A Holy Nation People

1 Peter 2:4-25, Key Verse: 2:9

"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light."

As we all know, a nation consists of three components: People, Sovereignty, and Land.  Throughout the history in the Bible, what we can see among many is that God’s people fought against their enemies in order to drive them out of the Promised Land and occupy it. In that sense, I would like to say that we also occupy some land here in the form of the center and the common life tents behind it as our modern promised land through financing and some seed money instead of waging war or fighting physically against the residents like the ancient people. And we also acknowledge God’s sovereignty wherever we live and even in our lives.  Now what? One thins is missing. That’s a people, the essential element of a nation. That’s what we are going to think about today. God is looking for those who are willing to become his people for his kingdom on earth and in heaven. Let’s pray that we may catch some ideas about a holy nation as our true identity.

I. Who is Jesus? (4-8)

Look at verse 4. “As you come to him, the Living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him…” In the passage, Peter talks about many kinds of stones to explain about who Jesus is. Peter loves stones not because his hobby was stone collection but because his name means stone and he himself is a stone. Before Peter’s stones let me tell you the story about my stone. I thought I had nothing to do with stone. But a while ago I got the Sleeping Stone with a big discount sale. The reason why I got it is not only because my back is getting worsen but because I would like to help the American economy get jump-started and boosted with my five loaves and two fish. Anyway when I sleep on it, it makes me warm and relaxed so fully that I can have a good rest during the night. So I say, “The Sleeping Stone is good.” Am I advertising something? Yes. Actually I am advertising Jesus, who is the living stone. Usually we think stone is no good because stone is related to “Stone head,” “worthy of being stoned” and so on. But here when Peter calls Jesus the Living Stone, he means that Jesus is the Risen Christ. The Sleeping Stone gives us only warmth and relaxation. But the Living Stone gives us life because Jesus was raised from the dead. Without life, there is no use of warmth and relaxation.

The Living Stone Jesus is chosen by God and precious to him. But this precious Jesus was rejected by men. That’s why Jesus is called “the Rejected Stone.” God loved his people so much, but they kept going astray from him by worshiping idols in this world. They continued to turn down God’s calling. They even rejected God’s one and only son Jesus who was the promised Savior for them. Worse than that, they killed Jesus on the cross. God the mighty creator loved sinners like us, but they rejected and even killed the Messiah.   

However, God picked up the Rejected Stone and gave his life back from the dead. The Rejected Stone turned into the precious cornerstone. The cornerstone of something is the basic part of it on which its existence, success, or truth depends. The Risen Christ is the cornerstone of our existence, success, and the truth. Without Jesus nothing can stand. Without Jesus nothing is meaningful. Our life should be built on the cornerstone Jesus. He is also the capstone. The capstone is the topmost stone of a masonry pillar, column, or other structure requiring the use of a single capping element.  The capstone Jesus should be on top of everything because the capstone can hold all parts of our life. Therefore Jesus should be the top and the bottom, the beginning and the end of our lives. He holds up our lives as God’s holy temple.  Look at verse 8. “"A stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall." They stumble because they disobey the message--which is also what they were destined for.” Jesus is also the Stumbling Stone. Again I want to talk about the Sleeping Stone. Even though the Sleeping Stone is good, it will harm you if you do not follow the direction. Its surface is so hot that you have to place a thin blank. Otherwise you may burn your body.  The Sleeping Stone is good in nature but can be harmful if you do not follow the instruction properly. Likewise if we do not follow Jesus the Living Stone, it turns into the Stumbling Stone. In other words, if we do not come to Jesus and do not want to repent, we are offended by Jesus. So we stumble over the Stumbling Stone. Let us pray to come to the Living Stone and be made alive by his life-giving spirit, not be stumbled over. 

II. Who are we? (5, 9-10)

Mankind has been sought its identity throughout the history. Still many are seeking their true identity. One of us here, before he met Jesus, found his origin from monkey in which he must have tried hard to find his identity just like people in the world. Not only him but also did we try hard to find our identity by imitating celebrities or reading books or making boy or girl friends. Anyway, it is very hard to find it. So we very often feel the unbearable lightness of being just like the book title written by Milan Kundera. One thing for sure is that without knowing our true identity, we feel weightlessness of life one time and heaviness of life the other time and vice versa. For JBF members here it is now the time to think about it deeply as you grow more and more in body and spirit. You are a son or daughter of your parents and a student at each school and what else? Even though you say who you are based on what you are, it is not enough to explain about your existence and the reason of it. Most of all, if you do not work hard to find your identity in youth, you will be confused and get in trouble and your life could be screwed up. Therefore let us listen seriously and carefully to what the apostle Peter says about our identity. 

