Coming to Christ the Cornerstone - Peter's Principles for Prevailing Over Problems

Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Hole.

I want to empower you today to walk in your true identity as a worshiper and warrior.

Embrace the power of God's Word and the Holy Spirit.

Today, be encouraged with a word from my guest speaker.

Welcome to the Born for War podcast.

So would you turn in your Bibles with me to uh 1 Peter 2?

We're continuing Pastor Steve's message on Peter's principles for prevailing over problems.

And that's a great alliteration.

It reminds me of Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, you know.

So uh so today I'm gonna talk about coming to Christ as the cornerstone.

So I tried to stick with that alliteration.

It's not as many C's, so I hope you'll forgive me.

But uh let's read our anchor passage.

This is 1 Peter.

I'm in 2 Peter, that's not gonna work.

That would have been an interesting message.

1 Peter chapter 2, verse 4.

1 Peter 2:4

Coming to him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious.

You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

Therefore, it is also contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect precious, and he who believes on him will by no means be put to shame.

Therefore, to you who believe he is precious, but to those who are disobedient, the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone, and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense.

They stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they also were appointed.

Okay.

So we're going to talk a lot about rocks today.

Sound good?

Rocks and stones.

And I used to work for a landscaping company when I was in high school and college, and and uh we used to build these walls out of silo stone or different types of stones, and uh, you know, there was always a method to it, you know, how they how they fit together, and and uh it was really important that you got the foundation line correct.

Because all of the stones that you stacked on top of that stone were going to be based off of the line that you could create, the straight line, and then if you had to do a corner, that cornerstone was really, really important.

Because it was not only part of the foundation, but it was also the part of two walls, if you were going to connect two walls together.

So this cornerstone is very important to us, and I would say that this is one of Peter's life messages.

You know, if you remember in Acts 4, um, when they get threatened by the Pharisees, and then they come back and they say, Hey, Lord, consider their threats and grant that your bondservants would preach your word with all boldness, while you extend your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders in the name of your holy servant Jesus.

And when they had prayed, the place where they gathered together was all shaken and they began to speak the word of God with boldness.

Well, what Peter preached that created all of this ruckus was Christ the cornerstone.

So this is a life message of his, and he's talking about it again in his first epistle, and I think it's fun because his name means stone.

Right?

Like the name Peter, well, let's go to Matthew 16.

I have it up on the slides.

Matthew 16, verses 16 through 18, Jesus asked his disciples, Who do people say that I am?

Matthew 16:16–18

And they give him all these examples, oh, you're Elijah, oh you're these things, but he says, Who do you say that I am?

And then Simon Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And Jesus answered and said to him, Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my father who is in heaven.

And I also say to you that you are Peter.

And he does this little play on words in the Greek.

He names Simon, which means pebble, Peter, which in the Greek is petros, which means a boulder.

Like a small boulder, like this.

So it's like a smaller rock.

And then he says, and on this petra, and petra is a related Greek word, but it means like a huge outcropping on a cliff.

Like a gigantic connected mass of rock.

Like I live, I used to live down in Pueblo West by the reservoir, and there's all these cliffs, and you can see these huge rocks that are protruding from the cliffs.

And this is even reminiscent in Matthew 7, if we put Matthew 7, 24 up, whoever hears these things of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock, Petron.

So that's that same word.

He says, on this rock, on this petra, on this revelation of Jesus Christ the Messiah, I will build my church.

So he wasn't saying, Peter, I'm going to build my church on you, although I do think that he used Peter mightily.

You know, he preached the first sermon, saw the first revival of the church break out.

But he wasn't building his church on Peter, he was building his church on the revelation that was given to Peter.

Is this making sense?

So he renames Peter, says, you are a rock, but I'm you are a rock, but I'm gonna build my church on a rock.

See the difference?

You are a petros, and I'm gonna build my church on a petra.

And anyone who hears the words of mine and does them is like a man who builds his house, his life, his family, his decisions on this petra word.

Jesus told Peter that this revelation would be the foundation of the church he builds that would prevail over the power of hell.

