We are a Royal Priesthood - 1 Peter Series Part 3 - Konrad Stauffer

Lesson Transcript

I say none of the above. We are called to keep our conduct honest among unbelievers, or Gentiles, if you want to use that word, so that they may see who and how God our Father really is and glorify Him, not us. Their testimony ought to be, "I saw God and His people, and I wanted to be a part of whatever it meant to be a child of God." That should be the testimony of the people. This week we're going to be starting in chapter 2. This would be the third message in the series. We'll be looking at verses 1 through 12.

And I put for a title on the message today, "A Royal Priesthood," for obvious reasons, because some of our verses today have to do with us being a part of a royal priesthood. And there's just some things I want us to keep in our minds as we look at these verses. In 1 Peter, the first question I have here is, "Did you know that each one of you is called to be a lively stone?" And that's a really weird thing because we don't think of stones as being lively.

In fact, we think of them as being solid and staying the same way for hundreds of thousands of years, you know. But we're called to be lively stones. And we were also called to be priests, to offer spiritual sacrifices to God. And that's something that I want to keep in our minds. And there's something else. Did you know not only are we called to be priests, but we are called to be a part of a royal priesthood, meaning we are especially appointed by the king for that priesthood. That's something really special.

That's a great privilege and a great responsibility. So much of our message today will be in light of all of that. But I'm going to just step back a little bit, and this may overlap just a little bit with what we read this morning in 1 Peter, but I'm going to go back just a little bit just to give a background in 1 Peter 1:20-25, because this is all a book, this is all a letter, and I think it helps to go back and to read some of the stuff that came before that.

"He was for known before the foundation of the world, but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you, who through Him are believers in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope in God, having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart. Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God.

For all flesh is like grass, and all its glory is like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever. And this word is the good news that was preached to you." And there's just three points from that that I want us to keep in our minds as well. Purification of the soul comes by obedience to the truth. Secondly, this purification leads us to and enables us to love our brothers. And thirdly, we are to love earnestly, or intentionally, if you will.

Love just doesn't just happen. It's a choice, and it's intentional. And those are three things that we see here before we even begin on chapter 2 here. The first part here in 1 Peter 2:1-3, I'd like to read those.

And I've called this part, "Long for the pure spiritual milk." "So put away all malice, and all deceit, and hypocrisy, and envy, and all slander, like newborn infants long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up in," and ESV says, "into salvation." But I don't really care for that reading, so I'm going to read it in the Old King James. "As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby." It's a little bit different, and I think that's better.

"If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good." I think we all want to see spiritual growth in our lives, and yet to pretend at being mature is not sufficient. Peter is saying, if we want to grow in the Lord, we must become as a child in some ways. We have to go back to even begin growing. We need to go back and become as a small child. And as I was thinking about just the thing about being a small child, what are some of the qualities? Generally, we'd say they are not malicious.

I'm thinking especially of babies, really small children. I know children, as they get older, they can be malicious. So some of these things don't apply. But generally, they are not malicious or have ill will towards others. They're not deceitful, knowingly, lying to misguide others. They don't have that in them yet to do that. They're not hypocritical, desiring to give a false impression of themselves. They are what they are, and you get what you see. Babies have no envy.

They don't generally look out the window and wish they had the neighbor's car, house, money, or position. Babies and small children have no desire to ruin someone else's reputation because they have no malice. They have no envy, so they don't have that desire to do that either. We are called to remove these things from our thoughts and from our lives. Peter says we should desire the sincere milk of the word. In other words, the straightforward, honest, unembellished truth of the word. This will be our foundation.

Milk is the pure essence of life. From it, we have all had our beginnings, physically. Peter is calling the believers to put aside all those things that tend to cloud our reason and to take a hold on a pure word of life. And I think back to what he said in chapter 1 there, said, "Gird up the loins of your mind." In Isaiah 55:1, it says, "Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." It's just interesting.

Anytime God talks about richness, or the prophets talked about richness, they often mention milk, wine, or honey. And today we're looking at the milk. In 1 Corinthians 3:1, and you could say that this passage is a little bit more on the negative side of things, but it's kind of a same idea. 1 Corinthians 3:1-4, "But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.

