Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / May 31st, 2015 | The Church - Week 1

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May 31st, 2015 | The Church - Week 1 · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, good morning.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the church.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Topeka Bible Church.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: How are you guys doing this morning?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Good.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, well, my name is Hunter.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm privileged to be here before you this morning.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to talk a little bit about the church this morning.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: You see, there's a lot of confusion about the church.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: If you look out in the world today, over two billion people will gather in the name of Jesus Christ, and they will go to church, just like you're doing, just like uh people are doing down the street.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: But there are a lot of churches.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever stopped to think about this?
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Of how many different kinds of churches there are in the world?
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: There are Christian churches, there are Mormon churches.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Did you know?
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: As of two years ago, the atheists even have a church.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've heard of this movement called the Sunday Assembly.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: It started in the United Kingdom when a group of atheists headed by two very popular British comedians named Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans decided that they wanted to start a church.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Apparently, atheists felt like, well, we need a place to go on Sunday mornings to worship, to rock songs, and listen to messages about different intellectual things.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so they started this group called the Sunday Assembly.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: And now there are many Sunday assemblies that gather, even here in the United States.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: So they call themselves a church.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so we kind of get a little confused.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it's estimated that across the globe there are some, depending on who you ask, either 33,000 or even 38,000 different denominations of this church.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: By 2025, it's estimated that we might even have as many as 55,000 denominations of the Christian church.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: So the good news for you in all of this is that you're, if you're dissatisfied and you don't like a place here, you just go and start your own denomination, and apparently you'll be welcomed with open arms by anybody who wants to join you.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: But needless to say, there's a lot of confusion with all of these different options about what the church really is and what it should be about, and more importantly, who it should be about.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so what we're going to do this morning is we're actually going to return back to the basics of the Bible in an effort to have a fuller understanding and a more accurate understanding of the church.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really what we're going to be doing this week and next in a little series that we're entitling The Church, What and Who and How.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to be looking at the book of 1 Peter, chapter 2, verses 1 through 12.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: So you can go ahead and get yourself ready and open up your Bible to that part towards the end of the New Testament.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Or you can open up the app on your smartphone or your tablet and get that ready.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, we are taking a very big detour from Route 66.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: We're not even in the Old Testament.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: We're in the New Testament this week.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: But I really think that this is going to have value for us as we analyze even why we're here and what we do as the church.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I had the privilege last fall to really study through 1st and 2 Peter.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And as a result of that, I have I had an even greater privilege to speak on these very same verses and preach through them in places like Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm really excited and actually very humbled to be here this morning because this is my church.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: This is our church.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And the privilege to be able to speak of the rich text here in 1 Peter chapter 2 to my church is very, very exciting to me, but also very humbling to me.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: But I think as a result of our time here, we'll have a better understanding of really the foundation of what God says is true and should be true about his church.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to give you a little context and then we'll eventually dive into our passage today.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: But the context of 1 Peter tells us that this is a letter that was written by the Apostle Peter, who was one of Jesus' closest followers, one of his best friends.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter was a foundational member of the group of apostles who helped start the church in the name of Christ.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter was writing about A.D.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: 64 to a group of Christians in an area called Asia Minor, which is essentially modern-day Turkey.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: And the thing you have to understand is that these Christians were experiencing some great persecution.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say great, I mean really great.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: I mean like Isis-level persecution in the first century.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: Of the atrocities that you hear today, they were experiencing back then almost 2,000 years ago.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: You see, the emperor of the Roman Empire at this time was a man named Nero.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: And if you know anything about history, Nero and Christians didn't exactly get along.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, Nero was the one who would take Christians at his whim and order them to be crucified and covered in pitch and burned alive at his dinner parties in his gardens outside of his palace, just because he could.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was a very deep, very personal persecution that the Christians were going through.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: Even Peter himself, the author of this letter that we read this morning, was later, according to church tradition, crucified upside down in a painting that's depicted by an Italian Renaissance painter named Caravaggio behind you.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: And he was crucified upside down, according to tradition, because he did not deem it that he was worthy to be crucified in the same manner as his Lord.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: But this persecution was very real.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was living and breathing flesh and blood examples of 2 Timothy 3.12, where Paul writes that all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will experience persecution and will be persecuted.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: So Peter's words to his audience, both back then and even today, are very important because he essentially told him, stand firm in the faith.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Stand firm as the church of Christ.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to look at three foundational truths today that inform us about who and what and what and who the church should be about.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Just a little teaser there, you know, the who is Jesus in you, okay?
