IV. A New Identity (1 Peter 2:4-10)
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IV. A New Identity (2:4-10)
2:4-8 In 2:4-10, Peter describes our identity as the people of God with support from several Old Testament passages. The overall metaphor here is the idea of stones being fit together into a building. The chief stone on which all the others depend for proper alignment is Jesus Christ. By virtue of his resurrection from the dead, he is a living stone. During his earthly ministry, he was rejected by people but honored by God (2:4).
As it was then, so it is today. You have only two choices with Jesus: accept him or reject him. Those who accept him know he is the Lord’s honored cornerstone—the stone on which the whole house aligns. We are to live our lives with reference to him, and we will never be put to shame (2:6). But for those who reject him, he is a stone to stumble over; thus, they will trip over him right into judgment (2:7-8).
Notice that Peter is not just talking about each individual’s coming to Jesus but to our corporate coming to him (2:4). God is taking living stones—that have life because of the living stone—and building a spiritual house (2:5). He’s not building houses but a house. And he wants all of us stones to fit snugly into that building.
You can be a good brick, but you can’t be the whole house. It takes all the bricks contributing together in the one house. We do not stand alone. All of us were dug out of the quarry of sin and cemented together by the grace of God
2:9-10 Peter describes Christians in a number of ways. They are a royal priesthood (also “a holy priesthood” in 2:5). Through Jesus Christ, we have access to God and need no other human priest to represent us or intercede for us.
Believers are a chosen race (2:9). As the last Adam (see Rom 5:12-21; 1 Cor 15:45-49), Jesus is the head of a new race of people. The first Adam brought sin and death, but the last Adam brought spiritual life. This new race includes believers from every ethnic group. All physical or cultural distinctions are subservient to this greater category: we are children of God.
The people of God are a holy nation—not a perfect people, but a people set apart with a passion to live corporately to please God. We are a people for his possession—we’re not special because of who we are, but because of the one to whom we belong (2:9).
Along with this new identity, God’s people are to live a new lifestyle. You are to proclaim the praises of the one who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. In other words, you are to serve as an advertising agency tasked with sharing the message of his love. We were formerly not his people. Now we are and have received mercy (2:10). Therefore, as we live in this world—both as individuals and when we gather corporately—people ought to be able to see what our marvelous God is like.