Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening and now
for today's program. Welcome to our program. I'm glad
you could join us today and I hope and pray that you benefit spiritually
from the preaching of God's Word as I do each Sunday morning as
I bring these messages from the Word of God, the Bible. Today
I'd like for you to, if you'd like to follow along in your
Bibles, I'm gonna be looking at 1 Peter chapter two. 1 Peter chapter two. The title of the message is this,
Christ is Precious. Christ is Precious. And the title
of this message comes from verse seven of 1 Peter chapter two. Let's just read verse seven.
It says, unto you therefore which believe, he, that is Christ,
is precious. But unto them which be Disobedient,
that means unbelievers. He's the stone which the builders
disallowed. And the same has made the head
of the corner. And we'll talk about that. But he's talking
to believers here, or professing believers. And he's showing how
if you're a true believer, Christ is truly precious in a way that
unbelievers cannot understand. Because Christ is the one and
only way of salvation. Christ himself and the glory
of his finished work is my only hope, my only merit, my only
plea. Nothing else, everything else
is excluded. I don't care how noble it sounds
or how moral it sounds to other people. And that's what I'm gonna
talk about. But let's go back to verse one
of chapter two, where the Apostle Peter is encouraging believers
to fight sin. And he says, wherefore laying
aside all malice, that's hatred, all guile, that's a dishonesty,
and hypocrisies, that's acting as if we're something we're not,
all envies, unlawful desire of things, and all evil speakings,
In other words, lay those aside. Believers are to fight sin, not
in order to be saved, but because we already are. And then he says
in verse two, as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the
word that you may grow thereby. Now, you know, a lot of people
are confused about that. They talk about the milk of the
word might be something that's easy to understand, and the meat
of the word is the harder, deeper doctrines. No, what Peter's saying
is that we are to be, if we're believers, we're to be as eager
to feed upon the word of God as an infant is eager to feed
upon its mother's milk. That's what he's saying. He's
not making any statements about any particular divisions of depth,
of meaning in the word of God. It's the whole word of God. We're
to feed upon, Christ said this, man does not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from God. Christ's word, he is
the living word. He is the subject of the preach
word and he is the written word. And so we're to feed upon his
word. And so he says, you're to be eager. He says in verse
three, and this is the key, if so be you have tasted that the
Lord is gracious. You're not gonna be eager to
feed upon the word of God unless God has already been gracious
to you. Now, what do I mean by that? There are things in this
book, my friend, that people who claim to be Christians actually
despise. I've spoken of that on this program
many times, the doctrine of the fall of man, the spiritual deadness
of man, the doctrine of election, the doctrine of particular redemption,
that Christ died for his people, not for the whole world. These
are doctrines of the Bible. We could talk about predestination,
or we could talk about redemption, we could talk about righteousness
imputed. There's doctrines that people
despise. Why do they despise these doctrines? Because they
haven't tasted yet that the Lord is gracious. They don't have
a taste for them. If God is ever gracious to you,
he's gonna bring you down to the point that you see yourself
as you really are a sinner who deserves and has earned nothing
but death and hell. I don't care where you grew up
or what you've done, that if God, listen, the psalmist said
it this way in Psalm 130 in verse three, Lord, if thou Lord shouldest
mark iniquities, who would stand? The wrath of God, listen to me,
the wrath of God abides upon all sinners to whom God charges
with sin. And it may be a preacher in a
pulpit, it may be a parishioner in a pew, it may be somebody
who dies for their fellow man. You see, there's only one righteousness. that will bring sinners in right
with God, and that's the imputed righteousness of Christ. It's the righteousness of God
revealed in the gospel. And so people despise that. People
argue against it. They say, well, if I believe
that, then it doesn't matter what I do. Well, that's because
you haven't tasted that the Lord is gracious. Grace is not only
a doctrine, grace is a dynamic. Listen, when the Holy Spirit
gives you a new heart, a new mind, a new will, new affections,
that's the power of God's grace to bring a sinner to plead nothing
but Christ and to follow Him. And so he says, if so be that
you've tasted that the Lord is gracious, look at verse four,
to whom coming. In other words, it's a continual
coming, coming to Christ. Coming to Christ is not just
something that you're supposed to do when you're a young person
and you get into a revival meeting and the preacher tugs at your
heartstrings through emotional stories and you walk an aisle.