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's what makes the church.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's Jesus in you.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll talk about that.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: But we'll look at these truths.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: And by the way, if you're here this morning and you're kind of visiting and you're just not sure about this whole Jesus thing, and you just think, well, I've heard about him.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just not really sure I know him personally.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, stick with us this week and next because I really think there's going to be some stuff here that will apply to you and will help stir your thinking and maybe your uh rethinking about the church.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because there are a lot of mixed messages out there about what the church is supposed to be about.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of our time, I really believe we'll have at least the beginning of a clearer picture.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh this is a very theologically deep and rich passage that we look at today.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of Old Testament, a lot of even New Testament, a lot of Jesus, and uh I am I'm really by the grace of God, and it's only by the grace of God uh I able to be here before you this morning to talk about these things because in and of myself I'm not sufficient.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited, I'm humbled, and I'm looking forward to our time together.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, in order to start our time, I'm gonna do something and have us participate.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: We don't normally do this here at Topeka Bible Church, but I know of other churches where this is part of what they do as part of their service and their time together when the Word of God is read.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: But what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna have all of us that are able to to stand while we read the Word of God in order to help us focus on what the words are and what's being said.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: So let's all stand together as we read the Word of God together.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And you can read along in your Bibles.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: We'll also have the words on the screen behind me.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: But we're gonna be reading from 1 Peter chapter 2, verses 1 through 12.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: As Peter writes, So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like newborn infants, long for pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: 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, and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles, to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: Father, really, as we look at these verses, uh I know that I really have nothing uh to bring uh in this area, because this is all about simply uh remembering you and pointing people to you and proclaiming the truth that you have already declared of the the gospel of Jesus Christ crucified for sins and and resurrected to new life.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: And uh He is now uh the head of the church.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: And as we look through the verses that we do in the moments to come, please inform our hearts and our minds of what it means uh to see the church as you see the church and to worship Christ as the head of that church.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: And even as we look ahead later uh to celebrating communion in his name, God, may this just be a time where we can, as your people, come together and be continually changed and transformed to be more in the image of Christ.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Please uh limit the distractions and please focus our hearts and our minds on you and on your truth and your word.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: In Christ's name.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: You may be seated.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: So to set the stage a little bit, a little uh history, a word study, if you will, a little history, uh word study on the church and the origin of the term.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: As best as I can discover, and I found this on the internet, so it must be true.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but as best I can understand, the word church comes from the Middle English word uh chirche, which comes from the old English word uh serise, and you know, if you can prove me wrong on the pronunciation, you you go for it.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: But as best I can tell, no one today was alive back then to tell us how to pronounce these words.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Some guy after the first service said, I think it's pronounced circus.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Well, I'm not sure about that, but uh, you know, something like that.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: You can see how these words kind of evolve.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then finally, from the ancient Greek, there's a tr a phrase that's in ancient Greek writings called kuriaka oika, or in some cases kuriaka doma, which just stands for the Lord's house.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's how it's translated, the Lord's house.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: The word in ancient Greek for Lord is kurios, and uh the belief is that that kind of that word got taken and adapted, and eventually we get our word church.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: What's interesting is that in the ancient Greek, that phrase the Lord's house would have referred to a pagan temple.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't have referred to the worship of the one true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: But it's only as that term has gotten adapted, Lord, and then Lord's house, and now church, that we see the evolution of that word.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: As best we can tell.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: But in the grand scheme of things, this stuff is not all that important.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: What is important is our understanding of what the church is today.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna present, I'm gonna present to you a working definition of the church.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: You may not agree with it, and that's okay.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're welcome to file and send any complaints and suggestions you have to Jim at discovertbc.com.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: And since he's out of the country, he won't get to me until after next week's sermon anyway.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: So um, but here's our working definition for the church that I'd like for us to embrace this week and next, and that is this it is the church is a community of people who are founded upon Jesus Christ and led by Jesus Christ in order to carry out the mission of Jesus Christ.