What Christian’s Are (Part B)

When you can't win friendships with the lost out in the world, you don't get opportunities. Your opportunities to preach the truth are greatly diminished.

But when people at least respect you as a decent person, whole tracks of opportunity can open up. I'm not telling you something I read in a book. I'm telling you something that I've lived in my life. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of 1st Peter.

Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. Today's message is called What Christians Are, taught from 1st Peter chapter 2. We can learn much about a person by what they hold to be precious, to be dear to them. What is dear to you? What is the most dearest thing to you?

Create a list in your head and what's at the top and how far up is it? If you're honest, you might say, I know it should be the Lord, but I have other passions. I don't like that I have these other passions, but they are there. That's an honest answer.

That's where the fight is. There's nothing wrong about being honest. There's something very wrong with pretending that the truth is not the truth. And so we learn much about ourselves by what we hold to be precious, Jesus said, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Well, you go through a long stretch of time in your Christian walk where Jesus is just this radiant, beautiful Savior, but then tough days come and they don't, they last a long time sometimes. And you may find yourself struggling to find that same zeal in the faith that you once had.

You are now mature. You're expected to work through this and be victorious because of the scripture, because of your faith. And so the thing we hold precious, what will it do to us? It is more of an act of our will than it is our emotions.

You see, the lesser precious things, it's emotional, the loved ones, the children, you know, we can feel that, but when we're struggling and it seems that Jesus is not helping like we had hoped he would, the emotions begin to betray us if we're not careful. And so he says, but to those who are disobedient, in contrast to those who have willfully come to Christ, willfully have him as Lord and Savior, in contrast with those who are disobedient, people will face consequences for disliking Christ. They will face consequences for not accepting whom he says he is. The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. Again, stone metaphor for the Christ, Messiah, God's Son. By the time Peter wrote this letter, the Jewish nation had finalized as a nation their rejection of Jesus Christ. Yeah, there were Jews that were Christians and there were still Jews coming to Christ, but as a people in their synagogues, at their temple, they had rejected Christ completely.

And these were different days now. Christ and the church, God and the Holy Spirit, was now center stage as far as the light of the world. And whether it be in Jerusalem or Israel or the diaspora, the Jews dispersed throughout Gentile lands, he was rejected. We read about it in Acts chapter 18.

For example, Luke is writing about Paul's experience in Corinth, Acts chapter 18 verse 5. When Silas and Timothy had come from Macedonia, Paul was compelled by the Spirit and testified to the Jews that Jesus is Messiah. But when they opposed him and blasphemed, he shook his garments and said to them, your blood be upon your own heads, I am clean, from now on I will go to the Gentiles. They had rejected as a people the chief cornerstone. They had forfeited their calling as builders of righteousness. This is not against the Jewish people, it is a fact. It is a fact not only of biblical history, but world history. Their refusing the chief cornerstone has brought upon them much unnecessary sorrow, perhaps more than any people that have ever been. Because not only are they battling the world, but the Satan behind the world that is determined to destroy them to prove God's promises are not sustainable. Satan will fail, of course, in that endeavor, but because he is insane with his own ambitions, he doesn't believe it. Verse 8, and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, they stumble being disobedient to the word to which they also were appointed.

So he continues to develop it. A stone of stumbling, a rock of offense. What would have been the most crucial component of the structure, that chief cornerstone, that symbolic stone of their faith. It became the cause of injury and not salvation. 2 Corinthians 2 16, to the one we are an aroma of death leading to death and to the other the aroma of life leading to life. To the unbeliever the message and the Christian himself is a message of death and judgment if they remain unbelievers. But to those who have become believers the message of the cross is life, it is light, it is a sweet smelling aroma.

This is what it always comes down to, one or the other. And in your most difficult times as believers that is what we cling to. That we believe in Jesus Christ, that he is the Son of God, that he died and rose again, that he is coming again, that he has given me his Holy Spirit to preach the truth concerning God and salvation and the state of man. This is what makes us believers amongst other things, not an exhaustive list nor is it intended to be. They stumble being disobedient to the word, that's what it says. Look at verse 8, a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, that means things got ugly. They stumble being disobedient to the word. How many of you wish the sermons here, now don't answer this, were at ten minutes. So all right yeah go ahead answer it, tell me more. But you see there are many places like tennis elbow but it's wrist elbow from looking at their watch every two minutes.

When's the ten minute gonna end? Because the words not preached nor is it desired. This is a tragedy.

This is not something we're going to be critical of them, we're better than them, that's not it at all. It is what has happened here. Our own Bible is loaded with these sorts of exhortations concerning God's Word but they're just dismissed. They stumble being disobedient to the word. Hell is packed with those who treat God's Word as though it was is not God's Word, that's how they got there.