Oh, I came to Christ back. No. For a believer, coming to
Christ is an everyday, lifetime thing. I come to him every day. Come to his word. prayed to him
as my great high priest plead his righteousness evermore. So
he says in verse four, to whom coming? As unto a living stone. Now the stone there is a way
of referring to Christ based upon Old Testament prophecies
that speaks of him as the builder of the church and the foundation
of the church and the chief cornerstone of the church. and he's a living
stone. We don't worship a dead God.
We're not looking for his tomb or his shroud. We look unto Christ,
Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith. We serve
a living Savior, a living Lord. Somebody said, well, if they
found his tomb, would you wanna go there? No. As the angel said
to the disciples, he's not here. I wanna go where he is, not where
he is not. And all these religious artifacts
that people worship and think there's some spiritual power
there, my friend, it's just idolatry. We come to him continually as
unto a living stone that was disallowed indeed of men. Men
turned him down. He came unto his own and his
own received him not, but chosen of God. God chose his son to
be the surety. the mediator, the substitute,
the redeemer, the savior of his people. God chose him. He's the second person of the
Trinity, co-equal with the father and the spirit. And he's precious
to the father. The father said at his baptism,
this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased, hear ye him. The father received him up under
glory. And he says in verse five, you
also as lively or living stones. Now his people are called stones,
little stones, like Peter was called a little stone. Christ
is the rock, the boulder you might say. He's the foundation
of the church. He's the chief cornerstone of
the church. His people are little stones
set in place, a building, as we read in passages like Ephesians
chapter two, a building. We're all, we who are saved by
grace, we who are justified based on His righteousness imputed,
we who are redeemed by His blood, we who are born again by the
Spirit, who are brought to faith in Christ, we're just little
stones in the church, the building of the church, set where He would
have us. And He says, you're built up
a spiritual house. What's He talking about? The
church, the church is not a building. The church is the people of God,
the elect of God, the redeemed of the Lord, His sheep, His brethren. And he says, and holy priesthood. Now, holy means that they're
separated. It doesn't mean they're perfect people. We who believe
are perfect in Christ legally. based upon His righteousness
imputed to us. His blood has washed away our
sins and God will not charge them to us. Who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justify it. We
cannot be condemned, Christ died. But we're not perfect in ourselves.
Now one day we will be when we go to be with Him, when we're
glorified. But now we have a struggle with the flesh. But we're still
holy. We're separated under God. He chose us before the foundation
of the world. He redeemed us by the blood of
Christ. He regenerated us by His Spirit.
We're separated by His grace. Our separation doesn't have to
do with what we wear, or what we eat, or what we don't eat.
It's the grace of God in Christ, and we're a wholly, a separated
priesthood. Now, what does that mean, priesthood?
That means we have full, free access to God by the blood of
Jesus Christ. There's nothing hindering me
from coming to God, into his presence, pleading the righteousness
of his Son. Now if I come pleading anything
else, there's a big wall between me and God. Cain came pleading
his works. He was rejected. Abel pled the
blood. He was accepted. You see that? And that's the priesthood. And
he says to offer up spiritual sacrifices. What are those spiritual
sacrifices? Our prayers, our worship, our
praises, singing hymns, Our obedience, the honor hymn. And how are those
things acceptable? Because they're not yet perfect.
I'll tell you how, verse five. Acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. That's it. The only thing that
makes us accepted, or our works accepted, or our praises accepted,
our spiritual sacrifices accepted, is we're accepted in the beloved
Jesus Christ. That's His intercessory work,
He's our advocate. He lived and died, was buried
and rose again for our justification of His people. He ascended into
the Father, He's seated at the right hand of the Father, ever
living to make intercession for us. completing his merits all
the time. And that's how we're accepted.
Verse six, wherefore also it is contained in the scripture,
behold, I lay in Zion. Now he's quoting here from the
book of Isaiah. He says, behold, I lay in Zion.