I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it, and even now you are not ready. For you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?" For when one says, "I follow Paul," another says, "I follow Apollos," are you not merely human? And we see kind of see the context of that verse. They had apparently not learned how to put the malice and the deceit and all the other things out of their mind yet.

Paul says, "I need to go back to the beginning of things with you guys. I need to go back to the milk. You all need to get it straight, what it's all about, first of all, before you can even start growing." And in Hebrews 5:12, same type of situation again, "For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God.

You need milk, not solid food." Looking over some of these verses we just read, you may think that drinking milk spiritually is a bad thing. However, if you have no real good understanding or grasp of the fundamental elements of being a follower of Jesus, you really need that sincere milk of the word. And I look at the Sermon on the Mount as like that sincere milk of the word. It's the very foundation of us as followers of Jesus. And I think we all need to go back to that sometimes.

We need to go back and first to begin to understand what being a Christian is really all about, or your growth as a Christian, and your faith will always be stunted. It will always have struggles if you don't understand what Christ is all about. Moving on to verse 4-8, "A living stone rejected by men. As you come to Him, a living stone rejected by men, but in the sight of God chosen and precious.

You yourselves, like living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture, 'Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame.' So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone." So I'm just going to pause there.

So if you're struggling to get a hold of Jesus or to follow His commandments or to obey His will, you might as well just get it straight in your mind, he's saying, that this is the cornerstone of what we're trying to do here. There's no other cornerstone. There's no other foundation but that which is laid in Christ Jesus. "And a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.

They stumble because they disobey the word as they were destined to do." There are some questions that may pop in our mind as we read this passage, and then again, it may all make sense to you. But here are some of the questions you might ask. First of all, what does Peter mean by saying, "A living stone," or what is a living stone? Secondly, why and how is it that this stone is rejected by men and yet chosen by God? Thirdly, what kind of a house is a spiritual house? Who and what is it for?

Fourthly, how or why does this stone become a stone of stumbling for so many? I think we answered that question in part already. Fifth, what is this holy priesthood Peter refers to? And sixth, how do we offer spiritual sacrifices? Of what do they consist? What is a spiritual sacrifice? When I think of a living stone, I think of a rock that is firm and yet adaptive to all climates and situations.

However, I believe that one of the biggest things we must realize is this stone is an adaptive living stone, not so much to the climate of this age or the climate of this world, but it's to the spiritual world. Jesus is not going to adapt Himself to what the world thinks. He is adapted to the spiritual world. He's a living stone. So it's always going to be, if you think about it, He's always going to be out of place a little bit in some areas.

He's not going to fit into what we, if we're trying to line our life up with society in some way, it's not going to work if we're trying to build ourselves on Christ. And as we said, that of the spiritual world, above all, it is becoming or becoming the dwelling place of God, a temple. Jesus is that cornerstone, and if we are to build up as part of this house, spiritual house, we must also become living stones, stones that are adapted to the conditions of a spiritual world, namely adapted to Christ.

We have to be living stones. If we're not living stones and we're trying to build on this foundation and we want to keep the way we are and plan our lives in Christ, we're going to cause fissures in that wall. The rest of the wall is going to be growing, but we're going to be stuck. And we're going to cause cracks and crumbling unless we get out of that place. And so that's something we need to keep in mind. There are two representations of spiritual powers that beat upon this house that we're working on building.

Sorry, I lost my place a little bit here. They cannot abide the chief cornerstone. One is the kingdom of this world, driven and ruled by Satan, and we understand that. So of course, he and his servants are going to try to tear down the house of God, or this spiritual house that we're building, the spiritual dwelling place. The other is also of this world, however, they become a tolerated subculture of Satan's kingdom.

And I don't want to use language that's too strong there, but this next group that is fighting against this spiritual house is a subculture of this world, even if we might not see it as such right away. And they become a subculture of Satan's kingdom because they no longer pose a threat to him or his plans, and yet believe themselves to be the kingdom of God. The second group I will call religious institutions.