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you see the centrality of Christ to all of this: a community of people who are founded upon Jesus Christ and led by Jesus Christ in order to carry out the mission of Jesus Christ.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna look at three essential truths that are based off of our passage and our reading today that have both corporate and individual significance to us.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll just jump right in and say that this is the first truth.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And that is that in Jesus you are part of something bigger.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: You're a part of something bigger.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just you, and you and Jesus, but it's you and Jesus in the context of others.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: And keep in mind the definition is a community of people, it's not just an individual.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: So we begin looking at this and we get this truth from verses four and five of 1 Peter chapter 2.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: As Peter says, um, as you come to him, and come to him would mean to come to him by faith and approach him.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: And uh even as a Christian, you continue to come to Jesus with confidence because he's provided the way of salvation and access to God.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: But he says, as you come to him, a living stone.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: And we just have to pause and say, hey, wait a minute.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Hold up here, back up.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Living stone.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, the word stone here is uh lithon in the Greek, which is different from a petros.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: A petros would be a stone that's just found in the field, that's unrefined, and is just simply just there.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: But lithos is something else.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: Lithos is a stone that is actually taken and quarried and shaped specifically with a perfect dimension and proportion so that it might be put to use, usually in a building or for some other uh project in the ancient world.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's a we get the word monolith uh from this phrase as well, from this word.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: But it's it's a stone that's been crafted.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: But really the odd thing that should strike us, and then we sometimes read over this in the Bible and we kind of yada yada.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: I've heard that before, and we shouldn't do that.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: We should always pause and look at the details and observe.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: But a living stone should stand out to you as something strange.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because the last time I checked, I didn't see any stones living and walking around.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: They are just inanimate objects that are in nature.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: Living stone is an example of oxymoron.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what an oxymoron is.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's two terms that when brought together don't make perfect sense.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: I wrote down some some here that I found.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, act naturally.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: How?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Good grief.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: Pretty ugly.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Wait a minute, okay.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Detailed summary.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Really?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the list goes on and on.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: Jumbo shrimp.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: Icy hot.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Microsoft Works.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: And one of my favorites, KU football.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's just sorry.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't resist.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: But this is an oxymoron, a living stone, and we should say, well, how is this possible?
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: What does it mean?
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the living stone.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, who is the living stone?
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: The living stone is Jesus.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: The living aspect of it is that he is alive.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Just as we read at the tail end of the Matthew's gospel, when they come to the stone tomb of Jesus, and they say, Well, where's his body?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: Where have you laid him?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: And they say, He's not here.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: He's alive.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: He's living.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus indeed is alive, and the resurrection of Jesus makes all the difference in the world.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you understand that.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: That without the resurrection of Jesus, there really is no hope, and the gospel is not good news at all.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: But the amazing reality is that Jesus is alive and he is still alive today, which means that there is hope, and the gospel is indeed good news.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: We find that Jesus is the rock, but he is the living rock, the living stone.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: And the text here says that he was rejected by men.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's when he was rejected on the cross, when he was crucified for your sins and mine.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: But he was chosen and precious in the sight of God, which means that God chose him for a specific purpose, to die for the sins of the world, to be brought back to new and resurrected life, which is why he's the living stone.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: But the amazing reality in all this, as we continue reading, is that he's not the only living stone that's described in this passage.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Peter goes on to say that you yourselves, anyone who's trusted in Christ, are also like a living stone.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: We are also like a living stone who's being brought together and being built up as a spiritual house, which is just it makes us pause and go, wait a minute, wait, okay, so how am I a living stone if Jesus is a living stone?
