4As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him—
5you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
6For in Scripture it says: "See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone,and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame."
Next, Peter teaches us a third truth. He says that this SPIRITUAL HOUSE can be built only if one of the LIVING STONES is a CORNERSTONE.
The cornerstone is the most, important stone. If you don't have the cornerstone, the building will not stay standing.
Who do you think is THAT CORNERSTONE?
Yes! Jesus is THE CORNERSTONE of THE SPIRITUAL HOUSE that God is building.
It is only with JESUS, OUR CORNERSTONE, that we can be a part of His CHURCH or THIS SPIRITUAL HOUSE that God is building.
Incredibly, we become this SPIRITUAL HOUSE... and within that HOUSE God lives. He lives within us, and within His CHURCH! If we are followers of Jesus, He will send His Holy Spirit and He will live within us forever.
With Jesus as our CORNERSTONE, we can begin today to build our lives on Him.
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Fourth, Peter tells us that we can, also, enter into this HOUSE and go straight to the Throne of God because we have become a part of the HOLY PRIESTHOOD.
This means that we are PRIESTS. In the Old Testament days, God's children had to go to a certain person called the high priest if they wanted to give SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES to God.
But now, if we are followers of Jesus then we have become a part of this HOLY PRIESTHOOD. This means that we can actually go through Jesus to God and give our SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES to Him. We are all PRIESTS within this SPIRITUAL HOUSE.
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A fifth truth that Peter tells us is that we are to be offering SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES. In the Bible, we learn about offering ourselves in many ways. During this campaign we are looking at how God wants us to offer our Time, Talents, and Treasures to the mission at Lakeside.
Our mission is to reach out to those around us with the life-saving hope of Jesus and to encourage one another to draw nearer to Him.
SACRIFICE means to give up, to let go of, to surrender, and to take a risk. But, does is it really risky? When we think of what Jesus SACRIFICED for us, what do we really have to lose?
Let's join together and ask God to show us what SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES that He wants each one of us to offer during this campaign. How will we SACRIFICE for the mission?
Remember our SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES will not make us important to God. Jesus was the one, perfect SACRIFICE that could do that. Now we offer our SACRIFICES because it is the least that we could do to show our love.
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