Saturday, May 3, 2025  

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Today's Scripture
1 Peter 2:1–10

Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture:

“See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious;
and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe,
“The stone that the builders rejected
has become the very head of the corner,”

and

“A stone that makes them stumble,
and a rock that makes them fall.”

They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts 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. (NRSV)

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Reflection

It’s so easy to see only one side of an argument. Simpler still to surround yourself with people who agree with you; to create an echo chamber where you hear only what you agree with. Today’s passage seems to challenge us to do better than that.

I try to read passages like this in first-person. “Rid yourselves of. . .” seems quite simple. “Some of us suffer from this but certainly not me.” Try this one on, “Rid yourself of. . .” That is a more direct statement. Something I teach my students is the enormous rhetorical difference between, “Can we shape this phrase better” versus “Could each of you focus on the phrase shape this time.” It’s easy to allow someone else to answer the question, to assume responsibility, or to take blame when the rhetoric is group-oriented. It’s more difficult if you feel that you have been asked something or told to do something directly.

Something else struck me in this passage. Like a newborn, long for, hunger for pure spiritual nourishment. Why? So that each might grow into salvation. That statement is striking to me; startling, to borrow from Dr. Buchanan. What if at least a component of our salvation is here and now? Can part of our salvation or “being saved” be a state of being as well as a final destination with God? Perhaps this “growth into salvation” is allowing ourselves to love and to be loved, to see others and to allow ourselves to be seen, to intentionally live more into Christ’s radically inclusive love.

Imagine if each of us allowed ourselves to be “living stones” to be built into God’s spiritual house. Living things grow and learn and develop. Imagine this spiritual house growing and learning; becoming all that God calls it to be. There is an admonition here as well. This “stone that was rejected” is also a stone that makes them stumble and fall. It is easy to live in our echo chamber believing that we have a corner on the correct answer.

That stone may be there to keep us from becoming complacent or content with our works.

Something to remind us that this journey to God’s promised day is a long one. Once we were no people. Now we are God’s people. Soli Deo Gloria.

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Prayer
God of the resurrection, help me rid myself of those things that stand between me and others in your royal priesthood. Nourish me with your word that I might continue to grow in salvation. In the name of and for the sake of Christ, the perfector of our faith. Amen.

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Written by Robert Sinclair, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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