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And what you see is that everything that is about truth about Jesus, when you trust in him, he imparts to you.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: He imparts his life, he imparts his identity, he imparts his grace and his truth upon us.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why we can be living stones that are together brought together as the church.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mentioned that this word stone is something that's shaped and fashioned.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: You and I, in the same way, are being shaped and fashioned by the Holy Spirit and by the grace of God to be more and more shaped into the image of the true living stone who is Jesus Christ.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: And we are being built up into what the Bible calls this temple, but not an old temple that is static stationary, but a new temple that is constantly changing and evolving.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is really against all principles of architecture that I studied.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: When you built a building and you build a building today, you don't want that to change.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: You don't want it to shift.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: You want it to be stationary once it's set.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: And this picture that Peter paints for us of the church as a building that's constantly changing and being transformed, it's it's an amazing reality.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: But it also doesn't make a lot of sense, especially in the ancient world and even today.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: Say, well, that wouldn't be any kind of building I would want to be inside, but yet it is because of the amazing reality of who we are as living stones in Christ.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: Focusing on this idea of being shaped and transformed, Chuck Swindahl in his book Hope Again, when life hurts and dreams fade, which is actually sort of a modern-day commentary on the book of 1 Peter, he writes these words, talking about us being shaped and changed.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: He says, He has quarried you from the pit of your sin, and he is chiseling away and shaping you and ultimately sliding you into place.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: You are a part of his building project.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that amazing?
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: It should be.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it should also be humbling.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter was again contrasting this new temple, this spiritual house of the church.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: Contrasting it against the religion of his day, which were built in stone temples, which were dead and non-moving.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And this imagery would have flown in the face of the Jewish leaders of the day.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because for them, the temple in Jerusalem was the most important building, and this is where God dwelled.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: And now you're saying that there's this new temple, and these people and the church, and it would have upset them.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: We have to understand that as Christians, we are, like I said, part of something bigger.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: We're part of a community, we're part of the body of Christ.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: No one Christian can live the life that God intends in isolation by himself or by herself.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, I know the temptation.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: I know what it's like to say, oh, I'm okay, it's me and Jesus, we're good.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, you and Jesus may be good because you trusted him, but if you're not abiding in Christ through the life of the fellow believers around you, then you're not living the life that God wants you to live.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: The amazing thing is that when we gather together as the church, and not just on Sunday mornings, but throughout the week, as you gather with your Bible study or your community group, or even as you get together one-on-one with a Christian brother or a sister to pray and encourage one another, the amazing thing that happens is that God says He is in your midst.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: And he dwells in this place, this spiritual temple.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: And to me, that kind of blows my mind to think that just getting together with other Christians creates a temple or a building, a spiritual house where God dwells.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it reminds me that the physical building that we find ourselves in in the church is ultimately not that important.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: Last month I had the privilege of being in Haiti with a friend of mine, uh Cory Clutter, one of our deacons, and we met with nine Haitian pastors.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we asked him, hey, what are what are some of your challenges?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: What are some of your needs?
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: And one guy says, you know, man, I my my building doesn't have any pews.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: Can't afford them.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Very, very poor down there.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: Another guy says, you know, my building doesn't have a roof.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Another guy says, you know, since the earthquake a few years ago, I don't even have a building.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: And while they need those physical things, they don't need those physical things, and you and I don't need those physical things in order to be the church.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: You may remember the old rhyme that you probably learned if you grew up in the church, or maybe if you didn't, you still heard it.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, you put your hands together like this, and here's the church, here's the steeple, and you know this.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Open the door, and there, look at all the people.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: To constantly say, Am I the pinky?
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: Am I the index finger?
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Which one am I?
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: But really, what we're talking about is something that takes that and turns this on its head.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I think by turning this on its head, it looks something more like this.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: You actually start with Christ, and then you look at the people, you say, Well, you know, here's the church.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's made up of the people that happens to meet in a building that may or may not have a steeple.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because some do and some don't.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because the physical structure is ultimately not that important.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's the spiritual reality of what we are called to be as the church.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'm not saying, hey, you know, we just do away with the building because the building serves its purpose and it offers a place and it has its function.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not the most important component of what makes the church the church.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that's clear enough.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: What we find is a deeper mystery in this.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: It kind of gets even more spiritual and strange if you think about it in the historical context, but it says that, you know, we're to be this church, these living stones built into a spiritual house, uh, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: And you're just gonna say, all right, okay, hold on, wait, wait a minute.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Holy, you know, kind of a priesthood, a holy priesthood.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: What is this about?
