lord, are true to our profession and our vocation, and keep ourselves near our Master, then we shall be built up; and if we do not, we shall not.
So, dear friends, all comes to this: There is the Stone laid; it does not matter how close we are lying to it, it will be nothing to us unless we are on it. And I put it to each of you. Are you built on the Foundation, and from the Foundation do you derive a life which is daily bringing you nearer to Him, and making you liker Him? All blessedness depends, for time and for eternity, on the answer to that question. For remember that, since that living Stone is laid, it is something to you. Either it is the Rock on which you build, or the Stone against which you stumble and are broken. No man, in a country evangelised like England–I do not say Christian, but evangelised–can say that Jesus Christ has no relation to, or effect upon, him. And certainly no people that listen to Christian preaching, and know Christian truth as fully and as much as you do, can say it. He is the Foundation on which we can rear a noble, stable life, if we build upon Him. If He is not the Foundation on which I build, He is the Stone on which I shall be broken.
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: 1Pe 2:4-8
4 And coming to Him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, 5you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6For this is contained in Scripture: “Behold, I lay in Zion a choice stone, a precious corner stone, And he who believes in Him will not be disappointed.” 7This precious value, then, is for you who believe; but for those who disbelieve, “The stone which the builders rejected, This became the very corner stone,” 8and, “A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense”; for they stumble because they are disobedient to the word, and to this doom they were also appointed.
1Pe 2:4 “And coming to Him” This is a present middle (deponent) participle. NKJV, NRSV and TEV translate this as an imperative. Note the continual coming and personal element, “to Him.” The gospel is primarily a person to welcome, to trust, and to emulate. This term may have the connotation of approaching God, as a priest or worshiper (cf. Heb 4:16; Heb 7:25; Heb 10:1; Heb 10:22; Heb 11:6). Peter changes his metaphor from milk in 1Pe 2:2-3, to construction metaphors in 1Pe 2:4-8 (believers as living stones and Jesus as the cornerstone). This is possibly a continuing allusion to Psa 34:4 from the Septuagint.
“as to a living stone” In the OT God’s stability, strength, and perseverance are often described by using the analogy of rock as a title (cf. Deu 32:4; Deu 32:15; Deu 32:18; Deu 32:30; Psa 18:2; Psa 18:31; Psa 18:46; Psa 28:1; Psa 31:3; Psa 42:9; Psa 71:3).
The metaphor of Jesus as a stone is found in
1. a rejected stone (Psa 118:22)
2. a building stone (Psa 118:22; Isa 28:16)
3. a stone to stumble over (Isa 8:14-15)
4. an overcoming and conquering stone (kingdom), (Dan 2:45)
Jesus used these passages to describe Himself (cf. Mat 21:40; Mar 12:10; Luk 20:17).
“which has been rejected by men” This is a perfect passive participle. This may be an allusion to 1Pe 2:7, which is from the Septuagint of Psa 118:22. The stone is disapproved by “the builders,” which may refer to the Jewish leadership, but in Peter it is widened to all unbelieving humans. This term, from apo and dokimaz, means the testing of someone or something to find if it is genuine. The Jews continued to reject Jesus as the Messiah and this rejection became a state of spiritual blindness (cf. Mar 8:31; Mat 6:23).
“but is choice and precious in the sight of God” This is in direct contrast to the previous phrase. The term “choice” is literally “elect” in the sense of “foreordained” (cf. 1Pe 1:2; 1Pe 1:20). A rejected (crucified or unreceived) Messiah has always been God’s only plan of redemption (cf. Luk 22:22; Act 2:23; Act 3:18; Act 4:28; Act 13:29; Eph 1:11).
1Pe 2:5 “as living stones” The NT uses several corporate metaphors to describe the church.
1. a vine (Joh 15:5)
2. a flock (Joh 10:16)
3. a bride (i.e., a family, cf. Eph 5:27; Rev 19:7; Rev 21:9)
4. a body (Eph 1:22-23, 1 Corinthians 12)
5. a family (Rom 8:15-17; 1Ti 3:15)
6. a city (Heb 11:10; Heb 11:16; Heb 12:22; Heb 13:14; Rev 2:2; Rev 2:10)
7. here, a temple (cf. 1Co 3:9; 1Co 3:16; 1Co 6:19)
“are being built up as a spiritual house” This is probably a Present passive indicative, although in form it could be a present passive imperative. This is the same verb used in Mat 16:18 to describe the church being built on the rock of personal faith (i.e., Peter as an example). The entire context is continuing to develop the metaphor of 1Pe 2:4. Jesus is the new Temple (cf. Joh 2:18-22). Believers in Christ are the true priesthood. The unbelieving Jews have stumbled over (cf. 1Pe 2:7-8) the very stones on which YHWH built His spiritual Temple(1) Jesus and (2) the Church (cf. 1Ti 3:15). Only those who have faith in Christ can function in God’s spiritual temple, offering spiritually acceptable sacrifices (i.e., holy self-giving lives, cf. 1Pe 1:14-16; Rom 12:1-2).
SPECIAL TOPIC: EDIFY
“for a holy priesthood” Peter is using the names of God’s OT people, Israel, to describe the church (cf. Exo 19:5; 1Pe 2:9-10; Rev 1:6). In the OT YHWH promised through Eve’s offspring to redeem all mankind (cf. Gen 3:15). YHWH called Abram (cf. Gen 12:1-3) to call a kingdom of priests (cf. Exo 19:5-6) to reach all the world (cf. Gen 12:3 and Exo 19:5). Israel failed in this task (cf. Eze 36:27-38). Therefore, God appointed a new people of faith (cf. Jer 31:31-34; Eze 36:22-38) to reach the world (cf. Mat 28:19-20; Luk 24:47 Act 1:8; 1Pe 2:9).
Martin Luther used the authority of the Bible and the Pauline truth of justification by grace through faith to reject the traditions of the Catholic Church. He coined the phrase “the priesthood of the believer” (singular). Western individualism has taken this slogan and turned it to a license for personal freedom in belief and lifestyle. But this concept is corporate, not individual (i.e., notice the plural pronouns in 1Pe 2:5; 1Pe 2:7; 1Pe 2:9). It is gospel-proclamation focused, not personal-freedom focused. Believers have been given Israel’s world-wide evangelistic assignment (cf. Rom 15:16; Heb 13:15-16). To view the priesthood as meaning that we have direct access to God through Christ is true, but this is not the purpose of the metaphor. A priest stands between a needy people and a holy God. He advocates not his own position, but the needs of the people. The NT affirms the priesthood of believers (plural, corporate) as they bring a lost world to faith in Christ.
SPECIAL TOPIC: CHRISTIANITY IS CORPORATE
“to offer up spiritual sacrifices” After the destruction of the Temple in A.D. 70, the Jews accentuated the OT passages which advocate non-animal sacrifices (cf. Psa 50:14, 51:27, Psa 69:30-31; Psa 107:22; Psa 141:2; Hos 14:2). Heb 13:5 reflects this type of Christian sacrifice. In context this refers to believers living holy and self-giving lives from 1 Peter 1 (esp. 1Pe 2:14-16; Heb 13:15-16).
1Pe 2:6 “A choice stone, a precious corner stone” This is a quote from Isa 28:16. This concept of the Messiah as a rock or stone is recurrent in the OT (cf. Psa 118:22; Dan 2:34-35; Isa 8:14; Isa 28:16). These OT passages are often quoted in the NT (cf. Mat 21:42; Mar 12:10; Luk 20:17; 1Co 10:4; Eph 2:22; 1Pe 2:6-8) to refer to Jesus as God’s promised One. Peter also used it in his sermon in Act 4:11. See note at 1Pe 2:4 b. See Special Topic: Cornerstone at Mar 12:10.
NASB”and he who believes in him will not be disappointed”
NKJV “and he who believes on him will by o means be put to shame”
NRSV”and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame”
TEV”whoever believes in Him will never be disappointed”
NJB”no one who relies on this will be brought to disgrace”
This phrase is from the LXX of Isa 28:16. Notice the invitation is open to all (cf. Joh 1:12; Joh 3:16; Rom 10:9-13; 1Ti 2:4; 2Pe 3:9). This is a double negative, “never, no never, be disappointed” or “ashamed.” For “believes” see Special Topic at Mar 1:15.
F. F. Bruce, answers to Questions (p. 158) points out the difference between the Septuagint and the Masoretic Hebrew texts.
1. The LXX “will not be disappointed” (NASB) or “brought to disgrace” (NJB) is the verb ybsh
2. The MT “will not be disturbed” (NASB, margin), “in a hurry” is the verb yahish
On page 157 Bruce comments that NT authors probably quoted the version in common use in the early church unless they had a special theological reason to depart from it and use another one. The general thrust of a passage is the key to the concept of inspiration, not a fight over each and every individual word. Humans have been given a trustworthy revelation!
1Pe 2:7 “the builders” The Jewish Targums (Aramaic translation with commentary) use this term as a title for the Scribes. This is a quote from Psa 118:22. Jesus uses this same OT quote in His parable of the wicked tenant farmers in Mat 21:42. This parable described the Jewish leadership of Jesus’ day. It is uncertain whether Jesus’ strong words of judgment related to (1) His rejecting the concept of non-Aaronic Jewish leadership (i.e., Annas and Caiaphas) who purchased their positions from Rome or (2) His rejecting all Jewish people (i.e., Israel) who refuse to believe in Him (cf. Romans 9-11).
1Pe 2:8 “A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense” This is a quote from Isa 8:14. It is also quoted in Rom 9:32, where it refers to Jesus. The special stone has been rejected and becomes the object of destruction!
“they are disobedient” This is a present active participle. They (unbelievers of Peter’s day, both Jews and Gentiles) continue to be disobedient because they reject Jesus as the Suffering Messiah. They have rejected both Jesus’ preaching and that of His Apostles (cf. 1Pe 1:24-25). They have rejected the eternal word (i.e., the gospel, cf. 1Pe 1:22 to 1Pe 2:2).
NASB”and to this doom they were also appointed”
NKJV”to which they also were appointed”
NRSV”as they were destined bo do”
TEV”such was God’s will for them”
Calvinists use this verse and Rom 9:22; 1Th 5:9 to assert that God chose some to salvation and some to damnation. However, verses like Joh 3:16; 1Ti 2:4; 2Pe 3:9 show this cannot be true. God’s election is primarily for holiness (cf. Eph 1:4; Eph 2:10); for Christlikeness (cf. Rom 8:29).
This verse reminds me of Isa 6:9-13. God’s covenantal people had the light they needed to respond appropriately to Him, but they would not. This continual rejection issued in hard hearts that could not respond. Only judgment was possible. The God of time and history knows what humans will do but allows them to do it and then He affirms and recognizes the consequences of their temporal/eternal choices.
