Turn back to 1 Peter chapter
2. 1 Peter chapter 2. We finished up chapter 1 last
Thursday, or Thursday before last. I don't think we were here
last Thursday. And we finished up with Peter saying, that we
were born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by
the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. And He tells
us that all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the
flower of grass. He tells us this lest we think
more highly of this flesh than we ought to. The grass withereth, and the
flower thereof falleth away. You know, every year we are reminded
that everything dies. Everything dies. The flower that's
so pretty in the spring is gone by the time winter rolls around.
All the leaves are off the trees. They've died. The leaves have died. And Peter
tells us that this is what flesh is like. Sooner or later, we
too, we too will die. But the word of the Lord, he
said, endureth forever. It's not going to die. It'll
be here when you and I are gone. And this is the word which by
the gospels preached unto you. Now seeing this as so, seeing
that you have been born again. You've been born of God. I don't think, and I know for sure,
that being born of God has never impressed me like it does now. It has impressed me. But I find
that truth now more precious than ever before in my life,
since I've believed. It's been about 40 years. To
be born of God, to be birthed of God Almighty. And that's why He's saying, you've
been born of God, seeing that you've been born of God, and
the seed by which you were born is the incorruptible Word of
God. And that all flesh, even ours,
is nothing but grass. You know, let's take care of
ourselves, but let's not put too much time in this flesh.
You know, you can doctor it up, do the best you can with it,
but it's going to go to the grave. No matter what you do, it's going
there. And nothing good ever comes from the flesh. And he says this, seeing that
you're born of God, lay aside. And the idea here is as a runner
in a race, if you're going to run a race, you lay aside. You
lay aside every weight that would hinder you in running that race.
That's what Paul says in Hebrews, lay aside the sin which so easily
besets you and run that race that's set before you. And that's
what he's saying here. And what he's going to point
out here are sins of the heart. And the reason he's going to
point this out is because we still have a nature that's fallen. We still have a sinful nature.
That nature I was born with 62 years ago, that old Adamic nature,
I still have it. It's still with me. I struggle
with it. I fight with it. And he says
this, lay these things aside like a runner in a race. Lay
aside malice, that's anger or ill will towards others. Lay
that aside. Don't carry that around with
you. Drop it like a hot potato. And Gael being deceitful with
others for his own gain, he says, drop that, lay that down. War
against that. Fight that in yourselves. It's
there. It'll raise its ugly head. It'll do it. Give it time. It'll
raise its ugly head. And when it does, He says, lay
it aside. In another place, He says, to
mortify the deeds of this flesh through the Spirit. You can't
do it by yourself. This is something that's too
strong for us by ourselves. We need the Holy Spirit to help
us, to enable us to do this and lay aside hypocrisies. Don't
pretend, he said, to be something you're not or to have something
you don't. A hypocrite back in that day
is what we call actors in this day. That's what they called
them back in this day. They were called hypocrites. We call them actors now. We call
them movie stars now. And we watch them walk the red
carpet. You're watching a bunch of hypocrites
walk the carpet. Really. Because they're playing
something that they're not. They're always playing a role
that they are not. And Paul said, don't do that.
You don't do that. As believers, you be who you
are. and envies. This is what a person
feels when someone else besides them prospers. He said, lay that
aside. That's ungodly. That comes from
self-love, not brotherly love. And all evil speakings, lay this
aside. Evil speakings here is speaking
down another. It's defaming another's character.
That's evil speaking. Did you hear? Did you hear about
so-and-so? Oh, if we could just learn to
just put that off. I like to put a clamp on my tongue. I read these things and I understand
what he's saying. I understand reading that. I
understand what Peter's saying. I experience every one of these.
I experience it. And I think, Lord, help me to
lay these things aside. All these traits are traits of
the old man. They're traits of the old man,
not the new man. The old man. This is not who you are. He says
in verse 2, You lay these things aside, and as newborn babes,
as newborn babes desire, and that word desire has to do with
intensity. It's a real intense yearning
for the pure Word of God. When a child is born, that child
yearns for its mother's milk. Intentionally, it cries for it. As newborn babes desire the sincere
milk of the Word that you may grow thereby. After telling us
to lay aside these fleshly sins, that we have been so long accustomed
to. So long. As newborn babes, he says here.
You lay these other things aside and as newborn babes. That's how we start out as a
believer. We start out as a baby in Christ.
We grow to young men in Christ and then grow to Old men in Christ,
that's what we do. And as newborns desire the sincere
pure milk of its mother's breast, even so we desire the pure..."
Now listen, and here's what it means, unadulterated Word of
God. It's my responsibility standing
here not to mix in with the Gospel, the Word of God, my opinion.