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I haven't gone to seminary, I've never been ordained, I'm uh you know, I didn't grow up Catholic, I have nothing to do with being a priest, haven't been trained, I'm not gonna offer any sacrifices, no way, that's really gross.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Slitting the throat and the blood, no, I'm too squeamish.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't go to medical school for that reason, whatever.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: And you just have to say, now, let's put this into context, is talking on a spiritual level.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: You may not feel like you've been ordained and equipped, but in Jesus Christ you actually have been.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: This is what we call the priesthood of every believer.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: Every believer is a priest who offers spiritual sacrifices to God through Christ Jesus.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, the final sacrifice was made by Christ on the cross for our sins.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: But we continue to offer our lives as sacrifices to him, in the way that we live, in the way that we serve others.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: We find this very clearly in passages such as Romans 12:1, as the Apostle Paul writes, I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: We see some connections here to 1 Peter chapter 2.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: Again, here in Hebrews 13, 15.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: Through him, that is through Christ, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God that is the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: So what we see is that how we live, what we do with our bodies, what we say with our mouths, and the words that we say, the words that we sing, and how we use our minds and the thoughts that we think, all of these are to be a sacrifice to Christ, something that is pleasing to Christ.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're going to talk more about this next week, but all I can say is this this is kind of the bottom line on this.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: If there is an area of your life, just like in my life and everybody's life, really, that is not consistent with the character of Christ, then he is asking you to turn from living a life that is ultimately for yourself in that area to make it a sacrifice to God.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: And again, we're going to talk about that next week.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: But the one thing we have to understand in all of this is that in order to even live a life pleasing to God, it has to be based off of the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ and through Jesus Christ.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's through Christ's sacrifice that when we accept Him and that sacrifice for us in our behalf, that we then, through the Holy Spirit that indwells us and through the grace of God that transforms us, are we then able to live a life that is a living sacrifice to God?
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's all about Christ and it all starts with Christ.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: That leads us to truth number two, which is that in Jesus you have a perfect foundation.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: A perfect foundation.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Here's our definite, remember our definition of the church, a community of people who are founded upon Jesus Christ and led by Jesus Christ to carry out the mission of Jesus Christ.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: The problem today is that too many churches, even good intention churches, found their ministry and their church on a person other than Jesus Christ.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: And this leads to a lot of problems.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: And you might wonder why.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's because only Jesus Christ is the one who is able to support the church, to be the church, as God has designed the church.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: All other people will ultimately fail.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: They will fail you, they will fail God, and they will disappoint, and they will discourage.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: Only Jesus Christ is the one who is able to be the true foundation of the church.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: We find this in 1 Corinthians 3, 11.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: For no one can lay any foundation, Paul says, other than what is being laid, which is Jesus Christ.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus Christ alone is the foundation.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: From Ephesians chapter 2, verses 20 and 21, a passage that parallels 1 Peter 2 in many ways.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_00: Christ Himself being the cornerstone, we'll talk about that in a moment, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: We see that Christ is the only one who can be the foundation that the church requires.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: Now, again, an architecture 101 principle here.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: I studied architectural history and you go in there and you learn that it was important to have a sturdy foundation.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: If you build your church on a person other than Jesus Christ, your foundation will be weak.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: And when your foundation is weak, the church will fall.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: And the people will struggle.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: The body of Christ will suffer.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: Only Jesus offers this foundation because only Jesus offers the perfect foundation.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: Amen?