And by the way, hell is never booked up. There's always room for more. It is an abyss, is endless, and that's what concerns us. When we say we love Jesus, that he is precious to us, then what is precious to him must be precious to us too. And if it is just our lives and the circle of our loved ones, we are missing it. We've been hijacked. It must go beyond the church doors, the home, it has to get out into the world.

You say how does it do that? You hand up my CDs. You and I, when we are with the world, we're not on our best behavior, we're on our Christian behavior. We do as best we can. But if we're dishonest and abrasive and unlikable and grumpy, especially all the time, we can't win. We can't win friendships. When you can't win friendships with the lost out in the world, you don't get opportunities. Your opportunities to preach the truth are greatly diminished. But when people at least respect you as a decent person, whole tracks of opportunity can open up. I'm not telling you something I read in a book.

I'm telling you something that I've lived in life. If we are blameless people, if we walk upright, God will use us. We'll come back to that in a minute. But back to this, they stumbled being disobedient to the word. They would not heed their own prophets concerning their own Messiah.

What should have been foundational to them again became a hazard, a sentence of doom. Such are the consequences of recklessness with God. To get a believer to where you can say to, an unbeliever, to where you can say to them, you're being reckless with your eternity by making things up about it. You have no authority to make up things about what is going to happen to you when you die or anyone else.

But there is an authority. And you must understand that Satan is devoted. He is fanatical about getting people to not believe this is what God has said. Peter, of course, as we considered once, we'll consider throughout his letter, said we've got the more sure word of predictive prophecy, prophecies that have been fulfilled. And we today have prophecies that are being fulfilled. He says here, to which they also were appointed.

The Jews were appointed to the laws of preaching God's Word, yes, but also to the judgments of rejecting it. And that's what he's talking about here. The laws of cause and effect, you reap what you sow. If you sow unbelief, you're going to get unbelief. You will not get a harvest of belief from doubting. When you find yourself doubting, which is understandable, you should never be surprised at that.

No Christian should ever be surprised that doubt tries to gain entrance. What we should be surprised at is if we start making it feel very comfortable that we let it come in. It's sort of like, you know, you can get a critter into your house that you don't want in your house. You're going to spend your energy to get it out, like a hornet, for example. Even a bird. I don't want a bird in my house. All right, anyway, maybe you do. I mean, I don't mean a domesticated bird.

Maybe to help you with it. How about a turkey vulture? Do you want one of those ugly things? The ugliest creature ever made.

Ugly. Well, to which they were also appointed. Now he's not talking about, he's not introducing Calvin's doctrine of election. He is talking, as I mentioned, cause and effect, reaping what you sow. He points out the inevitable consequence of rejecting the Messiah is judgment. So a brief review of the history of the Jew, and it is a sad thing, and it should, it's not gleeful at all, but it is fact. The 2,000 years since the crucifixion of Christ, we have watched the nation of Israel, even though they've been without a land for most of those 2,000 years, we have watched them suffer as a people who once had light and no longer do.

They've wandered throughout the world. They have been strangers in Gentile lands, exiled, forced out of their own homeland. Their country dissolved into a state that has been trampled underfoot by the Gentiles and their powers, as Jesus referenced it, the time of the Gentiles.

They have been misunderstood. They have been hated and persecuted simply for being Jewish, not for attacking anyone. Simply for being Jewish. They have faced anti-Semitism in every country under the sun. And then there was that horrific Holocaust.

No other people have been subject for so long a time to what the Jewish people have been subjected to. That is fact. That is history. Coupled with that is their rejection of their own God.

A judgment. But there's more. There's hope. But before that hope comes to fruition, there's going to be a lot more suffering for them as a people. And their own prophets have written about it long ago. It's there to be considered and to be shared from the scriptures. Now verse 9, but you are a chosen generation.

Let me pause there. If the Bible is right about all this with the Jewish people, then you who doubt the word because of your struggles, maybe it's some addiction in your life, something you just cannot get rid of, maybe it's an illness you can't shake, whatever it is, you have that more sure word of prophecy. You have God saying, listen to me. My word is accurate.

I've left enough proofs for you to see. The fact that there are these other things in your life that you don't understand does not justify your rejection of the things you do understand. Hold to those things that you know to be true. The day will come, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow or for a long time, but the moment will come where all that is evil and weak about you will pass away.

And the only thing that will matter is your friendship with me. And this is what the Bible says to man. And God has hated for this by many. Verse 9, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. What Christians are.

That is what we are considering because Peter tells us. He's resuming his identification of Christians. He's giving us some identity. You're more than just human. The philosophers of the world, the best they can do is talk about humanity.

That's as far as they go. It takes an apostle, it takes a prophet to go beyond that and say there's more to you than your humanity. There's more to you than being human. Look at verse 5 of 1 Peter chapter 2.

You also as living stones are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. There's more to you than just pleasures and convenience and Korea and everything else. Peter tells us what we are even in the midst of difficult times, even in the midst of depression. You know you just don't feel like life. You don't feel the joy. Anytime I get like that because of one of you.