My opinion, it doesn't matter. And you're not going to grow
spiritually on my opinion. You're going to grow on the pure
word of the gospel. That's the way they call it.
No additives. Just give it to me as it is. It doesn't need
any additives. I was eating at a steakhouse
some time ago, And the lady asked me, she said, do you want any
steak sauce? I said, not if it's any good.
If it's any good, I don't need steak sauce. I don't need it. I don't need to sauce it up if
it's any good. We don't need to sauce up the
gospel. We don't need to add to the gospel.
We don't need to make it more attractive. Just leave it as
it is. And you want it that way. That's
the way you want it. Unadulterated, nothing added
to the Word of God. Leave it like it is. And the
reason is this, that you may grow thereby. Here's why as newborn
babes, here's why as believers, we desire the sincere, unadulterated
Word of God, is that we may grow up that we may grow in grace
and in knowledge of Christ. We have gathered here tonight
to worship the Lord, but we've also gathered here hoping to
grow up in Christ, to grow in grace and in knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ, that you may grow thereby. There
could be no spiritual growth in Christ, or in the fruit of
the Spirit, apart from the pure, pure Word of God." Can't do it. Can't do it. Apart from the gospel of Christ,
a newborn child of God cannot mature in Christ. And listen,
I want you to get this. We desire the Word of God to
grow, not to argue. not to argue with anybody, not
to prove a point. I'm not trying to prove a point
to anybody. I'm to stand here and declare
the Word of God, not try to prove a point. Some young man asked me some
time ago about preaching, and I told him to preach what the
Lord laid on his heart and do not get caught up in arguing
with false religion. I said false religion will be
false all the way to the end. You won't change it. You will
not change it. Now there are children of God
who are yet lost that are in false religion. I was. Many of you were. And God called
you out of it. When I heard the gospel, the
place I was going to, after I heard the gospel, I was so excited,
I thought they'd be just as excited as I was. And when I told them
about it, they were upset. The man was upset, the pastor
was upset, and I had to leave. But God called me out of it. I thought maybe that whole group
would come at it. It had nothing to do with it. Nothing to do
with it. That's why I think the Lord said
to Peter, Peter, feed my sheep. Don't get caught up fighting
those Pharisees. They're going to be wrong all the way to the
end. Don't get caught up fighting false religion. Preach the gospel,
feed the sheep, feed the lambs. The gospel will rebuke false
religion. I don't need to. It will do it. Henry said one time, if you want
to show a crooked stick, the best way to do it is lay a straight
one right down the side of it. If you want to show a crooked
stick, just lay a straight one right there. And you can see
by that straight stick how crooked that other one is. Now, it says here, verse 3, If
so be or seeing you have tasted that the Lord is gracious." Another
translation of that word gracious is this, is that the Lord is
excellent. Excellent. He is excellent in
His person. He is excellent in His work.
He is excellent in His salvation. He's excellent. And the Lord
Jesus Christ is the reason for laying all sins of the flesh
aside and desiring the sincere milk of the Word. Because if
you have tasted Him, you have found Him to be excellent. And
note here, if so be ye have tasted. To taste something, what do you
have to do? You have to put it in your mouth. I don't taste
with my hands, my fingers, or my eyes. I taste with my mouth. Christ said, He that eateth my
flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life in him. It's Christ in you, the hope
of glory. For the grace of God in Christ
to be real to me, to be life-changing to me, I must be enabled to taste
Him, to eat Him by faith, to eat His flesh and drink His blood. There must be a hunger created
by the Spirit of God for the Lord Jesus Christ, a hunger-thirst
after Him. And this happens when you're
born of God. When you're born of God, you
have a real hunger and thirst, and you have, listen, you have
a real taste for Jesus Christ. The Jews rejected Him because
they had no taste for Him. Had no taste for Him. How sweet our gracious Lord tastes
to a needy sinner. Oh, how sweet He tastes. We who have tasted of Him find
Him to be excellent, find Him to be gracious. We do. And seeing that you're coming
to Him, it says, to whom coming? This is not talking about the
first time you came to Christ. What he's saying here, through
the whole process of growing up in Christ, we continually
come to Him. We are continually coming to
the Lord Jesus Christ. We are continually believing
on the Lord Jesus Christ. We go from faith to faith, from
one degree of faith to another degree of faith. That's how we
go, and that's how we grow, is that way. And we continually
feed on Him who is the manna from heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we come to Him as the living
stone, He's the true rock on which the
church is being built. He is the rock of our strength.