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, even Peter, a man who at one point in his ministry, Jesus looked at him and he, first of all, he gave him the name Peter, which means Rocky.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, you know, you proclaim me to be the Christ.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: Peter, you're going to be very instrumental in the founding of the church.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: But even Peter, who knew that he was foundational to the church as an apostle, he was not the foundation of the church.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: He was simply another living stone.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: And he would never claim that.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's why, you know, the Catholic Church gets it wrong when they say that Peter was the first pope and things like that.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: Peter never claimed that and never would have claimed that.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I believe he wrote passages like this in 1 Peter 2 to disclaim any of that.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: Some churches that I know even go so far as to say that Jesus Christ is their senior pastor.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: The senior pastor is not fill in the blank of the name of the guy who might be on the marquee or at the top of the organizational chart.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: No, in fact, they rewrite the organizational chart to say that Jesus is the senior pastor.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody else serves under him as who is their head.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now, to some this may sound silly, and you may go, oh, come on, you know what they mean.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, I do know what they mean.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: But if it takes actually writing down that Jesus Christ is the senior pastor of your church in order for you to really get it, then I say that's not silly at all, but it's necessary.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: And we need to keep that in mind.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus Christ is the head of the church, he is the foundation of the church.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll find out here he is also the cornerstone of the church.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: What Peter does in the next few verses is he takes three texts or verses from the Old Testament.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: And he shows, and they all have to do with the word stone or rock, and he shows how they apply to Jesus.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: And this also shows how Jesus fulfills in a way that is superior the Old Testament way of relating to God through Moses and the Old Testament covenant.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: But these verses will show us how Jesus is indeed the foundation of the church.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 2, chapter 2, verse 6 quotes directly from Isaiah 28, 16, where we read, Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone, chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: This idea in the day of Isaiah, this comes to us from Isaiah 28, 16.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: In Isaiah's day, what happened is that there were Jewish leaders, leaders in Israel, who were rebelling against God.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: They were embracing other gods, and they were rejecting the true God.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: And God finally says, Hey, as my leadership who's called to point people to me, if you're going to reject me, then I'm ultimately going to reject you.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to bring somebody else, something else, in your place that's going to ultimately point people to me.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_00: And that is this foundation, this stone, this cornerstone that's being laid in Zion, which was the place of the temple, which shows indeed, again, as we understand these words to be fulfilled by Jesus, how Jesus essentially replaced that and moved that old system aside.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: God promised, I'm going to bring you a future leader, this great Messiah, and he's going to be the cornerstone.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now, just to give you an understanding of this important word, this cornerstone, cornerstone back then was not simply like the corner of a building.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: In some cases, today we understand there's a symbolic cornerstone, maybe the first stone that's put down in buildings and construction today, and people, you know, take pictures of it, and it's, oh, that was the first stone laid.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the cornerstone back then in ancient times was even more important because it was not just one of the first stones laid, but it was the stone upon which the whole structure depended.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: It was the stone upon which the whole structure was designed and measured.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: Back then in ancient times, they had this practice of taking one part of a building and making it proportional to the whole thing, so that one block was equal in proportion to the whole rest of the building.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the cornerstone.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's the foundational stone that they're talking about here.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's who Jesus Christ is in the church.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: Without that stone, the rest of the building would collapse.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus, who is the chosen and precious living stone, now becomes an even more important part of the church, the foundational cornerstone.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: And what's made here is an amazing promise to those who embrace him and trust him.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: It says, whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to communicate this, and it doesn't come across in English, but in the Greek language, uh the not, the negative there in negating that verb is actually two words, two little words, ooh and me.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: And when they are put together, they become the most, the strongest way to negate a word in the Greek language.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus uses the same terms in John chapter 10 when he says, uh, no one will be able to snatch them, my sheep, out of my hand out of the Father's hand.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's sort of like two components of epoxy.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: When you bring them together and they they set together, they become an immovable, inseparable force.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: And what Peter is saying here is that everyone who believes in Jesus will never be put to shame.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: Their eternity is fixed, their salvation is secure.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: And that is an amazing promise when we build our foundation upon Jesus Christ.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: I really believe it has application for the whole church, that when the whole church really builds its foundation upon Jesus Christ, upon the word of Christ, that it has an unimovable foundation that will never be shaken and never be put to shame.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: We move on to the second uh passage that Peter quotes from, from the Old Testament.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then this comes to us from Psalm 118, verse 22.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's very interesting as we think about how this verse is also used in the rest of the Bible.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um He says, So honor or value is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe, and he's going to set apart a very different consequence for those who reject Christ from those who have accepted him and received him.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: He says, as he quotes here from Psalm 18, 22, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's a different word for cornerstone than it's used in the previous verse.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: It literally means the head of the corner, talking about the preeminence of Christ.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: And what's fascinating about the quotation of this from Psalm 118.22 is that both Jesus and Peter previously in the Bible had quoted those very same words from Psalm 118.22.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus at a certain point was approached by the religious leaders, a group of men called the Sanhedrin.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: And they were very disturbed by what he was teaching.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they went up to him and they said, Hey, you, Jesus of Nazareth, which by the way is Podon land in the north, what you come here to our capital city of Jerusalem, and you're trying to upset our religious system, under whose authority do you do this?