It must have been very hard for these Jewish believers to deal with the Jewish rejection of Jesus. How could this happen? These early believers began to read the Scriptures for clues to this surprising unbelief.
1. Isa 6:9-10; Isa 8:14-15; Isa 43:8
2. Jer 5:21; Jeremiah 7
3. Mat 21:33-44; Mar 12:1-12
4. Luk 2:34; Luk 20:9-18
5. Romans 9-11
6. 1Co 1:23
The following quote is from F. F. Bruce, Answers to Questions, pp. 196-197, about “election” vs. “selection.”
“Are ‘election to salvation’ and ‘election to damnation’ correlative terms?
In certain theological systems they are, but it is important to test all theological systems by Scripture, and to remember that, when the teaching of Scripture is systemized, something is usually left out in the process. The term ‘election’ has become so involved in theological controversy that the sense of the Biblical teaching on the subject might be better grasped if we used a non-theological word like ‘selection’ in its place. Christ selected twelve men to be apostles (Luk 6:13); He selected Saul of Tarsus to be a ‘chosen vessel’ (Act 9:15); but His selection of these men for a special purpose implies no disparagement of others who were not so selected. God selected Israel from among the nations (Act 13:17)to the great benefit of the other nations, not to their disadvantage. When the election of the people of God in this age is in question, it is not so much their ‘election to salvation’ as their election to holiness that is emphasized. This is so, for example, in Eph 1:4 and 1Pe 1:1 f; and similarly, in Rom 8:29, the purpose for which God foreordained those whom He foreknew was that they should be ‘conformed to the image of his Son.’ In none of these places is there any suggestion of ‘election to damnation’ as a correlative. We should beware of generalizing from such particular references as those in Rom 9:22 (‘vessels of wrath made for destruction’) and 1Pe 2:8 ‘they stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do’). The general analogy of Biblical teaching on this subject indicates that some are chosen or selected by Godnot in order that others, apart from them, may be left in perdition, but in order that others, through them, may be blessed.”
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
To. App-104.
as unto. Omit.
living. App-170.
disallowed = having been rejected. Greek. apodokimazo, as Mat 21:42.
of. App-104.
men. App-123.
of = in the sight of. App-104.
God. App-98.
precious. Greek. entimos. See Php 1:2, Php 1:29.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
4, 5.] Exhortation to come to Christ the chosen stone, and be built up into a spiritual temple unto God.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
1Pe 2:4. , whom) Apposition: whom, that is, the Lord, the Stone.-, approaching) of your own accord, through faith.-, stone) In what manner He is regarded both by believers and unbelievers, is declared, 1Pe 2:6-7. The name given to Peter by the Lord remained fixed in his mind: hence he alludes to it in various ways, not only under the name of Stone, Act 4:11, but also under the repeated mention of firmness [stedfastness, 1Pe 5:9].-, living) living from the beginning, 1Jn 1:1, and raised from the dead, Rev 1:18, after that He had been rejected by men, both Jews and Gentiles.-, disallowed) especially before His death: 1Pe 2:7, note.-, elect) 1Pe 2:6.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
The Temple of Living Stones
Unto whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.1Pe 2:4-5.
1. Earth has witnessed few scenes more sublime, none in which all the elements of outward magnificence were more strikingly blended with those of deep religious reverence and awe, than that which was presented by the Temple of Solomon on the day of its dedication. The holy and beautiful house crowning, with its fresh undimmed splendour, the terraced steep of Moriah, the vast congregation of worshippers that filled its courts and colonnades, the rich and solemn swell of choral melody, when minstrels and singers joined in the exulting hallelujah, the great altar in the open court with the brazen platform in front of it, on which the youthful prince kneeled down upon his knees in sight of that breathless multitude and spread forth his hands to heaven, the fire descending in answer to his prayer, and consuming the sacrifice, and the cloud of glory filling the house, so that the priests could not stand to minister;nothing is wanting to complete the solemn impressiveness of the spectacle.
Many centuries had gone by, and the Temple still stood, after many vicissitudes, in something like its earliest grandeur, and on its ancient site, when Jerusalem, the Holy City, witnessed another and a different scene.
In some humble dwelling, in one of its obscurer streets, a little company of worshippers was gathered together in an upper room. There was no outward splendour there to attract the eye, no imposing rites, no stately ceremonial, no altar, no priest, no ringing burst of melody. A few devoted men and women joining in fervent supplication, nothing more, when suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and cloven tongues of flame were seen hovering over each of them, and in this baptism of fire every heart was kindled with holy love and zeal, every voice burst forth in accents of adoring wonder and praise. In this outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, in fulfilment of the Saviours promise, and in token of His divine and almighty power, we see the dedication of that spiritual temple which He founded on this earth, we behold the beginning of that Church which is not for one nation, but for all people; which is not in its essential features outward and visible, but inward, set up in all believing, loving, and obedient hearts; which is not to continue for a season and pass away, but is to endure for ever, as a kingdom of righteousness, and peace, and joy.
2. The Apostle Peter set himself to try to persuade Jewish Christians that the time had come for the admission of the Gentiles to religious equality with the favoured Jewish nation, and that without submitting to the ceremonial law or taking part in the ceremonial sacrifices which (to the ordinary Jewish apprehension) were the price of their spiritual privileges. And the method he adopted was not to belittle the position of Israel as the chosen people of Jehovah, but to suggest that the old Jewish idea of a chosen people was but a poor analogue or type of the position of the Christian Church, that it was in that purely spiritual but none the less visible and concrete society that there was to be found the real fulfilment of the highest aspirations or predictions of Hebrew prophecy. For him the Christian Church was the spiritual Israel. Nor was the new and Catholic society which was to succeed to the narrow Nation-churches of the ancient world a society which could dispense with those fundamental institutions of old-world religionTemple, Priesthood, Sacrifice. The Church itself, the society, was the true templethe visible, material, local, yet living, habitation, as it were, of Deity. The whole of this society were Priests. And that society of Priests absorbed into itself the religious functions which everywhere in the old world, and especially in ancient Israel, were shared by kingsa royal priesthood, a holy nation. Nor was the temple without its sacrifice; for the external animal sacrifices of the old ritual were but a faint counterpart of the spiritual worship of the new society, the uplifting of will and heart to God, especially in the great act which the ancient Church called the Eucharist or thanksgiving par excellenceitself only a symbol or visible embodiment of the one real and true sacrifice of the will to God in a holy life.
I
The Temple
The Apostle has in his mind the great Temple at Jerusalem, esteemed and honoured by the whole Jewish race. And he summons up the vision not only of that vast edifice, but of the separate stones, which he well knew must have passed under the builders eye. And then by a bold venture of imagination he thinks of these stones as endowed with life, and taking their proper place in the building.
1. The Temple has a foundation. Christ is the chief corner stone. The term stone speaks to us of all that is solid, massive, steadfast, strong. It suggests at once ideas of immovable principle and ever-persistent purpose, and of capacity at once to resist and to sustain. We read in it how our Master is the same, yesterday and to-day, and for ever, in a fixity which the cliffs and crags may picture, but to which all the while they are but as fleeting shadows, as unsubstantial dreams, placed beside Him who is this same Jesus for ever.
But then, besides, Christ is the Living Stone. Taken by itself, the rock-metaphor gives us all we want of certainty and strength; but there is nothing in it of itself to warm the thought and to move the soul to a personal regard. But, behold, He is the Living Stone; He is strength instinct with glowing life. This foundation, this bulwark, this massy tower, foursquare to oppositionlook at it again; it is not it, but He. The Rock has voice, and eyes, and arms, and heart. He lives, all over and all through; and it is with a life which pours itself out in thought, and sympathy, and help, and love, to the refugee upon the Rock.
Here and here only in Holy Scripture is our Lord called the Living Stone. Repeatedly elsewhere, both in the Old Testament and in the New, we read of Him as the Stone, the Rock, Rock of Ages, Stone of the CornerAngulare Fundamentum. And we have indeed abundant Scriptures where He appears in all the glory and in all the power of Life. I am he that liveth, I am the life. But here only do the two truths meet in one magnificent witness to His worth and glory; only here is He named the Living Stone.1 [Note: H. C. G. Moule, The Secret of the Presence, 110.]
(1) Christ imparts life. We depend upon Christ for life. He is a living stone, and we who believe are living stones. But there is this all-important difference between Him and us, viz. He is the Living One, He has life in Himself, while we live only in Him. His life is inherent; ours is derived. He would live on, if we were to die; whereas if He were to die, our life would end for ever.
Here is an elect stone, chosen of God though rejected of men. It stands every test. Satan searched in vain for any flaw in Christs character; any imperfection, however small, in His obedience. Sir Walter Scott, in Ivanhoe, tells us how Locksley, with his cloth-yard shafts told every rivet in De Bracys armour, on the walls of Front de Boeufs castle. Had there been a weak point anywhere in that armour, the arrows would have found it out, and De Bracys life would have been forfeited. So, to compare the infinitely greater with the less, with his fiery darts of manifold temptations did Satan tell off every rivet of our blessed Lords armour of righteousness while here upon earth. Could he have found but one weak point anywhere, His entire work as our Redeemer would have been marred, and He could not have been our Saviour. No weak point, however, could he findGods elect and precious stone is a tried stone.2 [Note: A. C. Price, Fifty Sermons, xi. 19.]
(2) In order that we may become living stones, fit for building on the foundation, we must come into touch with Christ. In His own words we must come to Him. That is to say, we must commit ourselves to Him in faith.
Suppose a stranger arrives in a town and inquires where he can safely deposit his money. He is told by a friend that N. & M.s bank is perfectly safe. He thereupon obtains an audited balance-sheet, examines it, and from it learns the resources of the bank. He believes the person who tells him that the bank is good; he believes about the bank that the security it offers is ample; so he trusts his money to the banks keeping, i.e. he believes on the bank. Or, to put it in another way, a boatload of holiday makers may often be seen landing on the shore of some English watering-place. The tide is low, and the boat cannot be brought right up on to the dry sand or beach. The passengers do not wish to wet their feet, so the boatman invites them to ride ashore on his back. They believe him when he makes the suggestion; they look at him, and, seeing that he is a stalwart fellow, they believe about him that he is able to do what he proposes, so one by one they trust themselves to him.1 [Note: J. G. Hoare, The Foundation Stone of Christian Faith, 228.]
The things mysterious
That here vouchsafe to me their apparition,
Unto all eyes below are so concealed,
That all their being lies in faith alone,
Whereon high Hope proceeds to base herself,
And so Faith takes the place and rank of substance.
And it behoveth us from our belief
To draw conclusions without other sight;
And hence Faith takes the place of argument.2 [Note: Dante, Paradiso.]
