'To Whom coming, as unto a living stone, ye also as living stones.' Note
the verbal identity of the expressions with which Peter describes the
Master and His servants. Christ is the Stone--that is Peter's
interpretation of 'on this _rock_ will I build My Church.' There is a
reference, too, no doubt, to the many Old Testament prophecies which
are all gathered up in that saying of our Lord's. Probably both Jesus
and Peter had in mind Isaiah's 'stone of stumbling,' which was also a
'sure corner-stone, and a tried foundation.' And words in the context
which I have not taken for consideration, 'disallowed indeed of men, but
chosen of God and precious,' plainly rest upon the 118th Psalm, which
speaks of 'the stone which the builders rejected' becoming 'the head of
the corner.'
But, says Peter, He is not only the foundation Stone, the corner Stone,
but a _living_ Stone, and he does not only use that word to show us that
he is indulging in a metaphor, and that we are to think of a person and
not of a thing, but in the sense that Christ is eminently and
emphatically the living One, the Source of life.
But, when he turns to the disciples, he speaks to them in exactly the
same language. They, too, are 'living stones,' because they come to the
'Stone' that is 'living.' Take away the metaphor, and what does this
identity of description come to? Just this, that if we draw near to
Jesus Christ, life from Him will pass into our hearts and minds, which
life will show itself in kindred fashion to what it wore in Jesus
Christ, and will shape us into the likeness of Him _from_ whom we draw
our life, because _to_ Him we have come. I may remind you that there is
scarcely a single name by which the New Testament calls Jesus Christ
which Jesus Christ does not share with us His younger brethren. By that
Son we 'receive the adoption of sons.' Is He the Light of the world? We
are lights of the world. And if you look at the words of my text, you
will see that the offices which are attributed to Christ in the New
Testament are gathered up in those which the Apostle here ascribes to
Christ's servants. Jesus Christ in His manhood was the Temple of God.
Jesus Christ in His manhood was the Priest for humanity. Jesus Christ in
His manhood was the sacrifice for the world's sins. And what does Peter
say here? 'Ye are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices.' You draw life from Jesus Christ if you
keep close to Him, and that life makes you, in derived and subordinate
fashion, but in a very real and profound sense, what Jesus Christ was in
the world. The whole blessedness and secret of the gifts which our Lord
comes to bestow upon men may be summed up in that one thought, which is
metaphorically and picturesquely set forth in the language of my text,
and which I put into plainer and more prosaic English when I say--they
that come near Christ become as Christ. As 'living stones' they, too,
share in the life which flows from Him. Touch Him, and His quick Spirit
passes into our hearts. Rest upon that foundation-stone and up from it,
if I may so say, there is drawn, by strange capillary attraction, all
the graces and powers of the Saviour's own life. The building which is
reared upon the Foundation is cemented to the Foundation by the
communication of the life itself, and, coming to the living Rock, we,
too, become alive.
Let us keep ourselves near to Him, for, disconnected, the wire cannot
carry the current, and is only a bit of copper, with no virtue in it, no
power. Attach it once more to the battery and the mysterious energy
flashes through it immediately. 'To Whom coming,' because He lives, 'ye
shall live also.'