First, we are living stones. Do you like stones? I like stones, especially precious stones. Look at verses 4 and 5. “4 As you come to him, the living Stone--rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him--5 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” When we come to Jesus the Living Stone, we can have life and become a living stone. Before, we were rejected, hated, and ignored by people such as friend, teacher, brother, sister or even parent for some reason. We tried hard to get their attention and to have good relationship with them and yet there’s nothing we could do for it and we felt useless and worthless like an abandoned rolling stone on the street. Now, we are so happy because we are chosen by God and precious to him as a living stone being built into a spiritual house, that is, God’s church. In God’s house we are very worthy and precious children of God like a beautiful, shinny jewel or gem with the full extent of life. We can say that we are priceless gem full of life through Jesus Christ. Again, you are living, precious gem that shines in the world.

Second, we are a chosen people. Look at verse 9a. “We are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God...” Jesus told his disciples, "You did not choose me. I chose you, and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit." (Jn 15:16) Moses knew how precious God's choosing was. He told the Israelites, "The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his treasured possession." (Dt. 8)  As recently as last month I had read a news article about women and children in Afghanistan, and there they are addicted to drug abuse in order to forget their miserable existence. They suffer from widespread unemployment and social upheaval under the Taliban and the U.S.- led war, begun in 2001. One mother named Karima took her 5-year-old daughter, Raisa, to the market last month to sell her because she was desperate for cash to buy drug. But she couldn’t find a buyer. The oldest is Fahima among her 6. At 12, she is the size of a child half her age. She has big brown eyes and bald spot on her head from malnutrition. She is the one her mother sends out to buy drugs. All the kids have never gone to school. To make a long story short, they are under a great suffering and misery. That situation makes us think many things, but one thing I want to say is the result of being a chosen people by God makes a big difference in reality. Before Korean people were very poor and miserable because they went through Japanese colony and Korean War respectively. In those days, so many people drank alcohol and got drunk because there was no hope for the future and they just wanted to forget their miserable situation just like those now in Afghanistan. But God had mercy on Korean people and made them a chosen people through many missionaries. If God did not choose us as his people, we might be also sent to buy drugs for our parents without going to school and suffering from malnutrition and live a life of misery without any hope and vision. Let us give thanks to God who made us his chose people and keep praying for those in sufferings in Muslim countries to be a God’s people.  

Third, we are a royal priesthood. Look at verse 9a again. "We are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God..." Verse 5 says that we are a holy priesthood. What does it mean to be a priest? In the Old Testament, the high priest offered animal sacrifices to atone for sin. He went to pray at the altar of incense with the names of the tribes of Israel engraved on his breastpiece and on his shoulders. (Ex 39) This means that he prayed for the whole nation. All priests were supposed to be descendants of Aaron. But Jesus was not a descendant of Aaron. He was from the tribe of Judah. Jesus' priesthood was different. He was a Royal Priest. He was a priest like Melchizedek (Gen 14, Heb 7). Melchizedek, priest of the Most High God, king of righteousness and king of peace, came with bread and wine to encourage Abraham after the battle of the kings. Like Melchizedek, Jesus became a priest on the "basis of the power of an indestructible life." (He 7:16) Jesus was a man of prayer. He prayed early in the morning. He prayed for his disciples. He prayed for his nation. He prayed for his enemies. From the cross, he prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." Jesus chose us--all believers-- to be a royal priesthood. A priest is a mediator between God and mankind. The prayer topic Jesus taught us is: "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." As royal priests, we must pray for the people of the world. We must pray for China and North Korea and the Muslim people. We must pray for the colleges and university students of the world. We must pray for America to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation as a royal priesthood.