Kidding. But anytime I get him, you don't need a reason. That's the thing when you're depressed. You don't have to have all this is why. You don't have to. It's just there. It's always the same word from the Holy Spirit.

One foot in front of another, keep moving, keep moving. Don't lie down and wait for mercy from depression or anything else that is looking to harm you. Mercy is not something in Satan's vocabulary. It is not something that belongs to your sinful nature when it comes to confrontation with that between right and wrong. Peter tells us and remember he's writing to persecuted Christians. He's telling them what they are.

He's saying you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people. But I'm so unhappy. So what? You still have work to do. Clean up your room. You've still got to get it done.

You parents, you know when your child's room needs to be cleaned up, unless your room's worse than theirs, they got to get it done. And he's applying Exodus 19 to the church because it has been forfeited by the people and their rejection of Messiah. And so having already said the first thing about us and that we are born, or maybe I'll say it this way, begotten again. That's how he says it in chapter one. We are begotten again. And then he goes on to say we're born again, a different Greek word.

Same meaning. He takes for granted our humanity. He understands where people subject to all sorts of stuff. But again, he begins with a philosopher's drop off.

He applied all the terms that were for Old Testament Israel to the New Testament church now. It's now our job to be a light of the world. Moody mentioned about the lighthouse is that it radiates. It shines.

It has no horn to blow. It just shines its light. That's what a witness is. A mariner sees that lighthouse. He knows there are rocks over that way.

Stay away from there. We are to be this lighthouse. We are to radiate light and not blow our horns. And so he is raising Christianity up to a higher level than Judaism. Again, he said we are a chosen generation. God chooses to save all who choose to respond to God's terms and submit to them. That's who God chooses. We are a royal priesthood.

I'll open that up in a minute. We have time. We are a holy nation. His own special people. Chosen generation.

We take that one first. A new selected breed. That's what the Christian is supposed to be. We're not, again, not just human. There's supposed to be something about us that is not just human. Not just interested in our carnal appetites. We are supposed to have greater expectations because we know the deal.

We know where things are going. We start this life as humans, but we go on to a new birth. Now, if you are a human being without Christ, it is up to you to find out what kind of human being you're supposed to be. If you are born again, then it is up to you to find out what kind of born again you're supposed to be.

What is that going to look like? Well, Peter tells us some of the things that go into being. Born a second time. We are not to be as it was before we came to Christ. If nothing else, our determination to adore Him, to love Him, to love those, again, who are not lovable. We belong to another world.

When we first come to Christ, you kind of boast of that, don't you? I am not of this world. But as the days roll by, you find out this world is saying, yeah, well, let's see about that. We're going to find out how much of this world is in you or not.

And nonetheless, it is true. And so now we must figure it out how to be the kind of believer we ought to be, remembering who we are. Because if we don't know who you are, you don't know who you should be.

Get a new job, not knowing much about the new job you have. You kind of stand around so someone can begin to direct you, tell you what to do. The same with coming to Christ. Yes, we have the scripture, but He Himself has given us some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastor, teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edification of the body of Christ. And all of those positions of authority are so often rejected by those who say, but I love Jesus. Well, why don't you act like it sometimes?

In those areas where you can pull it off, do you pull it off? A royal priesthood. Israel had a priesthood, but it was not a royal priesthood. It was an Aaronic priesthood, a Levitical priesthood. It was a priesthood of ritual. It was a valuable ritual at the time, but it was not royal. And those priests offered sacrifices, they made prayers, and they stood between God and the people. That's what a priest does. Now, the Holy Spirit says you belong to a priesthood, not just the men, the women too.

The Old Testament entrance into the Jewish priesthood was controlled by Mosaic law. You had to be a man. You had to be born into the family of Aaron.

No exceptions. It was restricted. Joshua could not be a priest. David could not be a priest. Daniel could not be a priest in Israel. King Uzziah tried to infiltrate the priesthood.

He was struck with leprosy on the spot. The kings could be prophets, but they could not be priests. The two lines never crossed in the Old Testament. Even Jesus Christ in the flesh could not be a priest, according to the Old Testament law, because he was from the line of Judah.

That is how it was, but that is not how it is. And of course, in 70 AD, their temple was destroyed. In 135 AD, the Jews were completely tossed out of their own land. So everything that supported their Levitical ministry was lost.

God had no use for him. He had another priesthood now, according to the line of Melchizedek. We're so glad you tuned in today to study the book of 1 Peter on Cross Reference Radio. Cross Reference Radio is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia, and we're blessed to bring you God's word with each broadcast. If you'd like more information about this program or want to listen to additional teachings from Pastor Rick, please visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. We also encourage you to subscribe to our podcast, so you'll never have to miss a program. Just search for Cross Reference Radio in iTunes, Google Play Music, or your favorite podcast app. We hope you'll tune in again next time to join us as we continue our study through the scriptures, right here on Cross Reference Radio.