Introduction

In the Spider-Man comics, Peter Parker is a nerdy high school student who gets bitten by a radioactive spider and is transformed into someone with superpowers. He can climb walls, has super strength, swings from webs, and even senses danger before it happens. Even so, Peter never gets credit for how amazing he is. To keep his loved ones safe, he only uses his powers while in disguise. His classmates look down on him because they see him as a nerd. They have no idea that, beneath his awkward appearance, he is actually a superhero.

Jesus is kind of similar. I don’t mean he climbs walls or wears a mask, but he does have a hidden identity. He is the beloved son of God, but his greatness is hidden by the ordinary details of his life as a first-century Galilean carpenter. Religious and cultural leaders look down on Jesus because they only see what’s on the surface.

In the same way that Jesus is underestimated, his followers are underestimated as well. They are being changed into something extraordinary, but that transformation is hidden by the routines of daily life.

In today’s reading from 1st Peter, the Apostle wants his readers to remember that there is much more to Jesus than what people see on the outside. He also reminds them that, because they are connected to Jesus, they are remarkable too, even if their simple lives hide that truth from others. We can also easily forget the glory that lives in us. When we do, we can easily become discouraged. But if we focus on seeking God’s approval, we can find encouragement, even when life is hard.

Because of Jesus, we are important people with an important job to do. That important job is representing God to the world. Through us, others can see God and come to him. This only happens, though, when we care more about what God thinks of us than what the world thinks. Let’s read what Peter is saying in 1 Peter 2:4-10

You are coming to Christ, who is the living cornerstone of God’s temple. He was rejected by people, but he was chosen by God for great honor. 

And you are living stones that God is building into his spiritual temple. What’s more, you are his holy priests. Through the mediation of Jesus Christ, you offer spiritual sacrifices that please God. As the Scriptures say, 

“I am placing a cornerstone in Jerusalem,
chosen for great honor,
and anyone who trusts in him
will never be disgraced.” 

Yes, you who trust him recognize the honor God has given him. But for those who reject him, 

“The stone that the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone.” 

And, 

“He is the stone that makes people stumble,
the rock that makes them fall.” 

They stumble because they do not obey God’s word, and so they meet the fate that was planned for them. 

But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light. 

“Once you had no identity as a people;
now you are God’s people.
Once you received no mercy;
now you have received God’s mercy.” (1 Peter 2:4-10, NLT)

I. Jesus Turns Things Upside Down

In both ancient and modern buildings, foundations have to be right. When we build a house, we start with the footings. When you build a skyscraper, you excavate until you hit bedrock. The larger and heavier the building, the more important a solid foundation is. The builders of the cathedral bell tower at Pisa learned this lesson the hard way.

A solid foundation started with the cornerstone. That’s the stone with two walls resting on it. If the cornerstone isn’t straight and level, the walls won’t be straight and plumb. The higher you built on a defective cornerstone, the more obvious its defects would become.

Given the importance of the cornerstone, you might think people would be very careful in choosing the right one. Today if we were building a large building out of marble blocks, we would use precision tools to make sure the cornerstone was perfect. Of course, we can cut stones to the exact size we need, but for the purpose of Peter’s metaphor, the foundation is a person. And the only suitable person is Jesus. Even though Jesus is the only stone that truly fits, people reject him and try to build on something else. We do this at our own risk.

In the Old Testament, the temple was seen as the intersection between heaven and earth. But the authors of the New Testament imply that the temple was merely a signpost pointed towards Jesus. He is fully God and fully man, the true coming together of heaven and earth.

Peter expands on this metaphor. Jesus is the new temple, but Peter also sees the church as a house or temple for God. We are people filled with God’s Spirit. Now, on our own, we are not holy enough to be with God. We can only be holy because of what Jesus has done for us. He died to reconcile us to God, making it possible for the Holy Spirit to work in us and renew us. So Jesus is foundational (pun intended) to this plan. Only Jesus could serve as the cornerstone, but the builders—likely the Jewish religious leaders Peter is referring to—rejected Jesus. This means the structure they built is destined to fall apart. In history, this was borne out.

Jesus wanted God’s house to be an inclusive place that welcomes all people to God. But many of those who rejected Jesus saw the temple as a symbol of the Jewish nation, excluding all others. Their nationalism led to a disastrous war with Rome. During that war, the temple, their symbol of Religious exclusion, was destroyed. The Jewish nationalists built on a different cornerstone, one that embodied violence and exclusion, and the edifice they built on it ultimately collapsed.