And now Peter is explaining how the church is built on this petra, and he says it's built with living stones.

So let's look at this passage.

We have this picture here in verse 4 coming to him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, and you also as living stones are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

So the picture here is that God is building a spiritual house to collectively house his glory on the earth using living stones, who are believers that continually come to Christ, the cornerstone.

Notice it doesn't say who came to Christ.

He says coming to Christ.

And this is an extension of what Pastor Steve was preaching last week about the imperishable seed, the incorruptible seed being sown in our hearts, and then longing for the pure, undefiled milk of the word, like newborn babies.

He wasn't saying, Peter wasn't saying, you guys are so immature, like you know that passage where Paul says, I should be giving you meat, but I still have to give you milk.

That's really not what Peter's saying here.

Peter's saying you need to crave God's word.

You need to crave coming to him the same way that a newborn baby desires milk.

You know, you can ask anybody that had a has a newborn baby right now, they don't sleep a whole lot because that baby wants to eat all the time.

You know, they pretty much just eat, sleep, cry, and some other things that I won't talk about.

But you know, that's all they do.

And he's and Peter's telling us last week through Pastor Steve, they're saying that you need to desire my word.

You need to desire to consume my word and come to me like a newborn baby continually throughout the day is wanting to eat.

Right?

You know, it probably wouldn't be good if you only nursed a newborn baby on Sunday mornings.

You know, you know, thank God God didn't say give us this week our weekly bread.

He said, give us this day.

And Peter's saying it should even be multiple times a day.

You should be seeking after secret hidden places to feed on my word and come to me continually.

See, he says, coming to Jesus.

It's not a one-time occurrence at salvation, but refers to our entire Christian life as coming to Jesus.

We're not simply coming to the rock once, but we're coming continually.

So he's called a living stone.

What those words mean, so coming to him as a living stone.

Living, that's the Greek word zoe.

And stone, that's actually the word lithos.

So this isn't the same word, petros and petra, right?

So we're talking about that with Peter and his name and God building the church on that foundation, but now it's this word lithos, and lithos is like a building block.

It's like if you took a stone and you turned it into a brick, but it's alive.

Like this is a living lithos.

This stone has the zoe life of God.

That's the same word in John 10, 10, where he says, the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but I have come to give you life, and that you may have it in abundance, meaning like exceeding beyond the boundaries, like my cup overflows, like I thought it couldn't get any better than this, and then it did.

Like that kind of abundant life, that's the same life here.

He is a living zoe life, stone lithos, which is like a building block.

But we're also living stones in verse 5, right?

So in the same way that Christ is this Zoelithos, we are little zoelithoses fashioned after him in the likeness of him and lining ourselves up with him.

You know, I'm picturing like this stone that's connecting two walls, and it's also part of the foundation.

So we're coming to him continually.

Now, here's the problem with living stones.

Like, most stones aren't alive.

Has anyone ever seen a stone that was alive?

Yeah, me neither.

They're usually just a rock.

Right?

Like, they don't talk, they don't move around.

But living stones, man, that's a mess.

Like, imagine trying to build something with a bunch of living stones.

Right?

Like, you've got your pile of living stones over here, and you you pick one up, and you're like, okay, I've got my cornerstone here, I'm gonna put it here, and then you go back to get your other living stone and you pick that one up, and then you realize that that one's already moved.

Like, what?

Where did he go?

And yet, God in his wisdom has decided to build a spiritual house with living, breathing, moving stones that have their own will.

I'm like, dude, you're insane, God.

He's like, no, I know what I'm doing.

I'm really smart.

My wisdom looks like foolishness.

I'm like, okay, that that makes sense.

And I get to be one of those stones.

It's pretty cool.

It's pretty awesome that God gets to include me.

Look at this.

It says, Coming to him as a living stone, he was rejected by men, but chosen by God and precious.

That word precious means to be like highly esteemed and honored.

Almost, almost like this uh beautiful, valuable diamond.

He's precious.

Like you're not just gonna leave that laying around.

Worth a lot, very valuable.

He's to be honored and highly esteemed.

So, in the same way that he is rejected and chosen, so are we.