They speak much truth, but they have long lost touch with true spiritual life and the will of the Father because the words and teachings of Jesus find no enduring place in their hearts. So we can decide where we're at in this picture. Am I part of religious institution, which has its own thing set up in mind already, and it's not going to change that, or we're going to adapt ourselves to Christ? In the end, there's only two kingdoms. There's God's kingdom, and there's the kingdoms of the world.

There's no middle kingdom. Matthew 21:42-46, "Jesus said to them, 'Have you never read in the scriptures? The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes. Therefore, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you.'" He's talking to the Jews, to the Pharisees. "It will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.

And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him." When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds because they held him to be a prophet.

And Matthew 24:1-2, it says, "Jesus left the temple and was going away when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple, the spiritual, the religious institution, you could say." They said, "Look at this great thing. Look at this beautiful stone. Look at all that's been happening here for thousands of years." But he answered them, "You see all these? Do you not?

Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down." And I think Jesus was saying something deeper than just the temple in Jerusalem, but he was talking about human institution as well.

Acts 4:8-12, "Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, 'Rulers of the people and elders, if you are being examined today concerning a—sorry, if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by him this man is standing before you well.

This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." And in Romans 9:30-33, "What shall we say then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that it is a righteousness that is by faith? But the Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law." Why?

Because they did not pursue it by faith, but if it were based on works, they have stumbled over the stumbling stone that was Christ. They stumbled over him. "As it is written, 'Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. And whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.'" When we believe in him, we conform ourselves. It means we conform ourselves to him and to his life, and we will not be confounded. We will not find ourselves causing a fissure in the wall or a crack in the wall.

We will find that we can grow along with this spiritual building. But if we're not conforming ourselves to Christ, we're going to be put to shame. They stumbled because they disobeyed the word. The answer to that fourth question resides in the last part of verse 2. How does this stone become a stone of stumbling for so many? They stumble because they disobey the word. You see, we cannot separate Jesus from what he taught. If we would love him, if you would love him, you must also cleave to his teaching.

It must become like food and drink to your spirit, the spiritual milk of the word. Then and only then do you become useful in the construction of this spiritual house. Most pardon me, I'm reading a lot of verses. I really enjoy just looking at different passages, so I'm reading a good bit out of the Bible here. Mark 7:24-27, "Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it." Just pause there to think. I'm sure that the man who built that house on the sand did an excellent job of building it.

He probably even built it out of rock-solid material, but the foundation was no good. So it lost, it didn't stand. 1 Peter 2:9, back to 1 Peter 2 again, verses 9 and 10, "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people.

Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." And I'd just like to pause there and just say that it sounds like he's just taken a random group of people all of a sudden here, and he just claims them a chosen race or a chosen people or something like that. But God did not do that, and he did not do that in the Old Testament either. Even though in many ways in modern theology, you hear this thing of, "I don't understand why God chose Abraham. He was a liar.

He was all these things." But when you really go back and look at what God says about Abraham and some of these men that were chosen, it says he knew he would command his children after him. He had something to him. Even though he failed, he had something to him, and God saw that from the very beginning. And that's why he picked them. That's why he handpicked these men. And that's what God is doing here too.

He's handpicking these people and forming a nation, forming a people of people who have chosen the truth, who have chosen that they want this. And that's why they become this royal priesthood, this holy nation. A royal priesthood. Peter says, "We are to be as living stones in the construction of a spiritual house." But he also says, "We become a part of the royal priesthood." What does this mean for us?

Here Peter gives us at least part of the answer, what it means to be a part of the royal priesthood, that we may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. In other words, we are to be and become as Jesus when he walked the earth, conforming ourselves to his excellencies and his virtues. Anytime any one of us disciplines ourselves to do something or not do something for the betterment of God's kingdom and his people, we make a spiritual sacrifice.

You're sacrificing time to pray for others, time to help others, time to show love and kindness to others. These acts come before our Lord as a sweet-smelling aroma before God. Jesus is our high priest. He has opened up the holy of holies to all of us. We have gone from not being a part of the people of God to being a part of a royal priesthood. That is pretty amazing to me. And I'd just like to say this: priests were and are servants to God and his people.