Zion is a type of the church. That was a mountain outside of
Jerusalem, which David built a house, but it's a picture of
the church. A chief cornerstone. You know
what the chief cornerstone does? Everything is measured by the
chief cornerstone. Every dimension. Well, in God's
house, in the church, in the kingdom of God, everything is
measured by Christ. Acts 17, 31. He says, God has appointed a
day into which he will judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he hath ordained in that he had given assurance
unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. You
see my place in the house of God, the church of Christ, my
place in the kingdom of God, is measured not by my works or
my efforts or what I've done for the Lord. It's measured by
Christ. How do I stand in Him? Do I stand in Him? Unbelievers,
if you die in unbelief, you don't stand in Him at all. You stand
on your own and you'll be condemned. You don't have the righteousness
of Christ imputed to you. But if God has brought me to
faith in Christ and repentance of my dead works and my idolatry
and my sins, That's the evidence that Christ is my righteousness. And so he says, he's a chief
cornerstone. And it says, elect, God chose
him. Precious, oh how precious he
is. And he that believeth on him,
a sinner who's been brought to faith in Christ, shall not be
confounded, shall not be ashamed. Now if you stand before God at
judgment without Christ, without being washed in his blood and
clothed in his righteousness, you will be ashamed. Remember
those in Matthew 7, 21 through 23, Christ said, depart from
me, you that work iniquity, I never knew you. Well, my friend, if
we stand before God, clothed in his righteousness, washed
in his blood, you won't hear those words, you'll hear well
done, thou good and faithful servant. And that well-doing
is believing and resting in Christ. And so he says in verse seven,
this is our text. Under you therefore which believe,
he is precious. Now you might see in your concordance
the words an honor. Under you therefore which believe,
an honor. In other words, to be in Christ
is the greatest honor that God can bestow upon a person. And
it's not any honor that we have inherently. It's not any honor
that we do or earn by our works and our efforts. It's not a merit
badge sort of thing. It's not earning our rewards.
It's Christ and him alone. And that's why he says, that's
why the King James Version translators said precious, because if he's
my only honor, if he's my only dignity, My friend, he's sure
precious to me. I heard a preacher say that he
was talking about the free will of man, which he believed in.
You know, the issue's not really free will. You make choices every
day according to the things you want. But what if you went into
a restaurant, for example, and they gave you a menu, and you
saw on the menu it had hay, grass, raw oats. Which one would you
want to eat? Well, you say, I wouldn't want
to eat any of those. Well, what if you were a horse? Why does
a horse want to eat hay and grass and raw oats? Because by nature,
he's a horse. That's what he desires. And the
reason you don't desire those things is because by nature,
you're a human being. You want steak and potatoes and
hamburgers and whatever. I've often used the illustration,
if you took a sheep and a wolf, put them in a plush green pasture
and put a pin around them, and let him go hungry. What is the
sheep going to eat? Well, he's going to eat the grass. Why? Because of his, why won't
he eat the wolf? Does he just freely by his own
will choose to eat grass instead? No, he's a sheep. And that's
what he by nature wants. But now what's the wolf gonna
eat? Is he gonna eat grass or the
sheep? He's gonna go after the sheep. Why? Because of his own
free will, he chooses to eat sheep instead. No, he's a wolf.
Now, what the Bible teaches, that if God gives you the choice
of choosing God's way, God's honor, and God's glory, or your
own way, your own honor, and your own glory, you're gonna
choose your own way, your own honor, your own glory. Why? Because
of your own free will, you'd choose to? No, because you're
a sinful human being by nature. I am too. Now what happens when
God brings a sinner to salvation, He changes that sinner's will. He makes that sinner willing
in the day of His power to come to Christ. He shows us the reality
of our sinfulness and our depravity and shows us that our only hope
of salvation is His grace in Christ, His righteousness, His
blood. But this preacher who was talking
about free will, he says, well, he says, the way you all believe,
he's talking about the way I believe. He wasn't talking to me personally,
but just talking about people like me who believe what I believe
the Bible teaches. He said, you're saying that God
drags a sinner to Christ against his will. No, he doesn't. He doesn't drag anybody to Christ
against their will. They're born again. He changes
their will. The Bible says, thy people shall
be willing in the day of thy power. He gives them a new heart. You see what I'm saying? Now
what happens when God brings a sinner to see his sin and depravity
and his deservedness of condemnation and shows him Christ, the God-man,
the glory of Christ person. Who is Jesus Christ? He's God
in human flesh. He's Emmanuel, God with us. Great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh.