Fourth, we are a holy nation. The Hebrew word, kadosh, for holy means to be separate from the worldly influences. God is holy, meaning that he is actively involved in the running of the world, yet, totally unaffected by the world- and yet he hears and answers our prayers. That is holiness. This is our holiness also. As Christians, we must occupy ourselves in the betterment of the world through carrying out God’s directives. This means living in this world, studying hard, marrying by faith, procreating, working hard and at the same time not to be affected by the daily worldly occurrences. We do not separate ourselves from the world. In spite of entanglement in the mundane we will see the hand of God. And the Hebrew word (goi) for a nation means a body, which is a metaphor for a group of individuals whose relationship to one another is as of the limbs to a body. In Exodus 19:3 Moses goes up the first time into Mount Sinai, and God announces to him the general terms of the covenant in verses 5 and 6: “If you obey me and keep my covenant you will be my special possession, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.” In fact, God’s promise to make his people a holy nation goes back to the covenant that God made with Abraham. And it was renewed with his son Isaac. In Genesis 26:3 God says to Isaac, "To you and to your descendants I will give all these lands, and I will fulfill the oath which I swore to Abraham your father." And then to Isaac's son, Jacob, God appeared at Bethel (according to Genesis 28:13-15) and confirmed the covenant to him: "I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your descendants; and your descendants shall be like the dust of the earth … and by you and your descendants shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go …" At that time, Jacob may not have known that he would be going to Egypt and that for four hundred years his descendants would be slaves and that the promise would lie dormant until God confirmed it afresh with Moses. God called Moses and with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm God liberated his people from the bondage under Egypt. They crossed the Red Sea on dry ground. They received food from the sky and water from the rock. And in three months they arrived at Mount Sinai. Here God made a solemn covenant with Israel to confirm the covenant he had made with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Now what? What does a holy nation- God’s covenant made with the ancestors of faith- mean to us now? Unlike the Mosaic covenant only for the Israelites, the new covenant-making us a holy nation-of Jesus Christ through his death on the cross is intended for all mankind -- regardless of race. In the Great Commission Jesus sent His apostles into the entire world so they could tell the story of the cross (Luke 24:46-47; Matt. 28:18-20). The gospel call extends to every man and woman today through his holy nation that is us, ourselves. We have to show people in the world how to live a life of faith on earth. In obedience to God, we must live a life of excellence, not just being mediocre. Do your best in what you are doing. It dose not matter what kind of work you do because God gave each of us different kinds of talents. The value of doing your best in what you are doing is absolute. All matter is to do your best as a holy nation in what you are doing to reveal God’s glory. In this way we can live as a victor and become more than a conqueror, influencing the world, not to be influenced by the world. This is how we live as a holy nation.

Fifth, we are a people belong to God. We belonged to the devil before we came to belong to God. Once we had not received mercy, now we have received mercy. It’s because God redeemed us with the blood of Jesus, the Lamb without blemish. We were purchased by God at the price of Jesus’ death. Then you now realize how much worthy you are of. It’s Jesus’ life. We belong to God. This is our true identity.

Look at verse 9b-10 “that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” Here we see clearly our mission as a kingdom of priests, a holy nation, a people belonging to God. That is to tell the good news of him who brought us out of darkness into his wonderful light. We can find our identity as a holy nation people when we seek to bring people to God. We must witness to the unbelieving world by our words and actions and seek to engage in Bible study anyone who is willing. I pray that we may declare the praises of God in this world as his people by remembering God’s mercy upon us through his son Jesus.

III. Holy nation people’s lifestyle (11-24)

Verses 11-12 tell us that we should abstain from the evil desires that war against the soul and live such good lives that unbelievers may see our good deeds and glorify God. And in verses 13-23, He is telling us to have the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus. In these verses he points out 3 ways to imitate Jesus.  First, we have to submit to authority like Jesus. Jesus was not rebellious. He was not a slave of men. He was free but he used his freedom to serve like a slave. He even submitted to the rulers of his country, even though they were evil. He paid taxes, respected the Roman officers. We must use our freedom to show proper respect to everyone. Second, we have to bear up under unjust suffering. Jesus did not have a victim’s mentality, even though he was a victim of evil men. God allow suffering to purify our faith. To bear up under unjust suffering helps us to understand Jesus who suffered for us. Third, we should not retaliate. Jesus did not seek revenge because he entrust his whole life to God alone. Instead of retaliating, Jesus prayed on the cross for his enemies and for all sinners as well as his beloved ones. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

Look at 24-25 “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. 25 For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.” Lastly we should accept God’s grace and return every day to our Shepherd and Overseer of our souls, Jesus to live a holy nation people.

In today’s passage we learn that Jesus, the Living Stone, is the cornerstone and capstone of the Holy Nation People. When we come to Jesus we are made alive. We are chosen as living stones. Let us say together: "You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light."