2. The materials of the Temple are living stones.
(1) Where are the stones found?They are all cut out of the quarry of nature; stone by stone is brought out of that deep cavern, placed upon the living stone, and each united to the other.
I have read that some little while back there was discovered in Jerusalem a deep cavern close by the Damascus Gate, and those who have explored it have come to the conclusion that it is, the spot from which the stones were taken to build the glorious Temple of Solomon. It was there that the hammering and the cutting were done. It was there that the stones were shaped, and from thence, by some process that we do not now understand, they were brought from their deep grave, and separately placed in position upon Mount Zion. The blocks of stone were taken one by one out of the bowels of the earth and out of darkness, and then carried by mighty power to the temple walls, until, when the last stone was cut out and placed in position, with shoutings of grace unto it, the whole building was complete. This forms a beautiful illustration of the way in which the Lord builds His spiritual temple. The Spirit of God goes into the deep black quarry of fallen nature, and there hews out the hidden stones, and by His own almighty power bears them to the foundation stone and places them in a living temple to go no more out for ever.1 [Note: A. G. Brown.]
(2) There must be no deformity in the stones.You have probably visited one or another of our cathedrals, and, if so, you may have noticed that a process of repair is always going on in some part of the building. Stones once thought good and sound have developed a flaw; or under the influence of the rain and frost and gases of the atmosphere have been found to be losing their solidity, turning back and crumbling into their original sand. As material stones, this is only according to nature; there is nothing to be done but to remove them and put good ones in their places. But in the spiritual building the conditions are not the same. We who are living stones can by Gods help resist the deteriorating and wasting forces of the world. If we will, we may retain our solidity, our firmness, our strength, yes, even our polish and our lustre; and it is our duty so to do. We may be stones placed in inconspicuous positions. But if we are so honoured as to have any, even the most obscure, place in such a temple, how great should be our joy! We may be like those stones Ruskin found built in where they could not possibly be seen save by those who sought them, but still carved and finished as exquisitely as those that were in the facade of the building. If the master Builder knows that we are there, is not that enough to induce us to resolve that by Divine help not a whit of our symmetry and beauty shall be lost?
A beloved and beautiful memory rises before mea friend of my early undergraduate days, called to die before his own degree, but first called to live, as a living stone. Before he entered Trinity College he had passed through a military academy, a place which at that time was a scene of deep moral pollution. Gentle and even facile as he was by nature, God, just as he entered the place, had made him a living stone. With quiet, unshaken, unswerving steadfastness, under acutest difficulties, he lived, and he was a rock. And by the time he left the academyI record a factvice was out of fashion there.2 [Note: H. C. G. Moule, The Secret of the Presence, 214.]
(3) The building is ever going on.The workers are legion. Paul, with his relentless, flaming logic; John, with eagle eye, scanning and then writing of the future and the past; Augustine, with his pauseless, countless toils of pen and speech; Chrysostom consecrating his golden eloquence to themes of transcendent and golden worth; Bede labouring on our own northern shore, and in making the blessed Gospel accessible to the Saxon people finding the last dear service of his parting breath; Luther, with his strong human tenderness and unquailing knowledge; Calvin, with his severe purity and indomitable industry; Latimer, with his home-spun, ready, and racy heart-compelling speech; Bunyan, that true Greatheart of countless pilgrims; Wesley, that statesman; Whitefield, that captain of preachers. Time would fail us to tell of the great preachers and teachers with voice and pen who have lived to win souls to Christ. If His service can be ennobled by human associations, it is ennobled by such names as these. Let us be worthy of them. And Christs work is ever going on; His temple is ever rising. Men of varied faculty are engaged in the one work. The builders are many, the Architect is one. Builders pass, but new builders take up the work and it goes on. New methods of Christian labour may supplement the old. The tongues of old theology may cease in a larger and more loving language; but, amid all, the Spiritual Temple is rising.
In the crypt of Fountains Abbey, as in other ancient buildings, you may see windows of varied kinds of architectureSaxon, Norman, Gothic. The Abbey was long in building. The first builders died. But by other hands, and in other styles, the unfinished work went on. So in Christs Church. New styles, so to speak, may mark it from age to age. But though builders die, the Divine Architect survives. And He sees to the continuity of the work.
Have you heard the golden city
Mentioned in the legends old?
Everlasting light shines oer it,
Wondrous tales of it are told.
Only righteous men and women
Dwell within its gleaming wall;
Wrong is banished from its borders,
Justice reigns supreme oer all.
We are builders of that city;
All our joys and all our groans
Help to rear its shining ramparts,
All our lives are building stones.
But a few brief years we labour,
Soon our earthly day is oer,
Other builders take our places,
And our place knows us no more.
But the work which we have builded,
Oft with bleeding hands and tears,
And in error and in anguish,
Will not perish with the years.
It will last, and shine transfigured
In the final reign of Right;
It will merge into the splendours
Of the City of the Light.1 [Note: Felix Adler.]
II
The Priesthood
St. Peter changes the figure from a spiritual house to a holy priesthood. After saying, Ye also as living stones are built up a spiritual house, he adds, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
To understand the meaning of this abrupt change of figure, we must bear in mind that St. Peter was the Apostle to the circumcision. He wrote to Jews, and he sought to show them that by becoming Christians they lost neither temple, nor priesthood, nor sacrifices. They had them all. They were themselves all. They were the temple, built up a spiritual house, for Gods own habitation. They were priests unto God; a holy priesthood. And it was their privilege to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
The New Testament writers were men whose earlier days had been passed in a Church where sacrifices were offered, where there was an altar, a priest, animal victims. It is true that their ordinary weekly worship was presented in synagogues which had no altar, no priest, no victims; where the desk took the place of the altar, and the reader of the priest. But none the less the temple was the place where the culminating act of worship took place, and in that temple the chief place was assigned to the altar, and the chief function devolved upon the priest. Sacrificereal sacrificethe actual offering of oxen and sheep and dovesreal sacrifice was the chief rite of the Church to which the Apostles in their earlier days belonged. Hence the language of sacrifice was familiar to them as household words, so familiar that they could not throw it off when they exchanged Judaism for Christianity. But though they did not wholly abandon the old phraseology, they gave to it a new and higher meaning. They applied it to the offering of self rather than of oxen or sheep. Christianity went deeper than Judaism. Judaism was content with the offering of bulls and goats. Christianity was content only with the offering of spiritual sacrifices. These it declared were the only sacrifices acceptable to God.
1. They were a spiritual Priesthood.God dwells in us, and so the obscurest, humblest Christian is greater than the most venerable and splendid of the buildings which kings and nobles and mighty nations have enriched with gold and silver and costly marbles, which have been adorned by the genius of famous painters, and in which many generations of men have worshipped God. It is man that is sacred, above all when made one with Christ. God is a spirit, and He dwells not in material buildings, no matter by what solemn and mysterious rites it may be attempted to consecrate them. He, a Spirit, dwells in the spirit of man and reveals His righteousness and love in the life of man.
To me the poor seamstress that turns into Westminster Abbey for half an hours quiet and peace and meditation on Christ who has saved her is more sacred than the memorable building which is associated with the most famous events in the history of our country; and she should be treated with greater reverence. To me the beggar in his rags on the steps of St. Peters is more sacred than the vast church which is the material centre of a communion extending over the whole world. In the Christian man is the true shekinah, even though the visible glory which was the symbol of the true has now passed away. The inner life of the Christian man is the true holy of holies. God is there.1 [Note: R. W. Dale.]
It is certain that to the writers of the New Testament, the word Priest, when not applied to the sacrificial functionaries of the Jews, implied a spiritual function of every believer. It is never once applied by them to the officers of the Christian community. It did not summon up to their minds the ceremonies of public worship, but the acts of common life. And this mode of speech became habitual with the early fathers. These fathers, says Bishop Kaye, used a language directly opposite to that which counts the New Testament use of these words as merely metaphorical. They regarded the spiritual sacrifice as the true and proper sacrifice, the external sacrificial act as merely the sign and symbol.1 [Note: Dean Fremantle, The Gospel of the Secular Life, 177.]
2. They were an holy Priesthood.In the Jewish dispensation this meant no more, possibly, than an outward separation to the service of Godthe priests in the temple, the vestments of their ministry were said to be ceremonially holy. But certainly more is meant by the Apostle in the text than this ritual and external sanctity. The holiness of which he speaks consists in the possession of that mind which was in Christ Jesus, in the reinstatement in us of that image of God which was lost by the disobedience of the fall.
In one of the old Cathedrals in Europe the guide bids the visitor watch a certain spot until the light from a window falls upon it. There he sees, carved on a rafter, a face of such marvellous beauty that it is the very gem of the great building. The legend is, that, when the architect and masters were planning the adornment of the cathedral, an old man came in and begged leave to do some work. They felt that his tottering steps and trembling hands unfitted him for any great service; so they sent him up to the roof, and gave him permission to carve upon one of the rafters. He went his way, and day by day he wrought there in the darkness. One day he was not seen to come down, and going up they found him lying lifeless on the scaffolding, with his sightless eyes turned upward. And there they saw a face carved on the rafter, a face of such exceeding beauty that architects and great men bared their heads as they looked upon it, and recognized the master in him who lay there still in death.
In the Church of the living God we are all set to carve the beauty of the face of Christ, not on the rafters or walls of any cathedral, but on our own heart and life. Be it ours to do this work with such care and skill that, when our eyes are closed in death, men may look with reverence upon the beauty of the face our hands have fashioned. Some of us may feel ourselves too feeble, or too unskilled, to do any great work in this world for Christ; but none are too feeble or too unskilled to carve the beauty of Christ on our life. And it may be that in the time of great revealing, it shall appear that some trembling disciple among us, timid and shrinking, whose work is in some quiet corner, out of sight, has wrought the beauty of Christ-likeness in an exquisiteness which shall outshine all that any even of the greatest of us have done.1 [Note: J. R. Miller, Glimpses through Lifes Windows, 17.]
III
The Sacrifices
1. The sacrifices are spiritual, like the temple in which they are offered. They originate in the spiritual life of man, under the inspiration of the Spirit of God. They are spiritual acts. Mere external acts, however striking, however splendid, however impressive, are worthless. Only if there is real spiritual force in them can they be acceptable to God, and then only through Christ. The external pomp, the artistic beauty are of no account, but for the excitement of passion and delight which the pomp and the beauty may create. The sacrifices we have to offer are spiritual sacrifices.
The value of a material sacrifice lies in the thing given; the value of the spiritual offering consists in the will to give it. A material sacrifice has its beginning in an act; a spiritual sacrifice has its beginning in a thought. A material sacrifice is one which, by its very nature, demands constant repetition; a spiritual sacrifice, if it be a full expression of the heart, is offered once for all.
