1 Peter 2:4

Order of Service

• Call to Worship — Psalm 146:1-6
• Hymn — Nothing But the Blood (#307)
• Prayer of Invocation
• Hymn — When I Survey the Wondrous Cross (#252)
• Pastoral Prayer
• Sermon
• Benediction

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Sermon Title: The New Covenant Temple

Scripture: 1 Peter 2:4-8

I. The New Covenant Temple Is Founded on Christ

A. The church is the spiritual house of God only insofar as it is built upon Christ the chief cornerstone (1 Peter 2:4-5)

B. Peter quotes three Old Testament passages to identify Christ as the cornerstone

1. Isaiah 28:16 — the chosen and precious cornerstone laid in Zion
2. Psalm 118:22 — the stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone
3. Isaiah 8:14 — a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense

C. The cornerstone was the foundation of the entire temple structure; Solomon used costly, dressed stones for the foundation of his temple (1 Kings 5:17)

D. Christ applies Psalm 118:22 to himself in the Parable of the Tenants (Matthew 21:33-44)

1. The rejected stone becomes the destroyer of those who reject it
2. Those who receive Christ by faith become stones built upon him and offer spiritual sacrifices

E. The difference between fruitfulness and fruitlessness is not human effort but union with Christ

1. Pragmatic, man-centered schemes for church growth sideline Christ
2. The church's task is to be Christ-centered; he produces the fruit

II. The New Covenant Temple Is Living

A. Christ is described as a living stone (1 Peter 2:4); those united to him become living stones (1 Peter 2:5)

1. The church is not inert marble but a living, breathing house
2. Colossians 3:1 — those raised with Christ are joined to the resurrected cornerstone

B. The Davidic Covenant background (2 Samuel 7)

1. David wanted to build God a house of stone; God promised to build David a house of people
2. Christ, the Son of David, is the fulfillment — he builds a living, dynasty of people, not brick and mortar

C. Edmund Clowney: "God's architecture is biological — his house grows as new stones are added, but also as the stones in place are perfected"

1. Sanctification and evangelism go hand in hand
2. A church not centered on Christ and mortifying sin has nothing life-giving to offer the lost

D. The New Testament epistles address the church corporately — ecclesiology matters

1. 1 Timothy 3:15 — the household of God, the church of the living God, is the pillar and buttress of the truth
2. Evangelism is a corporate effort; the church must be a solid edifice anchored on Christ so that outsiders are invited into something vital and real

III. The New Covenant Temple Is Spiritual

A. The temple is spiritual because it is indwelt by the Holy Spirit (1 Peter 2:5)

1. Adam was lifeless until God breathed ruach (spirit) into him — true life has always been spirit-wrought
2. John 6:63 — "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is of no avail"

B. Gentiles, once excluded from the temple courts, now enter and offer spiritual sacrifices through Christ

1. Ephesians 2:19-22 — no longer strangers and aliens, but fellow citizens built on the apostles and prophets, Christ himself being the cornerstone
2. The old ceremonial sacrifices were types and shadows pointing to Christ's once-for-all atoning death

C. True spiritual worship is worship in spirit and truth (John 4:23)

D. Two errors to avoid regarding spiritual

1. Error 1 — Experiential subjectivism: treating "spiritual" as a vague, personal, truth-free category of feeling and experience; spirit is always joined to truth
2. Error 2 — Rationalist reduction: reacting against subjectivism by treating "spiritual" as less real than the physical — closer to Buddhist categories than New Testament theology; for the New Testament authors, that which is true is spiritual

E. God is immutable — he has always been spirit and has always sought worshipers in spirit and truth; proper worship finds its fulfillment in Christ, the spirit-giver