Like the Jews in Jesus’ time, we have to decide if we will build on God’s chosen cornerstone. Jesus might not look like the cornerstone we expect. We might look at him and think we know better. It’s like assembling Swedish flatpack furniture. You open the box, and you tell yourself, “I can see what needs to be done. You ignore the instructions while you put things together. I’ve done this and gotten almost to the very end, only to realize that I did something wrong at the outset. It’s a sad moment when you realize all your efforts were wasted, and you have to take it all apart and start over.

Building our life of faith is a bit like that. Sometimes, you think you know what needs to be done. You say, “Thanks for the instructions, Jesus, but really, I can figure this out on my own. We build the life that makes sense to us. “Of course, Jesus couldn’t actually mean that I need to forgive my enemies!” (Have you met my enemies?) or “Jesus didn’t really mean that I need to deny myself and pick up a cross!” or “Jesus obviously didn’t mean it when he said I should humbly serve others.” We end up building on a foundation that suits us, creating an imitation Jesus, who merely serves as a cheerleader for what we want. That false Jesus supports our interests and lets us ignore Jesus’ difficult and uncomfortable teachings.

The problem is, as we keep building on these weak foundations, the structure becomes more and more unstable. We might be the last to see it. Everything looks fine to us, but people outside can see that it’s shaky and unsafe. It’s like the parable Jesus told: when we refuse to build our lives on his teaching, it’s like building a house on sand. When storms come (and you can be sure they will), everything collapses. Building our faith on anyone other than Jesus will just lead us to ruin.

II. The Outsiders Brought In

So even though Jesus doesn’t look like a Messiah, at least to the people around him, he is the cornerstone. We should place our hope in his victory and build our lives on his teaching. As we do these things and allow our lives to become more like Jesus, we are becoming part of a new house.

The church is in the process of becoming something that will share in Jesus’ glory, even though it doesn’t appear that way. Now the NLT (which I read from earlier) says God is building us into a spiritual “temple,” but the Greek word underlying temple—oikos—is actually the word for house. I believe Peter has in mind a double meaning. We are being built into a temple for God, and also into God’s household (God’s people). So let’s look at these two main ideas.

A. God’s Temple

On one hand, God’s house could be a temple. In ancient times, the temple was where God’s people worshiped him. Today, God’s people worship God in the church (by the church, I mean the assembly of people, not the building where we gather).

The Old Testament temple was a holy place. That’s why there were so many rules in the Jewish law devoted to temple worship (Like the whole book of Leviticus). In chapter 1, Peter reminded us that we, too, should be holy.

The temple was where priests made sacrifices to God. Peter uses this idea and describes the church as priests making sacrifices. Thankfully, this no longer means animal sacrifices like in the Old Testament. The sacrifices Peter talks about are not things we burn on an altar, but prayers we offer to God. John uses the same image in Revelation 8, where he describes angels mixing incense with the prayers of God’s people as an offering. So even if you don’t have fancy robes or a deep theological education, you are still a priest.

The priests’ main function was to stand between God and the people. They represented the people by bringing sacrifices to God. They also represented God by teaching the people what pleased him. Our priestly role also means we stand between God and the people. We offer prayers on behalf of the world and show others how God wants us to live.

i. Sacrifices

First, sacrifices. As I had said, by ‘sacrifices,’ Peter clearly has prayers in mind. As Christians, we often don’t pray very much. The prayers we do offer are often about blessings for ourselves and our loved ones. “Please help the Leafs win the cup,” or “Please help my flight to be on time.” There’s nothing wrong with asking God for things like this. But if that’s all we pray about, we’re missing a big part of our calling as preists.

We’re meant to be present in the places of the world’s pain. We all see brokenness in the world. Maybe a coworker shares about struggles in her family, or we hear about wars and injustice on the news.

As God’s people, our job isn’t to hide from the world’s pain. We are called to enter into it, just as Jesus was God’s presence entering into a broken and hurting world. We are meant to pray for the world as intercessors.

You might hesitate to pray for things you think won’t happen. But remember, God can do what seems impossible to us, and it’s not up to us to make the answer happen (so no pressure). If you pray for your coworker’s son to find freedom from addiction, or for God to bring justice and reconciliation between Russians and Ukrainians, you are living out your calling as a priest.

You don’t need to know how God could do it; you just need to invite his will into that situation. And we need to listen because sometimes God calls us to be a part of the solution, but this always happens at God’s direction, so you don’t need to figure out how to fix the problem before you pray about it.

God doesn’t promise to answer every prayer the way we want or on our schedule, but he does hear and respond. As James reminds us,

You don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure (James 4:2–3, NLT).