I am on a pastoral round among lowly cottage homes. I ask at a certain door for one of our devoted church members, a labourers wife. She is not at home, but may be found five or six doors higher up in the street. We go and inquire for her there. It is the home of a sick friend, another labourers wife, and when we find her she says to her minister: You see Mary is ill and in bed, and I considered what I could do to help her; and I decided that I could at least do her weeks washing for her. It was beautiful! Our sister was a priest, or priestess, if you like, offering, amidst the steam of the washhouse, a spiritual sacrifice.2 [Note: J. C. Story.]
2. The sacrifice will mean
(1) Worship.The essential idea of sacrificial worship is communion, not propitiationthe identification of our wills with Gods by definite spiritual effort as a means to the identification of the will with Gods will in every act and moment of our lives. And this sacrifice of worship, of which the Christian Eucharist forms the highest act, must be looked upon as the act of the whole community. Every Christian must take his part in it. It is not a thing that can be done for one man by another, or rather in one sense it is a thing that can and must be done by every man for every other: since every prayer of the Christian is social, offered by him not as an isolated individual but as a member of the community, for the whole community as well as for himself.
Of Philip Edward Pusey (Puseys only son) Dean Burgon says, Though too deaf to hear what was being spoken, he was constant in his attendance at the daily Service and at Holy Communion: yes, and was absorbed in what was going on. A man, he was, of great religious earnestness, and consistent heartfelt piety. I cannot express what a help and comfort dear Philip was to me, nor how much I felt his loss: nay, how much I feel it still.1 [Note: J. W. Burgon, The Lives of Twelve Good Men, i. 17.]
We went to the cathedral, which is mere heaps upon heaps: a huge, misshapen thing, which has no more of symmetry than of neatness belonging to it. I was a little surprised to observe that neither in this, nor in any other of the Romish churches where I have been, is there, properly speaking, any such thing as joint worship; but one prays at one shrine or altar, and another at another, without any regard to or communication with one another. As we came out of the church a procession began on the other side of the churchyard. One of our company scrupling to pull off his hat, a zealous Catholic presently cried out, Knock down the Lutheran dog. But we prevented any contest by retiring into the church.2 [Note: The Journal of John Wesley, ii. 8.]
(2) Mediation.It is only through the Christian community that the individual can enter into this knowledge of Christ which is the knowledge of Godonly through the tradition of Christian teaching handed down by the community, through the religious life which pervades it, through the ideal which is more or less perfectly realized in its corporate life and in the life of some at least among its individual members. Thus it is no platitude to say that every Christian is bound to be a priest; for to say that he is a priest means that he is bound to take a part in this great task of revealing God to his fellow-men, by word and by deed, by the ideal that he proclaims with his lips and cherishes in his heart and sets forth in his life; by contributing to the creation of a Christian public opinion, and by impressing and (so far as may be) enforcing that opinion upon the whole society in which he lives, and so taking his part in the Churchs fundamental task of binding and loosing. It is of the essence of all true communion with God to diffuse itself to other men.
The Archbishop said that as a child he had been very much puzzled by the words of the marriage serviceWith my body I thee worship. He went to his mother and asked, How can one worship with ones body? His mother explained that worship was not used here in the usual spiritual sense, but meant that the husband would do such things for his wife as opening the door for her, fetching her a chair, etc. The little boy secretly made up his mind to watch his father, to see whether he performed these little services for his wife. But it was no use, added the Archbishop, for he always did.1 [Note: Frederick Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, i. 80.]
(3) Service.The materials of sacrifice are all around us, in our common work, in the little calls of Providence, in the trivial crosses we are challenged to take up; even in the very recreation of our lives. The great point is to have the mind set upon seeking and seeing in all things the service of Christ and the glory of God, and then every trifle which that mind touches, every piece of work it handles, every dispensation it encounters, becomes at once a sacrifice.
A young Chinese girl was brought to the Presbyterian Mission Hospital at Canton. She was doomed to blindness and lameness, so her mistress abandoned her. The doctors amputated her leg, and gave her little tasks to perform and taught her the love of the Saviour. She developed leprosy, and was forced to leave the kind friends about her, and betake herself to the darkness and horror of a leper settlement. But she went a Christian, and in two years that blind crippled leper built up a band of Christians in that leper settlement and in five years a Church grew out of her work. That poor crippled invalid life is to-day a centre of joy and service, and other leper villages are sending to her to ask about the wonderful good news which can bring joy even to outcasts.
The Temple of Living Stones
Literature
Brooke (H.), Studies in Leviticus, 57.
Burns (J. D.), Memoir and Remains, 312.
Fremantle (W. H.), The Gospel of the Secular Life, 175.
Hadden (R. H.), Sermons and Memoir, 1.
Hoare (J. G.), The Foundation Stone of Christian Faith, 225.
Jones (J. C.), Studies in the First Epistle of Peter, 233.
Keble (J.), Sermons for the Christian Year: Christmas and Epiphany, 316; Saints Days, 415.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions: 1 and 2 Peter and 1 John, 86, 92.
Meyer (F. B.), Tried by Fire, 78.
Moule (H. C. G.), The Secret of the Presence, 210.
Murray (A.), With Christ, 240.
Peabody (A. P.), Kings Chapel Sermons, 118.
Price (A. C.), Fifty Sermons, vi. 233; xi. 17.
Rashdall (H.), Christus in Ecclesia, 92.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xxiii. (1877) No. 541.
British Weekly Pulpit, ii. 321 (Dale).
Christian World Pulpit, iv. 409 (Rogers); vi. 161 (Punshon); xxvi. 89 (Mursell); lxxviii. 35 (Story).
Church Pulpit Year Book, ii. (1905) 169 (Punshon).
Contemporary Pulpit, 2nd Ser., ix. 168.
Expositor, 2nd Ser., viii. 187 (Matheson).
Homiletic Review, lix. 377 (Moule).
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
To: Isa 55:3, Jer 3:22, Mat 11:28, Joh 5:40, Joh 6:37
a living: Joh 5:26, Joh 6:57, Joh 11:25, Joh 11:26, Joh 14:6, Joh 14:19, Rom 5:10, Col 3:4
stone: Isa 28:16, Dan 2:34, Dan 2:45, Zec 3:9, Zec 4:7
disallowed: Psa 118:22, Psa 118:23, Isa 8:14, Isa 8:15, Mat 21:42, Mar 12:10, Mar 12:11, Luk 20:17, Luk 20:18, Act 4:11, Act 4:12
chosen: Isa 42:1, Mat 12:18
precious: 1Pe 2:7, 1Pe 1:7, 1Pe 1:19, 2Pe 1:1, 2Pe 1:4
Reciprocal: Gen 49:24 – the stone Exo 26:6 – one tabernacle Exo 36:13 – so it became Lev 4:31 – a sweet Num 12:7 – faithful 1Sa 16:7 – seeth not 1Sa 18:30 – set by 1Sa 20:27 – the son Psa 87:1 – His Son 1:17 – beams Isa 49:7 – and he Isa 54:11 – I will lay Jer 12:16 – built Hag 2:23 – for Zec 6:12 – he shall build Zec 6:15 – they Mat 12:6 – General Mat 22:42 – What Mat 26:68 – thou Mar 6:3 – carpenter Luk 3:22 – Thou art Luk 6:47 – cometh Luk 6:48 – rock Luk 23:35 – Christ Joh 1:14 – we Joh 2:21 – temple Joh 6:51 – living Joh 15:5 – vine 2Co 13:5 – Jesus Christ Eph 2:20 – built Eph 2:22 – an Col 2:7 – built Heb 4:12 – is quick 1Pe 2:6 – Behold
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
PETER AND THE CHURCH
To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
1Pe 2:4-5
Christ is everything to St. Peter in this Epistle. It is Christs resurrection that inspires the hope of rising again above evil and living a good life.
I. Are you crushed with the recollection of a sin into which you fell?Do you know that the misery is that your best ideal, as it were, of life has entirely been obliterated because you fell into some sin of which you are ashamed, and you grieve over it, and would give anything to blot out that page? St. Peter, with all his tears of repentance, could not blot out the page of the New Testament that tells us he fell. It is there. You sinned. You cannot stop that. It is done, but you can be the better man now; you can rise above it in the resurrection of Jesus Christ; you can find, as he did, as he bids you find, your hope in Christ. Because Christ rose again, you can rise above your sin. Do you find it very hard to go on steadily enduring little difficulties that you have got to meet, the worries of life which perhaps send you into a bad temper and make you cross at home, an uncomfortable person to those round about you? He puts, before you the endurance and suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that manly patiencenever forget that patience, although it is so splendidly characteristic of women, is still one of the attributes of a manand in that noble, manly, magnificent patience of Jesus, he would have you learn to meet all little difficulties, just as all great trials, and so persevere to the end. You say, Well, but my heart and life are so cold and indifferent that I cannot rise to all this. He puts before you in this Epistle what the character of Jesus Christ is, and shows how that transforms a man, so that through the life of Christ, if you let it sink into you, you can become a different person, all because Christ has done that and is ready to give you of His grace. You know what it is to struggle against the passions of your nature, and to find that the sins of a sensual kind, impurity and the like, are the ones by which you are most severely buffeted, and it may be, yea, it is, a hard thing to throw them off and a hard thing to trample them down; but here he lets you into the secret of doing it. It is in the mind of Christ being formed in you, and that is possible if you will only let yourselves come so near to Christ as to learn what He is, Who He is, and what His power over you may be.
II. It is not only in dealing with persons as individuals, but in dealing with us as a Church, that St. Peters Epistle is so valuable. Here is his spiritual building up of the Church brought before you in my text. It is not a thought peculiar to St. Peter; you find it in St. Pauls Epistle to the Ephesians, and in the Apocalypse. But here you will find it plainly enough in the writings of St. Peter. From what Bishop Lightfoot wrote, I think it is very likely that St. Peter and St. Paul were thrown very much together at the time when St. Peter composed this Epistle and St. Paul composed his Epistle to the Ephesians, which would account very much for St. Peters writing in this peculiar strain of the building up of the Church. And the great theory that is filling the minds of both of them is this: that there is to be a great spiritual temple builtthat is, a great Catholic Churchand each member of it is to be a spiritual stone in this great edifice. We Churchmen are constantly being accused of narrow-mindedness and exclusiveness. I wonder if those who criticise the Church understand it. That which we, according to our Prayer Book, are aiming at, and ought to be aiming at, is that breadth and catholicity of the Church which will not allow sectarianism, and therefore has to hold itself aloof from divisions and dissent because it realises that we ought to be one body, we ought to be one great Church. We are to realise what the unity of the great body iswe are to be built not into a number of separate small edifices, but to be built up into a great spiritual temple; and who can help seeing the strength it would be to Christianity if we realised that unity, if, instead of all that struggling and fighting, one set of people against another, we learned what that spirit of unity really is!