He's the rock of our hope. He's the living stone. And this
living stone is none other than God Almighty. None other than
God. He's not a dead, cold, hard stone,
but a living, warm, gracious, living stone. That's who Jesus
Christ is. He is the living stone. He is
the life-giving stone. Who ever heard of that? He's
the life-giving stone. And although it says here he's
disallowed indeed of men, they rejected him. The religious leaders
rejected this stone. They looked at it. They saw no
beauty in this stone that they should desire it. They looked
at it and said, this stone is not good for building on. It's not a strong enough stone.
It doesn't look strong. It's a weak stone. They thought
him to be weak. They looked at it and found it
to be a poor looking stone. They thought it would take too
much work to polish this stone up. So they threw it away. Threw
it away. Can you imagine that? Despised
and rejected of men. God Almighty in the flesh despised
and rejected of men, of men. But now what does God
think about this stone? Oh, here's what's important.
What does God think about this stone? It says here in verse
4, He's chosen of God and precious. This stone was chosen of God.
God is building His house on this stone. Christ is said to
be the first elect. He was chosen of God to be the
Messiah. He was chosen of God to be the
surety. He was chosen of God to be the
mediator. He was chosen of God to be the
high priest. He was chosen of God to be everything
in building His church. Everything. And He's precious. He's precious
to the Father. There's none like Him. It's His
only begotten Son. There's none like Him. He's one
of a kind. He's the express image of God.
That's who He is. And He's precious to the saints.
He's our all in all. He's the only way and only reason
I can stand before God is this man, Jesus Christ. But now He's
the living stone. He's the stone on which God is
building His church. And you are living stones. You also, in verse 5, you also
as living stones, that's lively, but living stones are built up
a spiritual house. You know what God, what He's
saying here is what God is doing is that Jesus Christ He's the
living stone. He's the cornerstone, as we'll
see. He's everything to the church, and God is building His church
on Christ. And you are living stones, and
God is building you up as a spiritual house, and God is building you
up as a spiritual house to dwell in you. That's what's going on
right now. Don't get so caught up with this
world, what's going on. Look at what God's doing. God
is building a building, a spiritual building for him to dwell in,
and you are the spiritual building. My soul. David said, I'm going to build
God a house. He said, you're not going to build me a house.
You're not going to build... God doesn't dwell in houses made
with hands. But I tell you who is building
Him a house, Jesus Christ. And you are the living stones
in that house. It's not a stone house where
there are just cold, dead stones. I like a stone house. I love
a stone fireplace. But I tell you what, those stones
are dead. There's no life in them. No life in them whatsoever. But the life of God is in you.
And you are alive, spiritually alive. And when all this is done,
when all this is said and done, there will be a spiritual house
complete that God's going to dwell in, and we're it. We're it. You also, as living stones, are
built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood." The priests were
set apart from God to offer up sacrifices acceptable to God
by Jesus Christ. Oh, my soul. a holy priesthood. The priests
were set apart for God's service. They were all for sacrifices.
And the sacrifices that you and I offer in the spiritual house
is a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. Praise and thanksgiving. Wherefore, also it is contained
in the Scripture." Verse 6. Behold, I land Zion, a chief
cornerstone, elect, precious, and he that believeth on him
shall not be confounded. The Holy Spirit so wisely moves
Peter to quote the Scriptures. That backs up what he's saying.
Listen. Scripture interprets Scripture,
not men. I'm not standing up here interpreting
Scripture to you. Scripture interprets Scripture.
No Scripture stands alone by itself. The Word of God interprets the
Word of God. He said, I lay in Zion. Those
who laid it, I did. God said, I did. God laid this
stone in the church. Christ is the foundation of the
church. He's the cornerstone of it. He is the first stone. He's the first stone in the church.
God said, behold, mine elect. And He was talking about His
Son, Jesus Christ. He's the first stone. The whole church started
with Him. He's the first cornerstone and
the rest of the stones... Now I want you to get this. I
got a star by this one. He's the first cornerstone and
the rest of the stones of this house are hewn out of Him. You know that the church is the
bride of the Lord Jesus Christ. You remember in the Garden of
Eden, When God created Eve, God has said, put Adam into a deep
sleep. And then He opened his side up
and took a rib out of it, and it says He closed it up. He closed
it back up, and He created woman. God is taking the church out
of Jesus Christ. He's creating His own bride out
of His own Son, which is a beautiful type there in the garden where
God takes Eve out of Adam. All the living stones are hewn
out of Him, taken out of Him, who is precious. Precious. There's no other stone
like it. There's no other stone that God
would use or could use to build this spiritual house but Christ. And he that believes on Him shall
not be confounded." Listen, you'll not be put to shame, you'll not
be guilty. You'll not be guilty. He that
believes on Him. Everyone that believes on Christ,
comes to Christ for salvation will have it. You'll have it. And you have it now. Now. unto you therefore which believe
He is precious." To you who believe He is. Now
you know whether He's precious to you or not, don't you? You
know what's precious to you. You know what's more precious
to you than anything. It better be Jesus Christ. It
better be the Lord Jesus Christ. He that loves mother, father,
sister, brother, son or daughter more than me is not worthy of
me." Not worthy of me. But unto them which be disobedient
to stone which the builders rejected or disallowed, well, God made
that same stone the head of the corner. God made that same stone. It says in Acts 2, verse 36,
that God hath made that same Jesus, whom you crucified, both
Lord and Christ. The ones they rejected is the
one God set up. The one they despised is the
one God loves, and you love. And to them He's a stone of stumbling
and a rock of offense. Even to them which stumble at
the Word, at His message, being disobedient whereunto they were
appointed. Christ is a stone of stumbling.