Right?

He's the living stone, we're the living stone.

The same way he lived his life is the way we're gonna live our life.

He was rejected by those that should have accepted him, and then chosen by God at the same time.

And I love this quote by uh uh Robert Gundry.

It says, the rejection and selection, rejection but chosen, of this stone assure Peter's audience that their own like rejection by non-Christians and selection by God follow the pattern of Christ's experience.

In the end, it's not a bad outcome, right?

When you think about the rejection of this world in comparison to the acceptance of God, it's really worth it.

You know?

And that's why we can actually rejoice in those things.

We have this hope and even a joy when we're rejected by those that were called to be builders, those that should be building other people up, even those in the church, when we're rejected or wounded by those in the church, it's still a joy because we know that we're accepted in the beloved.

Right?

Ephesians 1 says that you've been accepted in the beloved.

So how can you reject me if you're not the one that accepted me?

How can you take away what you didn't give?

I got accepted in the beloved by Christ.

And now he's adding me as a living stone to his spiritual house.

Who are you to reject me?

It's not even gonna bother me.

It's just like water on a duck's back when you get rejected by men.

You know, it's kind of like in uh Romans 8 where it says, all of creation is groaning and it's longing for the manifestation of the sons and daughters.

That's what I think about.

Like when people reject me, like when when I'm out and about and I tell somebody about Jesus and they get real fired up, I just think to myself, oh, it's okay, they're just groaning.

They don't they don't know.

You know, they're they actually want what I have, they just don't know that that's what they want.

So, you know, one person plants the seed, another person waters, but God provides the increase.

Amen.

Okay, so that wasn't in my notes, so that was for free.

So we're building up this uh spiritual house.

Okay, God is building this spiritual house.

So the same way that the Old Testament Jews had this temple that housed the literal presence of God, we now have a spiritual house that also houses his temple.

And it's important to acknowledge that we can't function as a spiritual house by ourselves.

See, alone we're just simply a stone.

That kind of rhymes, you know.

Alone, you're a stone.

I'm not gonna try and rap in front of you guys.

But together, we're the building of the church.

Together, we are the church that's being built on the petra rock of Christ and him crucified, of him being the Messiah.

He wants us to do things together.

See, our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, and when we gather, he not only dwells within us but walks among us.

Look at 2 Corinthians 6, 16.

It says, What agreement has the temple of God with idols?

For you, and that word you is plural, so it should say we, for we are the temple of the living God.

Right?

He's not saying you individually, that is true, but what's more true is that we collectively are the temple of the living God.

As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk among them, I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

So today we're gonna sing this song called Rest on Us.

And I've had so many people that will come up to me and say, Well, why are we saying Holy Spirit, come rest on us when he's already here?

Well, because he's in me for me, but he's upon me for you.

You understand?

You know, even when uh Jesus was resurrected, there was a moment where he breathed on his disciples and he said, Receive the Holy Spirit, but then later, on the day of Pentecost, they received the clothing and power that came upon them.

See, the Holy Spirit's in you.

You're sealed.

When you got saved, the Holy Spirit sealed you with the promise of the Holy Spirit.

God sealed you with that promise.

But there's also moments where the Holy Spirit comes upon us, and we've all experienced this.

You know, where we gather together, I can, even right now as I'm talking, I can sense the increase of the power in the presence of the Holy Spirit.

Even as we turn our heart's attention toward the presence of God, can we just do that together?

Just turn your heart's attention toward the presence of God.

Turn your heart's affection toward his presence, and you can feel the manifestation of his power increasing in the room as we're doing that.

This is a spiritual reality.

Right?

There was a moment where Jesus came down off a mountain and it says, and he discerned that the power of God was present to heal.

Well, this was Jesus.

Isn't the power of God always present to heal?

Yes.

Right here.

It is.

You have the same power that raised Christ from the dead dwelling within you.

But there is also this reality where as we come together, he not only dwells within us, but he also walks among us.

He's the one who walks among the lampstands.

He walks among his people.

He's intimately involved.

He's walking up and down the aisles even right now, ministering to people as they hear the word.