III. The explanation of the fact that Christianity does not take strong hold on the world, is because we are divided among ourselves. Let us learn to be united under our King of Kings, to realise the unity of the Church, and then we shall know what it is to be able to win souls for Christ. I am not saying one word to argue that there is to be a fixed adamantine kind of level of thought, or an absolute dictatorial uniformity. Unity is an entirely different thing from uniformity; and it is that unity of the Church which fills the mind of the Apostles. They have got the one thought of the one Head of the Church, Who fills every particle of their minds, their hearts, and their wills, and they want to be and they want to do all they can for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Bishop G. W. Kennion.
Illustration
We know well enough all the claims that are made in the name of St. Peter. If you study this Epistle right through you will not find one word said about his supremacy over other Apostles or over other people. If you read this Epistle with microscopic care, you will never find one trace of infallibility in it; but what you will find is that the strenuous, active, buoyant, high-spirited character that you knew of in Peter, the fisherman, called to be an Apostle, is, after his fall, his repentance, his reinstalment, and his baptism by the Holy Ghost, turned into a new channel. And because he is so entirely absorbed in the life of Jesus Christ, he bases all that he teaches, all that he thinks, all that he wants others to be, upon what Christ is, upon what Christ has done, and upon what Christ is able to do for those to whom he writes.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Christ the Living Stone
1Pe 2:4-8
INTRODUCTORY WORDS
One of the striking beauties of the Word of God, is the commonplace similitudes which abound in its writings. It is marvelous how the Holy Spirit can speak of the Lord Jesus Christ under the symbolism of most commonplace things, without in the least abusing the glory or the dignity of His Divine person.
One of these symbolisms is the stone, not a stone, merely, but a stone vivified, living, moving, having being, possessed of personality. To us, a stone seems to be the coldest, deadest proposition imaginable. But before we get through with this sermon we trust that we shall see how aptly the stone speaks to us of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Our Scripture tells of our coming unto Christ as unto a Living Stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious. It also speaks of us as “living stones,” built into a spiritual house and a holy priesthood.
Again, our Scripture describes Christ as a Chief Corner Stone, and as precious; as a Stone made the Head of the corner, and also a Stone of stumbling, and a Rock of offence.
We are to come unto this Living Stone. How do we come? We come that we may build. We have read, “Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” Any other foundation is no more than the sands. We step on to the Rock of Ages and find our feet secure.
“He took me out of the pit,
And from the miry clay;
He set my feet on a Rock
Establishing my way,
He put a song in my mouth
My God to glorify,
And He’ll take me some day
To His home on high.”
God has said that we are builders, and Christ is the Rock on which we build. What then are we building? If we are building gold, silver, precious stones; wood, hay, stubble, the day will declare it.
“We are building day by day,
As the moments pass away,
A temple that the world cannot see;
Every victory won by grace,
Will be sure to find a place
In that building for eternity.”
The Rock on which we build, the Living Stone, will never fall. The important thing, however, which should be our chief concern is, “Take heed how ye build.”
We are reminded of the story of the man who built his house upon the sands, and the winds blew and the floods came and it fell, and great was the fall thereof. Are we building secure, not only against present day trials and testings; not only against the storms of the world, the flesh and the devil, which beset us; but, are we building secure against the day of the judgment of the believer’s works, when we must all stand before the Lord to receive the things done in the body, whether we have done good or bad? How much better was the building of the wise man. He built upon the rock, and when the rain descended, and the winds blew, and the floods came, his house fell not, for it was builded upon the Rock.
And still better is the one who not only builds on the Rock, but who builds a building of the “precious stone” quality.
I. CHRIST THE LIVING STONE DISALLOWED OF MEN (1Pe 2:4)
The Lord Jesus Christ was despised and rejected of men. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. He came into the world, and the world knew Him not. Here is something inexplicable. It is natural for men to seek their own. We read “Safety First,” at almost every turn of the road. Yet, here is one place where man utterly fails to see his own good, “A Living Stone disallowed indeed of men”: This statement is passing strange: but it is as true as it is strange. Men of the world do not come unto Him. He is cast aside as a worthless stone. He is disallowed of men. Christ is the Stone which the builders rejected. They would neither use Him as their foundation, as their chief corner stone, nor as their head stone. There is no place for Christ in the lives of men.
“Our Lord is now rejected,
And by the world disowned,
By the many still rejected,
And by the few enthroned.”
The Lord is as much “disallowed of men” today, as He was in the day of His birth, when there was no room for Him in the inn. He came at that time to His own, and His own received Him not; He was in the world and the world knew Him not. There was no place for Christ in His home city, Nazareth; there was place for Him in His Father’s House; there was no place for Him on the whole wide earth; so men took Him and nailed Him to a tree.
The world still holds the same attitude toward the Son of God. His will is not wanted, His way is not desired, and His words are not accepted.
Christ the Living Stone is disallowed indeed of men, because He does not fit in to their plan of architecture; He is not even to be considered. The contrast between Christ the Foundation, the Chief Corner Stone, the Head of the Corner, and the rest of the building would be too great. There is no symmetry, no harmony, no rhythm there, so Christ is disallowed. This is the reason that so few have any room for Jesus.
“Have you any room for Jesus,
He who bore your load of sin?
As He knocks and asks admission,
Sinner, will you let Him in?
“Room for Jesus, King of Glory!
Hasten now, His Word obey!
Swing the heart’s door widely open!
Bid Him enter while you may!
“Room for pleasure, room for business;
But for Christ the crucified-
Not a place that He can enter
In the heart for which He died!”
II. CHRIST A LIVING STONE CHOSEN AND PRECIOUS (1Pe 2:4, l.c.)
When Jesus was born, He grew up before the Father as a tender plant, as a root out of dry ground. He was precious to the Father.
Men may reject the Saviour and disallow Him as the Living Stone, but not so the Father. Christ is chosen of God, and precious. Away back in the days of His birth, when there was no room in the inn, when men had no thought, no care for the Son of God; even then the Father acclaimed Him, and spoke from Heaven by His angel to the watching shepherds, saying, “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.” While the infant Christ lay with no bed but a manger, a multitude of the Heavenly host broke loose, “Praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
At the time when the Jews were seeking to kill Him, and only a few Greeks desired Him, the Father broke loose from above and sounded His note of praise. The Son had said, “Father, glorify Thy Name,” and the Father answered, reverberating Heaven with His praise, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.”
At the time when Christ’s body lay in the tomb, when all the world had despised Him, and had slain Him; then the Father raised Him from the dead and glorified Him, giving Him a seat at His own right hand.
At the very time that the Israelites were stoning Stephen because of his faithful testimony to Christ, and in their killing of Stephen were reeking forth their hatred of the Son of God, Stephen saw Christ standing at the right hand of God.
Christ is both chosen of the Father and precious. Not only did He grow up before the Father as a tender plant, but He obtained from the Father by virtue of His death, a new love, and a new preciousness. Christ said, “Therefore doth My Father love Me, because I lay down My life,” for the sheep.
III. CHRIST IS THE CHIEF CORNER STONE (Heb 2:6)
Christ is more than the foundation. He is the Chief Corner Stone, elect and precious. We now come particularly to the thought of Jesus Christ in His supremacy, both in the individual life and in the church. The corner stone usually bears the mark of distinction in the dedication of a great building. On it is engraved the name which the building is to bear.
The Lord Jesus is one with His brethren in the great building and He shares with the saints every responsibility, but He is also the Chief Corner Stone. He is Chief; He is the Firstborn among many brethren; He wears the crown, and the diadems are His. In all things He holds pre-eminence.
The great general may be one with his army and share with them every conflict in the battle, every danger, every discomfort; but he remains, withal, the great chieftain. His commands are final, and must be obeyed. He is not only one with his men, but he is their chief.
Where is he who is not glad to add his voice to that great multitude who crown Christ Lord of all? John the Baptist was not slow to say that he was unworthy to stoop down and loose the sandals from the feet of Christ. Many were they in the olden days who came and fell at His feet. The rich young ruler fell there; the Syrophenician, the man of Gadara, Mary Magdalene, all took their places, at the feet of Jesus. Mary, the sister of Martha, found no greater joy than to sit at His feet, and hear His words.
Are we not ready to join with them and crown Him chief? We will not say unto men, Rabbi, Rabbi; but we will say, “Great Master,” unto Christ. We are willing to obey His command, to do His will, and to follow in His footsteps.
IV. CHRIST THE STONE IS PRECIOUS TO US WHO BELIEVE (1Pe 2:7, f.c)
The Lord Jesus is now raised from the symbolism of the rough and rugged stone, which is the foundation upon which we build. He is now heralded by the believer, as precious. To him the Living Stone takes the quality of diamond, and jewel most rare,
1. Christ the Living Stone is precious to the believer because He lends them security. They know in whom they believe; they know on whom they have put their trust, and they know He will never fail.
“On Christ the solid rock I stand
All other ground is sinking sand.”
2. Christ the Living Stone is precious to the believer, because He is the smitten Rock from which the Living Waters flow. Our fathers did all drink of that spiritual drink, that flowed from that spiritual Rock, and that Rock was Christ. We love the song, “Rock of Ages,” because it speaks of the Rock being cleft, and of the water and the Blood that flowed from its side.
3. Christ the Living Stone is precious to the believer, because it speaks of the City whose Builder and Maker is God. Jesus Christ and the Father, are the Temple of that New Jerusalem, whose great foundations and gates of pearl shall stand for evermore. As we think of the Living Stone, Christ becomes more and more precious to us; particularly, as our minds leap into that great beyond, where we shall dwell with Him for evermore.
How our hearts are endeared to Him; how precious are His thoughts unto us; we feel as the Shulamite felt, when she said,-“My Beloved is mine, and I am His.” We cry as she cried, “I am sick of love.” We call upon Him, as she called,-“Come over the mountains of separation.”
V. CHRIST A STONE OF STUMBLING (1Pe 2:8)
“And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the Word, being disobedient.” About this there are several things to be said:
1. Christ was a Stumbling Stone to Israel. Paul wrote it this way, as the Spirit moved him on: “But Israel * * stumbled at that stumblingstone; as it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence.” Christ came by the way of grace, through faith; and Israel, who followed after law-works, stumbled at Him. The Cross was to them the Rock of offence. He was set at naught of the builders. Paul wrote again: “But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock.”
Unto this day, the Living Stone, which became the stricken Rock, is a stone of stumbling to Israel.
2. Christ will be a Stone of Smiting to the Gentiles. The Jews have not been alone in their rejection of the Son of God. The Gentiles were party to the crucifixion, and they have been a party to the disallowing of the Living Stone even unto this day. What is the result? “And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder” (Mat 21:44).