That's one of the things that characterizes the life of a priest, is his service to his people. I cannot imagine the kind of work those men did back in the days when they did sacrifices, especially over Passover, just one sacrifice after the other, butchering one animal after the other, and praying for the people. They were interceding for the people, is what they were doing. And is it any different today in a lot of ways? We're interceding for our brothers and sisters. We're interceding for the world as well.

So we are a royal priesthood. Revelations 1:4-6, "John to the seven churches that are in Asia, grace to you and peace from him who is, who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne." And I believe those seven spirits were the seven spirits of those churches. "And from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, the ruler of kings on earth, to him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us a kingdom, priest to his God and Father.

To him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen." And in Revelations 5:7-13, "And he went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints." I just want us to get that picture in our minds. The prayers of the saints being bowls of incense coming before the Lord.

And that's what the priests did. They offered incense to God. "And they sang a new song, saying, 'Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.

And you have made them a kingdom and priest to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.' Then I looked and I heard around the throne, the living creatures and the elders, the voice of many angels numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, 'Worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.' And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that is in them, saying,

'To him who sits on the throne and to the lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever.'" And back to 1 Peter 2 again, verse 11 and 12.

And these are the last two verses we'll be looking at today. "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh." This is in light of all that we've looked at before and in light of our position today as Christians as a royal priesthood. He is begging them, "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.

Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation." Abstain from the passions of the flesh. Peter gives us the challenge as a royal priesthood to abstain, to stay away, to put off, to deny those passions of our flesh. And why? First of all, we are sojourners and exiles, strangers and pilgrims, which means we really don't belong to this earthly kingdom. And that's where our flesh is.

Secondly, these passions war against our soul. And I think sometimes I lose sight of it, and it's easy for us as humans to lose sight of this, that these passions are warring against that which is eternal in us. Remember, we are living stones. We are lively stones being built up into a spiritual house. And these passions and lusts and sin have a deadening effect on our very soul, that which is eternal within us.

And we would soon become dead stones, unable to grow, potentially causing fissures in the construction of this spiritual building. And I know I said that before, but that's really important. And I'd just like to reiterate again, and I think we are all striving for this, lust and many of our human impulses, when left to take root, will crowd out that spirit of life that was born in us when we committed our lives to Christ. They will kill us.

Romans 6:12-14, "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments of righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under the law but under grace." Meaning there is no reason for us to live in continual defeat if we are not allowing sin to have power in our lives.

That's a choice that we make. Galatians 5:16-21, "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh. For these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

Now the works of the flesh are evident." And he gives a very concise, a very clear list of things here that we're all familiar with, but I'm going to read them. "Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions and divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these." Anything that falls under that umbrella, I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

And in 1 John 2:15-17, "Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with all its desires. But whoever does the will of God abides forever. Keep your conduct honest among Gentiles." To whom was this challenge directed? To the Jews?

Let's see what Peter says in verse 10 of this chapter. In the same context, "Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." So he's talking to people that were already Gentiles. But he says to keep our conversation honest among the Gentiles. So some kind of change has taken place. We've gone from being spiritual Gentiles to spiritual Jews. We've become the people of God. We've become the Israel of God.

And he goes on to say, "They may see your good works and glorify God on the day of visitation." What is the reason Peter gives for the necessity for us to keep our conduct honest among the unbelievers? So that they might see that we're different from them. Is that the reason he gives? So that they come running to us for advice because we obviously have it all put together. Are these the reasons that we're supposed to have our conduct honest among the Gentiles? I say none of the above.

We are called to keep our conduct honest among unbelievers or Gentiles, if you want to use that word, so that they may see who and how God our Father really is and glorify him, not us. Their testimony ought to be, "I saw God and his people, and I wanted to be a part of whatever it meant to be a child of God." That should be the testimony of the people as they look at our lives. And I know this is a bad place to let off, but that's where my message ends.

And I'm just going to read this one verse yet that we read earlier as a closing. "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light."