It's pretty profound and amazing that he does that.

You know, my dad always says this thing that I like to quote.

He says, you know, he always says to greeters, do we have any greeters in here?

Has anyone ever been a greeter at a church?

That's awesome.

So my dad always tells greeters, you have the best job in the church.

And if you've been a greeter, you know why that kind of makes some people laugh.

Because sometimes you have to deal with some stuff when you're a greeter.

But he says, the reason you have the best job in the church is you get to greet the presence of God as he walks in the room in the faces of his people.

Isn't that so cool?

When you're the greeter out there, you know, if you want to join Marcus's first impressions team, you know, and that job is the best job because you get to see God in the face of his people and welcome him in to this temple, this spiritual house.

Amen?

It's awesome.

So in the same way, chosen by God and precious, in the same way that Israel was chosen by God and precious to him.

Now we are chosen by God because we've been grafted into Israel.

Look at Hebrews 4, 14.

We have this high priest who is Jesus.

Seeing then that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are yet without sin.

Man, that's good news.

Because that means every time I get tempted, I can know that Jesus already overcame that temptation.

And he's paved a way for me to overcome it as well.

It's pretty awesome.

Zix 16, let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

And something that I always have to remind myself is when I make mistakes, that's when I need grace the most, so that's when I should come boldly.

See, a lot of us don't want to come boldly because we feel like we just made messed up, and we see ourselves through the lens of our most recent failure.

But that's not how God sees us at all.

He sees us the same way he sees Christ.

And so we come boldly.

He was a high priest, and in the same way, this says that we are a holy priesthood.

Did you guys know that everybody in this room is a priest?

And you didn't have to go through catechism.

Isn't that awesome?

Like you're a priest.

What do priests do?

Well, Jesus showed us what priests do when he was on the cross.

He stood in the gap.

How great the chasm that laid between us.

Right?

He stood in that chasm, that gap between God and man, because all had fallen short of the glory of God.

All had sinned.

And he bridged the gap, and he grabbed God the Father by the hand, and he grabbed Josh Floyd by the hand and he pulled us together and bridged that gap.

That's the priestly ministry.

It's standing between God and man.

That's what priests do.

If you think about everything that priests did in the old covenant, the Levites, they would come to God and they would minister to him on behalf of other people.

Right?

They would sacrifice sacrifices for that person's sin.

But then they would also have all of these priestly duties, you know, like Nacha Libra, I need some better duties.

I've got some priestly duties.

They had these priestly duties where they had to go and uh and minister to people on behalf of God.

Do you see this connection?

You know, if somebody, there's a whole bunch of funny scriptures about like, well, if this person's bald and they have a red spot, but it's also white around the edges, then you use this method to cleanse them and heal them from that thing.

Like, even the Old Testament priests had this authority that they use to cleanse people and heal people.

In an inferior covenant.

And we're afraid to pray for the sick.

And we have the Holy Spirit.

And they didn't.

They just had authority.

We have power and authority to the same degree that Jesus does.

That's incredible.

Incredible.

We're seated in heavenly places.

So we come to God and we intercede, just like we did for Israel.

We intercede on behalf of other people.

God, break in with power.

God, open doors.

God, send your word like a double-edged sword.

Send your word like a sharpened arrow.

And we intercede.

We minister to Him in worship as priests.

But then we also go to the grocery store and we heal the sick in the checkout line.

That's the priestly ministry.

We act as a representation of God.

Did you know that that's why we pray in the name of Jesus?

In the name of means as a representative of.

Right?

If I sign somebody else's name, it's not my name, but if they give me permission, I can do that.

Like I can cash somebody else's check on their behalf if they sign it for me.

Jesus signed the check for us.

And he said, now you go heal the sick.

This isn't even in my notes, I'm just talking.

You know, like we're we're priests.

We're representing Christ.

We're doing things in the name of.

We're coming to these people that have never seen God before, and we're getting to be the face of Jesus to them.

And ministering to them as priests.

Okay, I better get a move on.

Being built up as a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices.

Let's talk about these spiritual sacrifices.

Look at Romans 12, 1.