Daniel saw a little stone cut without hands from the mountainside, and it fell on Nebuchadnezzar’s great colossus and ground it to powder. At the Coming of the Lord, that Stone will fall upon the Gentile nations which have rejected the Lord, and they shall receive the just judgment and punishment of the Lord.
What is our final admonition? It is this: It is the very core of Peter’s message concerning the Living Stone: “He that believeth on Him shall not be confounded.”
That Living Stone will prove to every trusting soul, a covert from the storm; it will prove the shadow of a great Rock in a weary land. Let us, therefore, seek its shelter. Let us hide in its cleff.
“Oh, safe to the Rock that is higher than I,
My soul in its conflicts and sorrows would fly;
So sinful, so weary, Thine, Thine would I be;
Thou blest ‘Rock of Ages,’ I’m hiding in Thee.
Hiding in Thee, hiding in Thee,
Thou blest ‘Rock of Ages,’ I’m hiding in Thee.
In the calm of the noontide, in sorrow’s lone hour,
In times when temptation casts o’er me its power;
In the tempests of life, on its wide, heaving sea,
Thou blest ‘Rock of Ages,’ I’m hiding in Thee.
How oft in the conflict, when pressed by the foe,
I have fled to my Refuge and breathed out my woe;
How often when trials like sea billows roll,
Have I hidden in Thee, O Thou Rock of my soul.”
VI. CHRIST THE STONE THE HEAD OF THE CORNER (1Pe 2:7)
Christ is the Foundation, the Chief Corner Stone. He is also the Head of the corner. In our way of thinking, this last expression carries us to the time of the ascension, when the Lord Jesus was exalted a Prince and a Saviour. He became obedient to death, even the death of the Cross, “wherefore God hath exceedingly exalted Him, and given Him a Name that is above every name.”
Using the symbolism of the Church as a body, the Lord is the Head, “From whom the whole body, fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth * * maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.”
There is, however, another suggestion of the Chief Corner Stone, becoming the Head of the corner. The words look back to the ascension, but they are also prophetic, and look on the Return of the Lord. For many years Israel has been unmindful of the Rock that begat them: they have forgotten the God that formed them. Israel stands, by interpretation, as “the builders who disallowed the Living Stone.” During the centuries that Israel has been trodden down, Jesus Christ has been to His Church, the Chief Corner Stone.
Israel will not always dwell in rebellion. One of these days Christ will come, and He who was despised and rejected by His own people, will be received and admired. They who placed upon Him the crown of thorns will place upon Him the diadem of David, a crown of glory.
Now hear the words of the Prophet David: “Open to Me the gates of righteousness: I will go into them, and I will praise the Lord: * *. The Stone which the builders refused is become the Head stone of the corner. This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes” (Psa 118:19-22). These words doubtless anticipate the resurrection, and Christ’s entrance into Heaven, with His exaltation to the Father’s right hand.
Now hear the words of the Prophet Zechariah: “Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt * * bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it.” How glorious will be the fulfilment of this prophecy! Jesus Christ exalted and made Head, by the Father in His ascension, shall yet be exalted and made Head by His people Israel.
“Every eye shall now behold Him,
Robed in dreadful majesty;
Those who set at naught and sold Him,
Pierced and nailed Him to the tree,
Deeply wailing,
Shall the true Messiah see.”
VII. WE ALSO AS LIVING STONES (1Pe 2:5)
God is a Builder, as well as we. We build on the solid Rock, a building that must pass the inspection of the judgment-seat of Christ. God is also building on that same blessed foundation; He is building a spiritual house. The Foundation on which God builds is Christ the Living Stone; the stones which He uses for His building are saints, the lively stones.
Why are we lively stones? Because we have new life in Christ Jesus. He lives, and we live in Him. His life is our life. We have been born again. We are children of God in Christ Jesus; we have eternal life.
Why are we stones? Christ said to Peter, “Thou art Cephas, thou shalt be a rock.” We are rocks because we are bone of His bone, and flesh of His flesh. Whatsoever He is, we are. He puts the iron in our blood. He makes us an iron pillar and a stone wall. We are strong, invincible, incorruptible, in Him.
We are lively stones, builded up a spiritual house. In Eph 2:20-22 we read: “And are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the Chief Corner Stone; in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”
The Lord calls us His building. Each stone is the unit of a Christian life. Each stone is a living stone. The building completed, is a holy temple, a spiritual house. In that house, God takes up His abode in the Spirit. Christ, too, comes to abide in us. What is the result? There is formed a spiritual house which is God’s holy priesthood, “to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” God’s spiritual house, becomes a lighthouse to make God known. It is a house which is the storehouse of Truth, “the pillar and ground of the Truth.”
Precious, tried and sure foundation,
Disallowed, indeed, of men;
Living Stone, by God now chosen,
Laid in Zion, with glad acclaim.
Smitten Rock, with water flawing,
Cleft, my thirst to satisfy;
Symbol of His side once riven,
When the Christ went forth to die.
Stone refused by sinful builders,
Now become the Corner-stone;
Chief of all, by God accepted,
Seated on the Father’s throne.
Blessed Head Stone, hear the shoutings,
“Grace, yes, grace to it,” they cry;
Christ descending, now admired,
Coming in the clouds of sky.
Stone cut out from yonder mountain,
Smiting kingdoms built by man;
Filling earth with all its power,
Christ is coming back to reign.
AN ILLUSTRATION
STILL STANDING
And the Lord added to them day by day those that were saved. An insane man once entered a crowded church, and grasping two pillars of the gallery cried: “I will pull these down and destroy you, as Samson did the Philistine lords.” A panic was imminent, when the minister, quietly waving his hand, said, “Let him try.” He did try and that was the end of the panic. Infidelity lays hold of the pillars of our temple,-the Bible, the Divinity of Christ, and the like. Professors of probabilities say, “We will pull them down.” Let them try. Many have tried, but our temple stands. It was built by the Almighty, and from its sure cornerstone, to its highest pinnacle it is secure.-From the Presbyterian.
Fuente: Neighbour’s Wells of Living Water
1Pe 2:4. The figure of infantile nourishment is now dropped and the apostle takes up another illustration. Christ is represented as a living stone which denotes that He is not a material one such as the temples of men use for their foundation. Disallowed indeed of men refers to the rejection of Christ at the hands of the Jewish leaders. Jesus thus spoke of himself when talking to those self-righteous men (Mat 21:42). Notwithstanding His rejection by the Jewish leaders, God accepted Him and showed him to be precious by revealing the eternal riches offered thereby.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1Pe 2:4. To whom coming. The relative form of the sentence indicates its intimate connection with the previous section. The connection, however, is not between an exhortation and a statement of privilege appended in support of the exhortation, but between two exhortations which, while in themselves distinct, have a meeting-point in what is said of the Lord. This verse, therefore, gives a further explanation of the primary condition of all growth, namely, union with this Lord Himself. They who have tasted that He is good have an irresistible attraction to Him, and it is by giving effect to this attraction that they grow. If the Church, too, is to increase into that which God means it to be, its members must not only feed upon the Word, but come constantly to Christ Himself. Though the verb by which this is expressed is the verb from which the word proselyte is derived, it is fanciful to suppose that Peter had in his mind anything relating to the modes of admission for Gentile converts into Judaism. Neither is he alluding specially to service. It is held, indeed (e.g. by Schott), that Christ being represented here not as the source of the individual believers life, but rather as the foundation of the structure which is being built up of many regenerate individuals, the coming naturally refers neither to the first act of faith nor to the daily renewal of personal fellowship, but to the stated coming with all the powers of the regenerate life to Christ for purposes of service. The idea then would be that the giving of ourselves to Christs service in the great work of rearing the spiritual temple is to be made our recognised mode of conduct. But the construction of the verb (which is unusual here) points rather to something more than a simple approach to oneto a close approach or intimate association; while the present tense describes that as a habit. The idea, therefore, is simply thisthat the upbuilding of the Church on Christ the foundation can be made good only in so far as we, the builders, are ourselves ever coming into close personal union with the same Christ. The verb selected for the expression of this union, meaning as it does to attach one closely to an object, is in perfect harmony with the figure under which both Christ and believers are represented here.
a living stone. The E. V. inserts as unto. The original, however, is bolder. It has no such note of comparison, but designates the Lord directly a living stone; in which phrase the main thing, too, is the noun stone, not the qualifying adjective living. Christ is spoken of under the figure of a stone simply because in relation to the House He is the foundation; as believers are termed stones, because in relation to the same House they are in one point of view the materials to be used in building, while in another they are the builders. The word for stone here is an entirely different word from the term which is identical with the personal name Peter, and this prevents us from supposing (with Bengel, Canon Farrar, etc.) that the apostle was thinking here of the new name (Peter = rock or stone) which he had himself received from Christ. He uses the term simply as a well-understood Old Testament title of Messiah, as he uses it again in his discourse after the healing of the cripple (Act 4:11), and as Christ Himself employs it in order to point the application of the parable of the wicked husbandmen (Mat 21:42). Peter, indeed, as some suppose, may have been that one of His disciples who, as Jesus went out of the temple, said unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here, and who now pointed his readers to that Master Himself as the chief corner-stone of a more glorious temple slowly rising out of more imperishable material. The adjective living is attached here, as it is also to the subsequent stones, simply as a note of the figurative application of the noun. It does not refer to the Resurrection of Christ, neither does it express such ideas as that Christ became this living foundation only through death, or that He lives to make others alive, or that He penetrates and fills with His life the whole organism of believers, and causes it to grow (Fronmller). Far less is the expression analogous to the phrase living rock, describing the stone in its natural state as distinguished from the stone broken and hewn.
rejected indeed of men, but with God chosen, honourable. There is no reference here to the Jews as distinguished from others. There is simply a broad contrast drawn between two kinds of treatment accorded to the living stone, one on the side of men, and another on the side of God. It is much in Peters habit to draw such contrasts (cf. Act 2:23-24; Act 3:13-15; Act 4:10; Act 5:30-31; Act 10:39-40). Hence, too, instead of the builders of Psa 118:22, we get the more general phrase men. The verb which the E. V., following Tyndale, Cranmer, and the Genevan Version, translates disallowed here (as it does again in 1Pe 2:7, but nowhere else in the N. T.), conveys the stronger idea of rejection after trial, or on the ground of want of qualification. Here reproved is given by Wycliffe, and reprobated by the Rheims, and outside this Epistle the verb is invariably rendered reject in the E. V. The value which the stone has in Gods sight is expressed by two adjectives, one of which describes it as chosen or elect (i.e chosen by God as qualified for His object); while the other describes it as consequently honourable, or in honour with Him as such (the term being somewhat different from the precious in 1Pe 1:19). Other epithets, which in Isa 28:16 are descriptive rather of what the stone is to be in the building than of what it is in Gods estimate, are omitted.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Observe here, 1. The denomination, or title, given to Christ, he is styled a living stone, and the chief corner-stone.