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus ends up circling around in Psalm 118, 22, and he says, You know, the stone that the builders, Sanhedrin, you're the builders, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that must have driven them nuts.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, he's quoting from our Bible.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_00: How can he say that?
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: Blasphemy.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, they go through the crucifixion, the resurrection, the ascension, and they probably are saying, All right, well, I hope we never see that Jesus again.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, in Acts chapter 4, verse 11, we find that the apostle Peter is now proclaiming Jesus with his buddy John.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the same group of men, the Sanhedrin, comes to him and they say, Yo, Peter, we thought we were done with this Jesus guy.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, tell us.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, whose authority do you claim?
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: These claims about Jesus.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter uses the same terms from Psalm 118, 22.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, you know what?
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: The stone that the builders, you rejected, has become the cornerstone.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: That is Jesus.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: And again, they must have thought, oh man, there it is again.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: I bet those Pharisees could never read Psalm 118 again in their devotional life.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, it's just too painful to think about this church that is now spreading.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_00: But these are significant words that Peter uses, that Jesus used to talk about the stone that was rejected by men has now become the cornerstone, the foundation of the church, the perfect foundation.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Which leads to the third Old Testament passage from Isaiah 8.14, used here in verse 2.8.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: He's not only become the cornerstone, but also a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: And they stumble because they disobey or disbelieve the word as they were destined to do.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_00: This idea of rock of offense, the word in Greek is scandalon, like where we get scandalous.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: This is idea of like something that's so terrible.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a stumbling that happens.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: I have to describe this stumbling.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: How many of you at some point in your life have stumbled or tripped physically?
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like you've fallen over something, and that's led to very personal, difficult bodily injury.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'd I just begin to, I was thinking like yesterday afternoon.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, how many times have I fallen off things and tripped over things and done things that have caused me great bodily harm?
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's a miracle that I'm still able to like live and think and I'm alive.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: I go back to my 13th, unlucky 13th birthday when I got my brand new 10 speed and about half a mile from home slammed into a telephone pole and broke my clavicle.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: You're like, oof, that's a hurt, that physical stumbling hurts.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think about the summer of 1998 when I was painting houses and I had to upset a very angry bumblebee that I knew was gonna sting me.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so the most logical way that I could figure to avoid getting stung was to try to jump to the uh little porch roof that was around the corner of the house I was painting, only to miss it and drop two stories down and significantly bust up my ankle.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: Tried driving a five-speed stick shift with that bum ankle, man.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I can think of just a few years back, the very offices of Topeka Bible Church, the hallowed halls, where hurrying out of a staff meeting, I failed to see a large cardboard box in the hallway, which caught my feet up, caused me to stumble, almost made the save, but couldn't land except flat out, leading me to dislocate my left shoulder.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_00: Hank Nelson on our staff took a chalk lined picture of where I fell.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_00: God bless him.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, physical stumbling is one thing, that's painful, but men and women's spiritual stumbling is something else.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's a whole lot more of a drastic thing because the consequences of that are much greater.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_00: To reject Christ is to reject him forever.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: Essentially, where Jesus says, uh, hey, thy will be done, but you don't want to have anything to do with me.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna spend eternity apart from me.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: Just to encourage you, a lot of us stumble in our spiritual lives with sin.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, all of us do.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that's something the stumbling is greater.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that's not what we're talking about here.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about rejection.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: We're not talking about struggle with sin.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I hope you don't hear that, man, if I'm struggling with sin and I'm stumbling in my spiritual life, then I must have rejected Christ.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's not what I'm saying at all.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about something where, uh, like in the words of John 3.36, whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: Whoever does not obey, in other words, does not believe in the Son, does not have and shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, today the choice is yours.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: If you're still wrestling with this whole Jesus person and who he is and who he claim to be, he simply invites you to trust him.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's as simple as that.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: To accept him is to accept him as the foundation of the church, is to accept him as the cornerstone of your life.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: This reminds us that Peter is again drawing a very distinct difference between the religion of his time and the church as it's being established.