This is the first one that comes to mind.

I had like 10 of these, and I trimmed it down to two for you.

So you're welcome.

But these are the obvious ones to me.

Romans 12, 1 through 2.

I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, right?

Holy, acceptable to God.

Did you know that your body is acceptable to God?

So who are you to talk down about it?

That's for somebody here.

Quit talking down on your body.

It's been carrying you around your whole life.

Okay?

Be nice to it.

Because it's acceptable to God.

So it should be acceptable to you.

Somebody receive that.

Which is your reasonable service.

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

And then turn over to Hebrews 13.

You don't have to turn there, I've got on the slides.

Hebrews 13, 15.

Therefore, by him, everyone say, by him, let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God.

That is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.

So you cannot offer the sacrifice of praise to God with your lips closed.

Sawi.

You gotta use your lips.

You gotta give thanks to his name to do this acceptable sacrifice of praise.

Do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.

I love that Romans 12, 1 and 2, because it's saying that we're transformed by renewing this.

And Pastor Steve talked about that last week.

Remember the seeds?

Planting the incorruptible seeds.

You know, I was I was meditating on that this week, and I was thinking about, okay, what does that look like, Lord?

How do I plant these seeds in my heart?

You know, I'm trying to bear fruit.

I'm trying to bear fruit.

I want to bear 30, 60, 100 times more fruit.

I want to be good soil, I want to be a tree that bears fruit.

I want to be a fruit-bearing branch.

And then Holy Spirit was just like, okay, okay, calm down.

You're sweating a lot.

Have you ever seen a tree sweat?

I was like, no, I haven't.

Good point.

Trees just be.

Trees just is.

They is, they are.

Right?

They just get planted by the streams of His Word and they grow.

You ever walked out and seen a tree going, ah, boom, fruit.

Me neither.

You know?

That's not going to pop an apple out, you're going to pop a blood vessel.

Right?

We bear fruit through the renewing of our mind.

We just take these seeds.

God, I want to be a holy priest.

I want to offer spiritual sacrifices.

And through our lips, we just sow those seeds into our hearts.

You know, I'm sowing seeds into your heart right now.

I'm a seed spitter.

Everywhere you go, you're a seed spitter.

We're just planting these seeds, right?

Paul said, one person sows and another person waters, but God provides the increase.

Not Josh.

Josh doesn't provide the increase for you or for me.

It's not my effort.

Right?

I'm not righteous, I'm not the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus by trying hard.

I'm the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, period.

And the more that that seed germinates in the soil of my heart, the more I look that way.

So take some pressure off yourself and just be a tree.

Just be planted.

Okay, that wasn't in my notes either.

Man, I got too many notes and I'm not preaching them.

Okay, let's look at verses 6, 7, and 8.

This is really fun because Peter's an Old Testament guy, because he was a Jew.

So in verse 6, he's quoting Isaiah 28, 16.

So we can put that up there, but I'm going to read verse 6.

Therefore, it is also contained in the scripture behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect precious, and he who believes on him will by no means be put to shame.

So he kind of uh combines two things.

Isaiah 28, 16 says the same thing.

Now here's why I want to bring this to you, because this word for cornerstone that we've been reading so far, of Christ being a cornerstone, that's that word lithos that we've been talking about.

But the word in Isaiah 28, I can't remember, I should have written in my notes what it actually is, but I can't remember.

But what it means is like a precious like a gemstone.

So this gives us a whole new avenue of understanding what this cornerstone is.

It's not just a brick, it's a it's like a diamond.

It's like the lapis lazuli in in the Bible.

It's this gemstone, this precious gemstone is this lithos.

Right?

And then we go on, and in verse 7 it says, Therefore to you who believe, that word believe is the verb tense of faith.

So in the New Testament, whenever you read faith, it's the Greek word pistis, P-I-S-T-I-S.

I don't know if I'm pronouncing it right, but that's the anglicized spelling.

And the word believe is pistion.

So it's the action of faith.

So believing is activating your faith.

Faith is a noun, believe is a verb.