1. A living stone, that is, a lively stone, no dead foundation; a life-giving stone, having not only life in himself essentially but communicatively, imparting spiritual life to the whole building. Christ is not only an head of authority, but an head of vital influence to all his members; because he lives, they shall live also.
2. He is styled also the chief corner-stone, both in regard of sustentation; the corner-stone supports the whole building, the church’s grace, the church’s peace, the church’s consolation, the church’s salvation, are all upheld and maintained by him: and in regard of union, the corner-stone unites, ties, and knits the other stones together, that they should not drop out of the building. Christ alone unites the several stones of the spiritual building to himself, and one another. And this corner-stone is of God’s own immediate laying, Behold, I lay in Sion a corner-stone. Christ was first manifested and offered to the church of the Jews, and then to the rest of the world.
Observe, 2. The titles given to believers; 1. They of lively stones are built a spiritual house. Believers are God’s temple, dedicated to, and set apart for, his special service, and also enjoying his gracious and special presence. “This is my rest for ever,” says God concerning the believer’s heart; “here will I dwell, for I have a delight therein.”
2. They are an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable through Christ.
Learn hence, that every Christian in this life is a priest, and ought to offer up himself a sacrifice or oblation unto God. In a sacrifice there was a separation of the thing sacrificed from common use; the beast was separated from the rest of the flock, so must the Christian be set apart from the rest of the world. There was an addiction, or dedication, or solemn consecration, of the thing set apart to some holy and special use and purpose: thus the Christian, that presents himself a living sacrifice unto God, does not only separate himself from the sin, the world, and the flesh, but does addict, and devote himself to God, to serve and please him, to honour and glorify him.
Observe, 3. The application which believers make to Christ, in order to their being his spiritual temple, and a royal priesthood. To whom coming as unto a living stone! the particle denotes a continual motion, by which the soul gains ground, and gets nearer and nearer to Christ; they are daily coming by faith to him, and gradually advancing in the knowledge of him, and love unto him.
Observe lastly, The sweet fruit and blessed effect of their faith, Whosoever believeth in him shall not be confounded: that is, not ashamed, as a person who is disappointed of his hopes and expectations; he shall not be ashamed of his choice, he shall not be ashamed of his profession, he shall never be ashamed of the cause and interest of Christ, which he has espoused, and at all times appeared for; nor of the work and service of Christ, nor of the time and pains expended in their work and service: nor shall he ever be ashamed hereafter that he never was ashamed here.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Christ, “A Living Stone”
The last part of 1Pe 2:4 comes from Psa 118:22 , which Jesus applied to himself and his kingdom in Mat 21:42-46 . Peter also used this same passage in his first speech before the council ( Act 4:11 ). While men did not see Jesus as filling their needs and so rejected him, Woods says literally he was “by the side of God…chosen” and precious, or worthy of honor.
Fuente: Gary Hampton Commentary on Selected Books
1Pe 2:4. To whom coming With desire and by faith; as unto a living stone Living from eternity; alive from the dead; and alive for evermore: and a firm foundation, communicating spiritual life to those that come to him, and are built upon him, making him the ground of their confidence and hope for time and for eternity. The apostle alludes to Isa 28:16, where the formation of a Christian church, for the spiritual worship of God, is foretold under the image of a temple, which God was to build on the Messiah as the foundation-stone thereof. See the note there. There is a wonderful beauty and energy in these expressions, which describe Christ as a spiritual foundation, solid, firm, durable; and believers as a spiritual building erecting thereon, in preference to that temple which the Jews accounted their highest glory; and St. Peter, speaking of him thus, shows he did not judge himself, but Christ, to be the rock on which the church was built; disallowed , rejected indeed of, or by, men First and primarily by the Jews and their rulers, as not answering their carnal and worldly expectations, nor suiting their way of building; that is, not to be made use of for the carrying on and promoting of their worldly projects and interests. By representing Christ as being rejected of men, the apostle intimated that he was the person spoken of Psa 118:22; The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner; a passage which our Lord himself, in his conversation with the chief priests and elders, referred to as a prophecy which they were about to fulfil by rejecting him; but whose exaltation, notwithstanding all they could do to prevent it, should assuredly take place. See on Mat 21:42. But the Jews, or, added to them, the Turks, heathen, and infidels, are not the only people that have rejected, and do reject Christ; but all Christians so called, who live in known sin on the one hand, or who expect to be saved by the merit of their own works on the other, reject him; as do also all hypocrites, formalists, lukewarm, indolent, worldly-minded professors, and all those backsliders who, having begun in the Spirit end in the flesh, and draw back unto perdition, instead of continuing to believe, love, and obey, to the saving of their souls, Heb 10:38-39. But chosen of God From all eternity, to be the foundation of his church; and precious Of unspeakable dignity and worth in himself, in the sight of God, and in the eyes of all true believers.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
ARGUMENT 8
THE SPIRITUAL OFFICE
4. All sinners are the devils dead rocks, while Christians are Gods living stones. The Church of God, the divine ecclesia, not human ecclesiasticism, is here symbolized as a beautiful and majestic stone edifice, the apostles and prophets constituting the foundation, while Jesus Christ is the head of the corner The two pairs of parallel walls, i.e., Jew and Gentile constituting the grand quadrangular superstructure, are consolidated in the corners by the Chief cornerstone, secure against all the storms dashing against it by the caprice of men and the rage of devils.
5. And you as living stones are built up a spiritual house. You see how every saved soul becomes a constituent stone in that grand and majestic superstructure, destined forever to stand towering among the angels, the delight of cherubim and seraphim, and the admiration of the universe. Pursuant to this beautiful and instructive imagery, all truly sanctified people, in the capacity of efficient soul savers, are stone-masons. We go out into the devils mountains with an ample supply of Gods dynamite. We drill down into Satans profound strata, deposit the dynamite, apply the celestial electricity and witness smashings, explosions, blowing up and disintegrating the devils rock. This is the Sinai Gospel of a true spiritual conviction. Then every fellow lights on his own rock with his chisel, transforming it into the shape requisite for its place in the glorious edifice, beautifying it with the gorgeous luster of celestial splendor, transporting it on the salvation wagon to the building site and depositing it in its proper place in the gorgeous superstructure. All this is the Calvary Gospel of regeneration. Now the stones gathered from Satans mountain ranges, girdling the globe, have all reached their predestinated places in the glorified Church of the First John, there to abide, unjostled, despite earthquakes and volcanoes, in perfect and imperturbable rest through all eternity. This is the Pentecostal Gospel of entire sanctification, the souls sweet, unutterable and eternal repose.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 4
Living; durable, permanent.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
2:4 {4} To whom coming, [as unto] a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, [and] precious,
(4) He advances the same exhortation, but uses another kind of borrowed speech, alluding to the temple. Therefore he says, that the company of the faithful is as a certain holy and spiritual building, built of the living stones, the foundation of which is Christ, as a living stone sustaining all that are joined to him with his living power and knitting them together with himself, although this great treasure is neglected by men.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
2. Growing in God 2:4-5
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Not only is Jesus Christ the source of the believer’s spiritual sustenance, He is also our foundation. Peter not only changed his metaphor from growing to building, but he also changed it from an individual to a corporate focus. However, unlike a piece of rock, Jesus Christ is alive and able to impart strength to those who suffer for His sake. "Living stone" is an oxymoron, a figure of speech in which the writer joins contradictory or incongruous terms to make a point. The point here is that even though Jesus Christ is the church’s foundation, He is also alive today. Builders quarried and chiseled huge blocks of stone to support large buildings in the ancient Near East. Some of the Old Testament writers compared God to such a foundation (e.g., Deu 32:4; Deu 32:15; Deu 32:18; Deu 32:30-31; Psa 18:2; Psa 18:31; Psa 18:46; Psa 62:2; Psa 62:6; et al.; cf. Mat 7:24-25; Mat 16:18). Peter modified this figure and used it to describe Jesus Christ. [Note: See C. Norman Hillyer, "’Rock-Stone’ Imagery in I Peter," Tyndale Bulletin 22 (1971):58-81; and Frederic R. Howe, "Christ, the Building Stone, in Peter’s Theology," Bibliotheca Sacra 157:625 (January-March 2000):35-43.]
Here Peter began to give the basis on which the four preceding exhortations rest. These exhortations were: be holy (1Pe 1:13-16), be fearing (1Pe 1:17-21), be loving (1Pe 1:22-25), and be consuming the Word (1Pe 2:1-3). They grow out of our relationship to God who has begotten us.
The apostle referred to Psa 118:22 that both Jesus and he had previously quoted to the Sanhedrin (Mat 21:42; Act 4:11).
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Chapter 6
THE PRIESTHOOD OF BELIEVERS
1Pe 2:4-10
LEAVING the exhortation to individual duties, the Apostle turns now to describe the Christian society in relation to its Divine Founder, and tells both of the privileges possessed by believers, and of the services which they ought to render. He employs for illustration a figure very common in Holy Scripture, and compares the faithful to stones in the structure of some noble edifice, built upon a sure foundation. Such language on his lips must have had a deep significance. He was the rock-man; his name Peter was bestowed by Christ in recognition of his grand confession: and Jesus had consecrated the simile which the Apostle uses by His own words. “Upon this rock I will build My Church” {Mat 16:18} words which were daily finding a blessed fulfillment in the growth of these Asian Churches.
A rock is no unusual figure in the Old Testament to represent Gods faithfulness, and its use is specially frequent in Isaiah and the Psalms. “In the Lord Jehovah is an everlasting rock,” {Isa 26:4} says the prophet; again he calls God “the rock of Israel”; {Isa 30:29} while the prayers of the Psalmist are full of the same thought concerning the Divine might and protection: “Be Thou my strong rock and my fortress” {Psa 31:2} “Lead me to the Rock that is higher than I”; {Psa 61:2} “O God, my rock and my Redeemer”. {Psa 19:14}
But the language of the New Testament goes farther than that of the Old. Strength, protection, permanence-these were attributes of the rock of which Isaiah spake and David sang. The life-possessing and life-imparting virtue of the Spirit of Christ is a part of the glad tidings of the Gospel. Through Him were light and immortality brought to light. The rock which lives is found in Jesus Christ. In Him is life without measure, ready to be imparted to all who seek to be built up in Him.