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because the religion of his time was made up of dead stones that worshipped a dead false god in dead religion that ultimately led to spiritually dead people.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_00: But everything about the church is alive.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus is alive, the foundation is alive, the head is alive, the living stones are alive that comprise this organization called the church.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: And that's because our founder is still alive.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: We are a living, breathing organism that is founded upon Jesus Christ Himself.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that's because Christ alone is all about life.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: If you read about the words that he said, Jesus himself said, I am, I offer living water, which offers spiritual life to those who are thirsty spiritually.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I am the bread of life who offers true nourishment to those who are hungry spiritually.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_00: I am the way, the truth, and the life to those who are searching and seeking for something that is lasting.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's where you're at this morning.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I just hope you understand the truth of the gospel, which is Christ was crucified for you and raised for you, so that you might become a part of his church, a living stone.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_00: And what we find is that only as we know Christ and grow closer to Christ are we then able to carry out the purpose of Christ.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_00: Which is really our third truth that we get to from this text.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that is that in Jesus you have an important purpose.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: But here's a little uh teaser.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_00: We're not gonna talk about that this morning.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we're gonna talk about that next week.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna go into some more detail about what that means because it's a very important purpose.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's a very important mission.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_00: And you as uh living stones have been drafted into that mission, whether you wanted to or not.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: But we're gonna start off our time next week with a video.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: I really want you to be here for it because this video is gonna summarize exactly what we're talking about as we look at the church and what we're supposed to be about.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I hope you'll be here.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: But as we conclude, I want you to remember three things.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: The first is to remember our definition of the church, that we are a community of people who are founded upon Jesus Christ and led by Jesus Christ in order to carry out the mission of Jesus Christ.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, I want you to remember our three truths.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus, you are part of something bigger, you're part of the body of Christ, the church.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus, you have a perfect foundation.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: No one else can take his place.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then finally, in Jesus, you have a very important purpose, which we'll talk about next week.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: The third thing or item I want you to remember now is the Lord.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to remember our Savior, Christ.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_00: And uh this is where we transition to this time called communion.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because Peter's words would have been a great encouragement to the people back in his day.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_00: Great encouragement for those who were being persecuted and suffering for their faith.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: Same words should encourage us today.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: Even though they went through great persecution, they still gathered every time they met for this very same meal and celebration that we are gonna partake of in just a minute.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_00: This communion, this uh Eucharist, this Lord's table.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_00: And what we're gonna do is we're gonna reflect upon Christ.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna reflect upon who he is and what he has done as the foundation, as the living stone, who has offered you new and eternal life as a fellow living stone.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_00: And he did that through dying, which is a strange thing that doesn't make sense in many contexts.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_00: But Jesus brought life through his death.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: Even though he was the immovable cornerstone, he allowed himself to be moved and shaken through his death on the cross.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: And on that cross, his body was broken, which is symbolized by this unleavened cracker that you'll take and break a piece off of.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: His blood was shed as it ran down his arms and down his legs and down his face.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_00: Blood was shed, which is symbolized by that grape juice that we'll take in the cup.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the instructions are simply this when you're when you're ready, take of the bread and the cup as it's passed.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever you're ready, you're not going to get any instruction from us.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're just gonna have that as your time to sit and reflect upon the sacrifice of Christ for you.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I just want you to know that he invites you to worship him and remember him this morning.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: Father, thanks for your truth.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_00: I know that you can use this, uh, these words in ways that are just beyond me.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I praise you for that.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: I praise you for how you encourage me through these words.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_00: I praise you for the reality of Christ crucified for us, his sacrifice.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: I pray that we will remember him and reflect on the reality of what he's done for us and continues to do for us as he continues to intercede for us and make payment for our sins.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: We love you, and we are thankful for you.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: In Christ's name.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.