And then it says, he is precious for you who believe, but to those who are disobedient, and I actually don't really like, you know, I'm not a Bible translator, but the word there for disobedient is the negative verb form of the word for belief.

So in my humble opinion, as well as the NU text, it should say disbelief to those who disbelieve.

Right?

So it's the word unbelief.

When when uh the dude said to Jesus, well, Jesus says to him, If I can if you believe, anything is possible.

And he says, I do believe, help my unbelief.

Remember a couple months ago, Pastor Steve preached on that passage?

Well, those words are pisstion and apistion.

So they're the same word, the A in front of it just says none.

Right?

So this is for those who believe, Christ is this precious gemstone.

But to those who disbelieve, and then he quotes another Old Testament passage, and this is Psalm 118.

The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.

So the builders, we know he was talking about the uh the Pharisees.

They were supposed to be building God's people, but instead they rejected the chief cornerstone that the whole church was going to be built off of.

That's how we've been grafted in.

He's repossessing the dispossessed nations of the Old Testament.

And so he's saying, My Bible's turning pages on its own.

It really is the living word.

Just like me, living stone.

Sorry, I'm I'm having too much fun.

Verse 8 and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.

That's Isaiah 8.

It says, The Lord of hosts, him you shall hallow, let him be your fear, let him be your dread.

He will be as a sanctuary, but a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense to both the houses of Israel, as a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

And then he finishes off and he says, They stumble, being disobedient to the word.

See, that word for disobedient is not the same word for disobedient in verse 7.

In verse 8, that word for disobedient means to willfully refuse to be persuaded.

So it's like if I held up proof right in front of your face of something.

And you were doing this.

Or I'm telling you the truth, and you're going la la la la la la la la la la, can't hear you.

That's what that word disobedient means.

It's to be confronted with truth and to intentionally harden your heart to it.

And that word for word is logos.

So it's literally being disobedient to Jesus.

You know that Jesus is the Logos, John 1.

In the beginning was the Word, the Logos.

The Word was with God, and the Word was God.

And then later on the Word, Logos became flesh and dwelt among us.

So they're being disobedient directly to Jesus.

They stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they were also appointed.

So they were appointed to the word as well, but because they are disobedient to the word, they are appointed to stumble and become offended.

I don't have this cross-reference, but it just popped into my head.

You know, in the Psalms it says, When you hear the voice of the Lord, do not harden your hearts.

So that means it's possible for us to hear God's voice and out of offense harden our hearts.

And that's what happened with the Jews.

But they're going to be saved in a day, is what the Bible says.

And it's not too late for them, even now, you know, as we were praying, I believe that our prayers today impacted believers.

So let's talk about this lithos and uh petra.

This is what I'm really excited to preach on, and I have about four and a half minutes.

Okay, so bear with me.

So in verse 8, you know it says a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.

Those are two different words.

We've been talking about the stone, the lithos, right?

That building block, that's the cornerstone, and you're also a living lithos.

But then we know from the Old Testament reference that that that Hebrew word means like a precious gemstone.

See, that's the lithos.

And because we've been doing all of these alliterations, Peter's prevailing, Piper picked a pep of overpromises and all of that, and then Christ, coming to Christ, the cornerstone.

So I'm calling this the lithos lifestyle.

Okay, the lithos lifestyle.

It's trademarked, but you can steal it.

I don't care.

And and what that is, is like we're we're living stones, right?

And we're look- we're coming to Jesus continually as the cornerstone.

We're lining ourselves up with him.

Am I on the same foundation?

Am I lined up with him?

Are we on the same page?

Am I doing the same things?

Am I living the same way?

Am I speaking the same way?

Am I doing what the Father is doing?

Am I saying what the Father's saying?

That's the lithos lifestyle.

And it says that that stone, that lithos, is a stone of stumbling.

Now, watch this.

That word stumbling, it means to stub your toe on something.

It's like you're just walking along, you're walking along, and then you stub your toe on something, and what do you always do after you cuss?

You always look down and you go, oh man, I should have seen that.

So, but how many of you?

See, I don't get too excited when I stub my toe.

I actually stubbed my toe yesterday, which is funny about this.