“Unto whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious.” By purification of thought, and act, and word, that childlike frame has been sought after which fits them to draw near; and they come with full assurance. Jesus they know as the Crucified, as the Lord who came to His own, and they received Him not. Generations of preparation had not made Jewry ready for her Kings coming, had failed to impress the people with the signs of His advent; and so they disowned Him, and cried, “We have no king but Caesar.” But the converts know Jesus also as Him who was raised from the dead and exalted to glory. This honor He hath “with God.” No other than He could bring salvation. Therefore has he received a name that is above every name. And “with God” here signifies that heavenly exaltation and glory. The sense is as when Jesus testifies, “I speak what I have seen with My Father” {Joh 8:38} -that is, in heaven- or when He prays, “Glorify me, O Father, with Thine own self”. {Joh 17:5} From this excellent glory He sends down His Spirit, and gives to His people a share of that life which has been made manifest in Him. Their part is but to come, to seek, and every one that seeketh is sure to find. “Ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house.” Not because they are living men does the Apostle speak of them as living stones. They may be full of the vigor of natural life, yet have no part in Christ. The life which joins men to Him comes by the new birth. And the union of believers with Christ makes itself patent by a daily progress. He is a living stone; they are to be made more and more like Him by a constant drawing near, a constant drinking in from His fullness of the life which is the light of men. In this light new graces grow within them; old sins are cast aside. By this preparation, this shaping of the living stones, the Spirit fits Christians for their place in the Spiritual building, unites them with one another and with Christ, fashions out of them a true communion of saints-saints, who, that they may advance in saintliness, have duties to perform both directly to God and for His sake to the world around. By diligence therein the upbuilding goes daily forward.
First, they are “to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” From the day when God revealed His will on Sinai, such has been the ideal set before His chosen servants. “Ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” {Exo 19:6} stands in the preface of the Divinely given law. And God changes not. Hence the praise of the Lambs finished work when He has purchased unto God men of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation is sung before the throne in the self-same strain: “Thou madest them to be unto God a kingdom and priests”. {Rev 5:10} Under the early dispensation God was leading men up from material sacrifices to pay unto Him true spiritual worship. The Psalmist has learnt the lesson when he pleads, “Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, and put your trust in me” {Psa 4:6} and Hoseas sense of what was well-pleasing to God is made clear in his exhortation. “Take with you words and return unto the Lord; say unto Him, Take away all iniquity, and accept that which is good, so will we render as bullocks the offering of our lips”. {Hos 14:3} The Apostle to the Romans is hardly more explicit than this when he urges, “present your bodies a living sacrifice,” {Rom 12:1} or to the Hebrews, “Let us offer up a sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of lips which make confession to His name”. {Heb 13:15}
But the Apostles could add to the exhortations of the prophets and psalmists a ground of blessed assurance, could promise how these living sacrifices, these offerings of praise, had gained a certainty of acceptance through Jesus Christ: “Through Him we have boldness and access in confidence through our faith in Him”; {Eph 3:12} and in another place, “Having Him as a great priest over the house of God,” that spiritual house into which believers are builded, “let us draw near with a true heart, in fullness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water”. {Heb 10:22} Thus do believers become priests unto God, in every place lifting up holy hands in prayer, prayer which is made acceptable through their great High-priest.
It was only from oral teaching that these Asian Christians knew of those lessons which we now can quote as the earliest messages to the Church of Christ. The Scripture was to them as yet the Scripture of the Old Testament, and to this St. Peter points them for the confirmation which it supplies. And his quotation is worthy of notice both for its manner and its matter: “Because it is contained in Scripture, Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious; and he that believeth on Him shall not be put to shame.” The passage is from Isaiah; {Isa 28:16} but a comparison with that verse shows us that the Apostle has not quoted all the words of the prophet, and that what he has given corresponds much more closely with the Greek of the Septuagint than with the Hebrew. The latter concludes, “He that believeth shall not make haste,” and contains some words not represented in the version of the Seventy. The variations which St. Peter accepts are such as to assure us that for him (and the same is true for the rest of the Apostles) the purport, the spiritual lessons, of the word were all which he counted essential. Neither Christ Himself nor His Apostles adhere in quotation to precise verbal exactness. They felt that there lay behind the older record so many deep meanings for which the fathers of old were not prepared, but which Gospel light made clear. To somewhat of this fuller sense the translators of the Septuagint seem to have been guided. They lived nearer to the rising of the daystar. Through their labors God was in part preparing the world for the message of Christ. The words which Isaiah was guided to use express the confidence of a believer who was looking onward to Gods promise as in the future: “He shall not make haste.” He knows that the purpose of God will be brought to pass; that, as the prophet elsewhere says, “The Lord will hasten it in its time.” {Isa 60:22} Man is not to step in, Jacob-like, to anticipate the Divine working.
But “shall not be ashamed” was a form of the promise more suited to the days of St. Peter and these infant Churches. For the name of Christ was in many ways made a reproach; and only men of faith, like Moses and the heroes celebrated with him in Heb 11:1-40, could count that reproach greater riches than the treasures of Egypt. Other and weaker hearts needed encouragement, needed to be pointed to the privileges and glories which are the inheritance of the followers of Jesus. And in this spirit he applies the prophetic words, “For you therefore which believe is the preciousness.” Faith makes real all the offers of the Gospel. It opens heaven, as to the vision of St. Stephen, so that while they are still here believers behold the glory of God to which Christ has been exalted, are assured of the victory which has been won for them, and that in His strength they may conquer also. Thus they receive continually the earnest of those precious and exceeding great promises {2Pe 1:4} whereby they become partakers of the Divine nature.
But all men have not faith. The Bible tells us this on every page. God knows what is in man, and in His revelation He has set forth not only invitations and blessings, but warnings and penalties. Life and good, death and evil-these have been continually proclaimed as linked together by Gods law, but ever with the exhortation, “Choose life.” Of such warning messages St. Peter gives examples from prophecy and psalm: “But for such as disbelieve, the stone which the builders rejected, the same was made the head of the corner,” {Psa 118:22} “and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense”; {Isa 8:14} “for they stumble at the word, being disobedient.” Here the Apostle touches the root of the evil. The test of faith is obedience. It was so in Eden; it must be ever so. But now, as then, the tempter comes with his insidious questionings, “Hath God said?” and sowing doubts, he goes his way, leaving them to work; and work they do. Now it is the truth, now the wisdom, of the command, that men stumble at. But in each case they disobey. Those leave it unobserved; these despise and set it at naught. And the penalty is sure. For mark the twofold aspect of Gods dealing which is set forth in the passages chosen by St. Peter to enforce his lesson. Spite of mans disobedience, Gods purpose is not thwarted. The stone which He laid in Zion has been made the head of the corner. Though rejected by some builders it has lost none of its preciousness, none of its strength. Those who draw near unto it find life thereby; are made fit for their places in the Divine building, in the kingdom of the Lords house which He will most surely establish as the latter days draw on. But they who disobey are overthrown. The despised stone, which is the sure word of God, rises up in mens self-chosen path, and makes them fall, and at the last, if they persist in despising it, will appear for their condemnation. “Whereunto also they were appointed.” The Apostle has in mind the words of Isaiah, how the prophet, in that place from which he has just quoted, declares that many shall stumble and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and be taken. This is the lot of the disobedient. These penalties dog that sin. It is the unvarying law of God. The Bible teaches this from first to last, by precepts as well as by examples. The disobedient must stumble. But the Bible does not teach that any were appointed unto disobedience. Such fatalist lessons are alien to Gods infinite love. The two ways are set before all men. God tries us thus because He has gifted us above the rest of creation, that we may render Him a willing service. But neither prophet nor Apostle teaches that to stumble is to be finally cast away. Both picture Gods mercy in as large terms as those in which St. Paul speaks of the Jews: “Did God cast off His people? God forbidThey, if they continue not in their unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again”. {Rom 11:1-36}
A hardening in part hath befallen Israel, and to the Church of Christ there is offered the blessedness which aforetime was to be the portion of the chosen people. But the offer is made on like terms of obedient service, and involves large duties. St. Peter marks the likeness of the two offers by choosing the words of the Old Testament to describe the Christian calling, with its privileges and its duties. Believers in Christ are a peculiar treasure unto God from among all people, a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation, even as was said to Israel {Exo 19:5-6} when they came out of Egypt and received the Law from Sinai. But among the dispersion, for whom he writes, there were those who had been heathens, as well as the converts from Judaism. That he may show them also to be embraced in the new covenant, and their calling contemplated under the old, the Apostle points to another of Gods promises, where Hosea {Hos 1:10-11; Hos 2:1-23} tells of the grace that was ready to be shed forth on them which in time past were no people, but now are the people of God, which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. Thus all, Jew and Gentile, are to be made one holy fellowship, one people for Gods own possession.
And this kingdom of Gods priests has its duty to the world as well as unto God. Israel in time past was chosen to be Gods witness to the rest of mankind, so that when men saw that no nation had God so nigh unto them as Jehovah was whenever Israel called upon Him, that no nation had statutes and judgments so righteous as all the Law which had been given from Sinai, they might be constrained to say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people,” and might themselves be won to the service of a God so present and so holy. And now each member of the Christian body, while offering himself a living sacrifice to God, while delighting to do His will, while treasuring His law, is to exercise himself in wider duties, that Gods glory may be displayed unto all men. One of the psalmists, whose words have been in part referred to Christ Himself, testifies how this priesthood for mankind should be fulfilled: “I have published righteousness in the great congregation; lo, I will not refrain my lips, O Lord, Thou knowest. I have not hid Thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared Thy faithfulness and Thy salvation; I have not concealed Thy loving-kindness and Thy truth from the great congregation.” {Psa 40:9-10} These were the excellences which the Psalmist had found in Gods service, and his heart ran over with desire to impart the knowledge unto others. With juster reason shall Christs servants be prompted to a like evangel. They cannot hold their peace, specially while they consider how great blessings those lose who as yet own no allegiance to their Master.
“That ye may show forth the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” This theme fills the rest of the letter. The Apostle teaches that in every condition this duty has its place and its opportunities. Subjects may fulfill it, as they yield obedience to their rulers, servants in the midst of service to their masters, wives and husbands in their family life, each individual in the society where his lot is cast, and specially those who preside over the Christian congregations. Wherever the goodness of Gods mercy has been tasted, there should be hearts full of thanksgiving, voices tuned to the praise of Him who has done great things for them. Lives led with this aim will make men to be truly what God designs: a holy nation; a kingdom of priests. And ever as men walk thus will the kingdom for which we daily pray be brought nearer.
The opportunities for winning men to Christ differ in modern times from those which were open to the earliest Christian converts; but there is still no lack of adversaries, no lack of those by whom the hope of the believer is deemed unreasonable: and now, as then, the good works which the opponents behold in Christian lives will have their efficacy. These cannot forever be spoken against. A good manner of life in Christ shall, through His grace, finally put the gainsayers to shame. They shall learn, and gain blessing with the lesson, that the stone which they have so long been rejecting has been set up by God to be the foundation of His Church, the head stone of the corner, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.