Listen, He's a stone of stumbling to the self-righteous. He wasn't a stone of stumbling
to a harlot, was He? Or to that publican. That publican
said, Oh God, be merciful to me, a sinner. That Pharisee said,
I'm glad I'm not like Him. He's a stone of stumbling of
those Pharisees who could not get past his appearance. They
could not get past his education. How knoweth this man letters,
having never learned? He didn't go to our school. He
did not graduate from our school. Why do we pay any attention to
him? He never even went to school. Not to their school. He went to God's. His ear was
opened early from a child. At 12 years of age, he was standing
in the temple disputing with them, confounding them. They were, I had no doubt, they
were just dumbfound that this 12-year-old kid, standing there
in the temple, disputing with them, taught of God, I say this,
I would 10,000 times have a man stand in a pulpit
preaching the gospel to me that's been taught of God than any man
that's come out of a seminary and has all the degrees, as many
degrees as a thermometer after his name. Give me a man taught
of God. All thy children shall be taught
of God. He's a stone of stumbling to
the self-righteous. If there's one thing that'll
keep you away from Jesus Christ, if there's one thing that'll
do it, it's self-righteousness. Sin will not keep you away, or
self-righteousness will. It will. They couldn't get past His birth.
They couldn't get past His message. They said they stumbled at His
Word. They couldn't get past His message. He spoke to them
of the sovereignty of God and salvation, God saves whom He
will. And it made them mad. It made
them mad. But God left them alone. He says
they were appointed. And I think that just means God
left them alone like He did Pharaoh. He left them alone. That's what
he said to the disciples one time concerning the Pharisees.
He said, leave them alone. Worst thing God could ever do
is leave you alone. And I'm going to close here.
You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood. You are a king priest. I know
it doesn't look like it, but I'm looking at some king priests. Doug, I just asked you to pray
for us. How many times have I prayed?
How many times have you prayed? You can go into God's presence without calling me. You don't
have to call me. You can go into God's presence
in the name of Christ Yourself. Yourself. He has made us kings and priests
under God, and a holy nation. You know all the nations of this earth
are vile and wretched, right? They all are. But you know there
is There is a holy nation on this earth. And it's made up of believers
all over the world. And God knows every one of them.
He knows every one of them. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
our King. He's our King. This nation, this
holy nation, is under a theocracy. The Lord Jesus Christ. You're a holy nation, a peculiar
people. That doesn't mean you're weird.
That doesn't mean you're a bunch of weird people. That means you're
purchased people. Purchased. Some might be a little
weird, but that's not what it means. It means purchased. That's what
it means. You're a purchased people. You're
not your own. You've been bought with a price. And here, listen, that you should
show forth the praises of Him who called you out of darkness
into His marvelous light. Every day, you and I have the
opportunity to show forth the praises of God, wherever He puts
us. Whether it be on a job or your
neighbor, everywhere God puts us, we have an opportunity to
show forth His praises. The One who brought us out of
darkness and put us into His marvelous light, which in time
past were not a people. You know, and I've said this
before, our ancestry If we go back far
enough, our ancestry had no hope. They had no hope. They were without
Christ and without God in this world. They were strangers to
the covenants of promise over in Ephesians. But now, but now,
you who were afar off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. I'm glad I wasn't born 3,000
years ago." The Gentile world, for the most
part, sat in darkness until Christ died on the cross and the gospel
went out. You were not a people, which
in time past were not a people. I was watching a A documentary
was watching it on the Mayan Indians the other night. And
they were showing the American Indians and Mayan Indians and
all the idolatry and the things that they had going on. And God wiped it out. God wiped
them out. But nowadays, Here we sit. Here we are in our day. And we
have the gospel of the grace of God. We have the gospel, as
Paul called it, we have the gospel of God's glory preached every
week. Every week. But you are now the
people of God, which had not obtained mercy, but now have
obtained mercy. Does it get any better than that?
Doesn't get any better than that, does it? All right, Greg.