And shows him the power and the success of what Christ accomplished
in his obedience unto death on the cross, his blood, his righteousness. Do you know what happens to that
sinner? Christ becomes precious to him. But, he says in verse
seven, under them which be disobedient, that means who don't believe,
the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made
the head of the corner. Now, what he's showing here in
the reference, you go back to Isaiah and even in the New Testament
Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the builders were considered
to be the religious people, they were building. They thought in
their minds they were building the kingdom of God. But the Bible
teaches that we don't build the kingdom of God, Christ is the
builder. He told Peter, upon this rock,
the rock of Christ, not Peter, I will build my church. He's
the builder. He's the rock, the foundation
stone. He's the chief cornerstone. And
those, when he came into this world and he spoken to his people,
to the Jews rather, he's the stone, but the builders disallowed,
they rejected him. But the same one they rejected,
God has made the head of the corner, the chief cornerstone.
Look at verse eight. and a stone of stumbling and
a rock of offense, even to them which stumble at the word, being
disobedient or unbelieving, whereunto they were also appointed." Is
that what it says? It sure does. It said they were
aforeappointed to that, but they're held accountable by God. You
say, well, how do I know if I'm appointed to that or to salvation?
The secret things belong to God. The revealed things belong to
you and me. You seek the Lord in his word. Don't seek him by
the opinions of men or by the vote of men, the majority. Seek him in his word. This word,
Genesis to Revelation. But he was a rock of, he offended
them. They thought they were righteous.
He told them they were devils. They were satanic. He said, you're
of your father, the devil, you're preaching salvation by the works
of men. That's satanic, he told them. He's the light that's come into
the world, but men love darkness. They love the darkness of their
false religion and their self-righteousness. But my friend, he says in verse
nine, There's a group of people unto whom which Christ is precious,
and here they are, verse nine. You are a chosen generation.
Chosen? Who chose us? The preacher? No. God did. That's the elect of
God. Over in 2 Peter chapter one,
he says, give diligence to make your calling and election sure.
How do I know if I'm God's elect, one of God's elect? Have I been
called to Christ? for all salvation and called
away from myself, away from my works, away from my sins and
called to him for righteousness? That's the answer. You're a royal
priesthood, a kingdom of priests. That's what that means. You have
free access to God based on the merits of the blood and righteousness
of Christ. You're a holy nation, a separated
nation. This is not a physical nation
that occupies a physical land. It's a spiritual nation. It's
the people of God. It's the church of the living
God. It's the kingdom of God of which Christ is the head.
He says, you're a peculiar people. The word peculiar there doesn't
mean weird. It means you are a purchased
people. You're bought and paid for. Now,
what was the price? The precious blood of Christ,
redeemed with the precious blood of Christ. He paid the price
and he paid it all. And then he says, now having
done all that, if it's not based on my works, then what should
I do? Well, he says, verse nine, that you should show forth the
praises, the virtues of him who has called you out of darkness
into his marvelous light. The reason God has saved his
people by his grace through Jesus Christ and made them righteous
through Christ, is so that they might show His praise, His honor,
His virtue, His glory. The Bible says, like Matthew
5, 16, let your light so shine before men that they may see
your good works and do what? Honor you, talk about you, lift
you up. No, that they might glorify your
Father which is in heaven. The light there is not the good
works. The light is the gospel of Christ. And that's what we
want people to see. I want to point you to Christ.
I don't want to point you to me. I want you to hear me, but
follow him. And so he says in verse 10, people
which in time past were not a people, in other words, we sinners, lost
in our sins, but are now the people of God, made so by the
grace of God in Christ, which had not obtained mercy, but now
have obtained mercy. That means we've now been made
aware, acutely aware, of the preciousness of Christ as the
Lord our righteousness. The preciousness of Christ as
God in human flesh without sin. The preciousness of Christ as
our mercy seat. That's who Christ is. He's the
mercy seat. There's no, listen, let me show
you how precious Christ is to his people. There is absolutely
no love from God to any sinner apart from Christ. Outside of
Christ, it's only the wrath of God. There is no mercy from God
outside of Christ. There is no grace from God, no
love of God outside of Christ. It's all in Him. My hope is built
on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. And I dare
not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. On Christ the solid rock I stand,
all other ground is sinking sand. Unto you therefore which believe,
He is precious. I hope you'll join us next week
for another message from God's Word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1102 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia, 31707. Contact us by
phone at 229-432-6969 or email us through
our website at www.TheLetterRofGrace.com. Thank you again for listening
today and may the Lord be with you.