I like got my pinky toe on the door frame.

Oh my gosh.

And I was speaking to my foot all day.

In the name of Jesus, pain, you get out of my foot.

You know, I was speaking to the bones, because I'm not trying to go to the doctor and have them tell me I have a broken toe or something.

So I feel great today.

Amen.

Hallelujah.

But that if I had stubbed my toe on a three million dollar diamond, I would be way less upset.

You know?

Wouldn't you?

Like if you stubbed your toe on the lithos of Christ, that you look down and you see this precious gemstone, and that causes you to stumble, you're gonna be pretty excited.

You know?

That's what we have an opportunity with our lifestyle.

The lithos lifestyle can cause people to stumble on the path and then look and see Jesus in us.

Isn't that incredible?

And then the next one, it says a rock of offense.

So now we're bringing back this word, petra.

Remember all the way at the beginning, before I said a whole bunch of other crazy stuff?

And I said that Christ was building his church on the Petra, which was what?

The gospel.

So this rock of offense is the gospel.

And I'm here to tell you, I'm kind of stretching it a little bit, but I really feel feel like this is a good word for us today.

If we will live our lifestyle before we preach the gospel, people will stumble and turn toward God instead of being offended and turn away from God.

See, the gospel offends people.

I can't just show up on the street corner and say, Jesus is Lord, and expect people to get saved.

I mean, just being honest with you, I'm not trying to speak doubt over the power of the gospel.

It is the power of God for salvation, first for the Jews and then for the Greeks.

But my lifestyle can take people that were on a path this way and they stub their toe on something I did.

Like smiled at them.

Or when I'm in line at the gas station and I'm offended because I have rights because I'm an American.

Never mind the fact that I'm a slave to all men, right?

As a bond servant.

I gave up my life, my rights.

I gave up my American citizen rights when I became a Christian and decided to become a slave to all people.

You know, I'm preaching to myself, and I'm sitting there at Sam's waiting for the lady in front of me to figure out how to use the credit card machine.

And I'm like, man, I've been sitting here for so long.

And the Holy Spirit's like, you don't have any rights.

And instead, I could just get out, help her, talk to her, hey, how's your day gone?

My name's Josh.

The Lord might give me a word of knowledge that she's been struggling with some area and I'm able to pray for her.

That's her stubbing her toe on a lithos.

I'm a living lithos, I'm a living precious gemstone, just like Christ is.

Let's look at this last passage, because I gotta be done.

Man, this has been so fun.

You guys are so fun to talk to.

Uh don't let anybody tell you any different.

Matthew 21, 42 through 44.

Let's put this on the screen.

Jesus said to them, Have you never read in the scriptures the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone?

This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

This marvelous, beautiful, precious cornerstone.

Looks like a diamond, dazzling, bright, and shining.

Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it.

And whoever falls on this stone will be broken in a good way.

But whomever it on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.

Remember Daniel 2, that uncut stone that comes in and crushes the Antichrist Empire?

He's Jesus.

And he wants us to stumble and fall upon him and find his mercy and find his grace.

He wants us to be an example.

He wants us to be living stones of stumbling.

That everywhere we go, people can stumble over how we represent Christ and come to saving knowledge instead of hardened-hearted offense.

It doesn't matter if they have unbelief because the way that God helps unbelief, remember that guy?

Help my unbelief.

You know how he helped his unbelief?

He healed his son.

That's how he helped his unbelief.

You know, we get to help people's unbelief.

Those that are disobedient, he becomes this stone of stumbling.

We can cause them to stumble to the point that they actually come to saving knowledge.

Is this profound?

Isn't this amazing?

This is the privilege.

What a privilege to be added to Christ.

What a privilege that he's a cornerstone and I get to be a living stone just like him standing right next to him.

That is profound.

And you get to stand right next to me.

And we get to stand right next to each other and build a spiritual house that can bring a kingdom of God revolution to the Rockies.

Thank you for listening to the Forn for War podcast.

We hope today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.

To connect with Pastor Steve's sermons, books, and blog, visit Steve Holtonline.org.

God bless.