Lectionary Meditation: Stones

1 Peter 2:1-10
Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. 2 Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3 if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

4 Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 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. 6 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.’
7 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’,
8 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.

9 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 marvellous light.
10 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.

The lectionary today is full of stones.  In Acts the first Christian martyr is stoned, in the Psalm God is called our fortress and 'strong rock.'  And here, in the first letter of Peter we hear about the cornerstone that is Christ.

We don't usually notice stones, but the world is full of them. They make up our foundations, our sidewalks, our roads.  They are a nuisance to be raked out of our gardens, fun to be skipped across a still lake, pain in our shoes, or if you're like me they're door stops and paper weights.  Stones are mightily useful things, how often we taken them for granted.

Stones don't usually get much notice.  They're dull.  Go out to any farm field and you will find piles of stones around the borders and in the hedgerows, why?  Because they've been discarded. 

‘The stone that the builders rejected

has become the very head of the corner’ 

We often hear these words and think of the crucifixion.  But that's missing the point.  Just as the farmer picked up the stone in his field and throw it away as useless or harmful, the establishment wanted nothing to do with an itinerant preacher from Nazareth.  Jesus was a nuisance.  He didn't toe the line, and like the rock in our shoe he made those in authority very uncomfortable.

But Peter calls Christ a "living" stone.  You see Jesus didn't just get in the way.  A regular stone in a field might break a plow blade and needs to be tossed out.  There are lots of stones in the bible: Barabas was one.  A revolutionary, a freedom fighter, today we'd call him a terrorist.  He made the authorities plenty uncomfortable but that was all he did.  Jesus did more than just make some folks uncomfortable.  He went beyond that to offer an alternative.   As our "living stone" he offered teachings that could be a foundation for a whole new way of being.

Jesus came to those that authority and power had rejected.  I hate to say it, but he didn't come to people like us.  He came to the destitute, the outcast, the despised.  Today what would those people he came to look like?  They might have been AIDS patients, transgender teens, single mothers or grandmothers on welfare, the homeless, the insane.  And what did he bring?  He brought hope.  He sat down and ate with them, and he gave them good news.  He told them that they were not useless.  He empowered them.  He lifted them up, and taught them to care for and one love another.  He told them that he loved them, and that GOD loved them.

That is the good news, no wonder it was rejected.  If those "others" are truly good and useful, truly beloved of God, the authorities would have to admit there was something fundamentally broken about their world.  The bad news is the world is still broken, and the good news is still being rejected.   The temple authorities rejected Jesus and his Way; we do too.  Every time we condemn or reject someone who makes us uncomfortable, every time we allow the world to tell us that we are useless, every time we give up, or give in.  

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5 like living stones, let yourselves be built* into a spiritual house

God is calling us to become living stones ourselves.  God is offering us the chance to be like Christ.  That isn't an easy thing I'm afraid.  It means rejection.  It means that the world will not understand us.  It means we will be called to speak out against repression and violence wherever it finds root.  Doing so won't make us popular.  Like Stephen and Jesus and thousands of others it will mean our rejection by many.

Most of us are probably pretty comfortable.  But our world is still full of the same repression and violence and inequality that held sway when Jesus walked the hills of Palestine.  It might make us unpopular but we are called to speak out when our government tramples on the poor, or oppressed (and it does).  We are called to speak out when big business does harm to workers or citizens or creation itself.  We are called to speak out when our churches cause pain or harm through their teaching or actions.  We are called to be like Christ, to be living stones.  

We can become the foundation of the Kingdom of God.  No, we must become the foundation of the Kingdom of God.

"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 marvellous light."

God had a purpose for us when we were called.  Not to just come and sit here on Sunday morning and then go back to living in the world.  No, we were called out of darkness and it is our obligation to call others as well:

10 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."

God has made us Her people!  God has chosen us.  That is a frightening thing.  Because with it comes the responsibility to be Christ to the world.  When we were baptized into Christ's death, and His eternal life we were made living stones indeed.  Let us then not reject Him, nor our call from God.  Rather, let us become light, and mercy, and hope for those who live in darkness and despair.  Let us become food and drink for those who hunger and thirst.  Let us become a thorn in the side and a rock in the shoe of those who are too comfortable.  Let us become stones, breaking the plow blades that would turn under the weak and powerless of this world.

Let us be living stones!  Because God is good, and God has given us life and light and joy.  That we might bring all the discarded stones of the world to God who discards nothing!  Amen.   Alleluia.