2.03.16. Living stones
XVL LIVING STONES.
“If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” — 1 Peter 2:3-5.
HERE Peter walks closely in the Master’s footsteps.
He intimates that all his expectation of growth in the new life of his friends depends on their experience of forgiving love in their own hearts.
He proceeds on the supposition that they have “ tasted that the Lord is gracious;” otherwise he has no expectation of fruit. So taught the Lord himself, when he said, with reference to the relation between the vine and its branches, “ Without me ye can do nothing.” The actual performance of duty depends on the receiving of pardon, as an effect depends on its cause. In the gospel it is not, Do in God*s service, then and therefore you will receive from him; it is. Receive from him, then and therefore you will be enabled to serve him. It is the branch in the vine that is fruitful. In the affluent imagery of this fisherman apostle, we are introduced somewhat suddenly here to a new analogy.
Dismissing the conception of infants with their sure strong instincts for their mother’s milk as the means of life and growth, he steps with all the ease of a master into the widely different yet perfectly congruous conception of a house growing from its foundation to its summit, by the preparation and piling up of many stones. The figures here crowd upon one another, and yet all contribute to the exactitude and completeness of the idea. To the notion of many stones constituting one edifice, is added the idea of life in each separate stone, and the consequent increase of the edifice being a spontaneous growth instead of an operation performed on inanimate matter. And then the conception of a priesthood is added to that of the temple in which they serve, that another aspect of the kingdom may be included in the picture.
“To whom coming.” This is in harmony with the whole gospel. It is always and everywhere, “ Come unto me.” The corresponding complaint of the Lord against the Jews is, “Ye will not come unto me that ye may have life.*’ But here the “ coming “ is applied to a stone, that enters as a constituent of an edifice. The figure requires that we should conceive of a stone carried to the spot by human hands. So much the worse for the figure if it make any such demand. We are learning here at the feet of a teacher who is bent, not on maintaining the rules of rhetoric, but on conveying to men’s minds the saving truth of the gospel. The form must yield to the substance. When nature fails to convey the whole lesson, the lacking part will be given contrary to nature; and so the stones are “ living stones.”
They represent living souls, — a people made willing in a day of Divine power; therefore the rhetorical unity of the analogy must be broken, in order to maintain the unity of the faith.
Both the rock which constitutes the foundation, and the stones which are laid ou it, are living. The Christ to whom they come, and they who come to him, are living stones; and thus the house grows, like the vine and its branches. As the vine grows into the branch and feeds it, and the branch grows into the vine and draws from it sustenance, so the living foundation attracts the stones, and the stones, by that mysterious attraction made living, come to the foundation, and grow into an holy temple.
It is worthy of notice here that the growth of a tree and the construction of an edifice are very closely and very frequently united in the Scriptures, in order to exhibit the nature and result of the new life in a soul. We give two specimens, one from the Old Testament and the other from the New: “ That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth; that our daughters may be as comer stones, polished after the similitude of a palace” (Psalms 144:12).
“ Ye are God’s husbandry; ye are God’s building “ (1 Corinthians 3:9), The foundation chosen by God was rejected by men.
He came unto his own, and his own received him not. This rejection by the Jews was indeed the preconcerted mark by which the faithful should recognize the Messiah.
“ He was rejected and despised of men.” On this foundation resting, each living stone is a temple, and all the living stones together constitute the universal Church. As Christ himself is at once the offerer and the sacrifice, so a Christian is at once the temple where God condescends to dwell, and the consecrated priest who presents offerings there. Ye offer up spiritual sacrifices. In the Epistle to the Bomans, we find that the bodies of believers — this life, with all its faculties and powers — are the living sacrifices that God will accept at the offerer’s hands, as distinguished from the dead offerings of a former dispensation.
Two qualities in New Testament worship go to make it acceptable. One is, the offerings must be spiritual, not material; the other is, they must be presented through the one Mediator between God and man. Only spiritual offerings can be acceptable. Bodily service has no merit. No amount of material gifts contributed can avail the opulent worshipper, and no degree of self-inflicted torture can avail the devotee who is courageous but poor. Vestments and candles and incense are out of place under the gospeL God does not regard them; they have no value in his sight, except a value on the wrong side, as marking men who have departed from the simplicity of Christ. Beware, ye who labour in the fires to produce these mechanical and dead sacrifices. The answer prepared for your appeal is, — “ Who hath required this at your hands?” God calls for spiritual sacrifices. Christ taught with marvellous clearness that under the New Dispensation the acceptance of worship does not depend on place and form, but that men must everywhere worship in spirit and in truth. It is the human soul, in contact with the Father of our spirits, worshipping, loving, serving, — this only is acceptable. But even this, in order to be acceptable, must be all presented always through the one Mediator between God and man. The office of the Holy Spirit in the word is to take of the things of Christ and show them unto us. Here is a thing of Christ which the Spirit clearly shows. He is the Daysman, laying his hand upon both, to obtain acceptance for our worship or work. Even the most spiritual sacrifices are acceptable only through Jesus Christ. The announcement from above is, “ Lo! I am with you alway.” Let our heart’s answer echo up to him that speaketh — “Even so, come. Lord Jesus.” It is not his name as a dead letter in our creed, or his name as a sound at the termination of our prayer, but himself in simple faith accepted, dwelling in our hearts, and ever presented unto (Jod as our righteousness, not only when we bow the knee in prayer, but also in all the turnings of life. “ Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, within the veil.” Let the line be ever tight that unites the ship tossed on the sea of time to the anchor within the veil, until the soul, saved from shipwreck, get an abundant entrance into the Lord’s presence, and so the need of an anchor be felt no more.