We need to be daring and ask God for what seems to be impossible. But we must also remember, prayer is not about focusing all our attention on what we want. It’s about inviting God into the world’s places of need.

ii. Showing God’s Ways

The priests didn’t just represent the sinful people before God by offering sacrifices. They also represented God to the people by showing them his ways. For Old Testament priests, this meant explaining Jewish law so that people would understand the demands of their covenant with God. For us, it’s not about explaining a written code, but about living lives that practically demonstrate God’s ways.

The church shows God to the world when we live differently and embrace our call to be holy. For example, our culture tells us to focus on ourselves, but the church, reflecting God’s holiness, teaches us to be humble and serve others as Jesus did. The world encourages us to connect with people who can help us out, but Jesus shows that God values spending time with those who are struggling. Showing God’s ways means spending time with people, not for what they can do for us, but so we can share God’s love with them.

Our culture often believes in a retributive form of justice (where we need to punish sin). Cancel culture, whether on the right or left, is about excluding people who have made serious mistakes. But Jesus shows us that everyone falls short, and so we all deserve to be cancelled.  Instead, he offers a different kind of justice that focuses on reconciliation and restoration. When we forgive those who have wronged us or when we humbly admit our own shortcomings, we show the world what God’s justice looks like. So the church acts as God’s Temple, but it’s also the other meaning of ‘house’. We are God’s household.

B. God’s Household

In the ancient world, the household was the basic unit of society.

The Nuclear family of today—Mom, Dad and 2.5 kids—is a fairly modern development. Instead, families centred around the patriarch (the eldest living male) and included his extended family and any slaves the household owned. The household was where you belonged, and it was responsible for protecting you.

Peter uses this as a metaphor for the church. God is the head of the household, and we have been brought into the household, adopted as his children. This means that we’re all siblings: We belong together, and we ought to look out for one another.

A person in that culture could end up without a household through relocation, the death of the family, or expulsion from the household. A person without a household was vulnerable. Many Christians found themselves outside of a household, rejected because of their faith. But Peter reminds those people that they belong to a new household: the Church.

This household of God isn’t what most people would expect. The Jewish religious authorities thought only righteous Jews belonged to God’s household. So a group made up of sinners, former tax collectors, prostitutes, and Gentiles doesn’t seem like the kind of holy place where God would choose to dwell. It would seem presumptuous for such people to claim to be a part of God’s household. But that’s exactly what God says they are.

Peter alludes to the story of the Old Testament prophet Hosea to make the point. God commanded Hosea to marry Gomer, a prostitute. She has three children (the text seems to imply that the 2nd and 3rd aren’t even Hosea’s). He names the second ‘Not Loved’ and the third ‘Not my People.’ Eventually, Hosea expels Gomer because of her continued adultery. She appears to have ended up in slavery.

God instructs Hosea to redeem her and bring her back into his house as a symbol of God’s forgiveness of his wayward people. God instructs him to rename ‘Not Loved’ to ‘Loved’ and ‘Not My People’ to ‘My People.’ Peter is saying that even though the church is made up of people who were ‘Not My People,’ God’s grace has made them his people. They have been called to be holy. The words Peter uses to describe the predominantly Gentile Churches—“Royal Priests, Holy Nation, God’s very own possession”—are terms God once used for Israel. The big picture is that God has accepted these Gentiles, forgiven their sins by his grace, and grafted them into his people. He did all this for the same reason he asked Hosea to forgive his wife Gomer: to show his wonderful mercy.

III. The Insiders Cast Out

So Jesus turns everything upside down. He’s the Messiah who doesn’t look anything like anybody’s idea of a Messiah, and the people he calls don’t look like anybody’s idea of who God’s people would be. But just as Jesus brings the outsiders in, his secret identity means that many who thought of themselves as insiders don’t see him for who he is and end up on the outside.

Peter quotes Psalm 118 about the stone the builders rejected becoming the cornerstone. He likely chose this passage because Jesus used it to describe himself. In Matthew 21, Jesus tells a parable about a vineyard, referring back to Isaiah 5, where Israel is described as God’s vineyard. In Jesus’ story, the tenants (the Jewish religious leaders) refuse to give the fruit owed to the landlord. They mistreat and even kill the servants he sends to collect what he’s owed. The conflict peaks when the master sends his Son (the Hebrew word for ‘son’ is ‘ben’), and the tenants kill him.

Jesus then quotes the Psalm about the stone (Hebrew ‘eben’) that the builders rejected. He uses a play on words between son (ben) and stone (eben), showing that many in Israel reject the Son. In Peter’s quotation, we see that those who accept Jesus as the Son and the Stone will be honoured, but those who reject him will fall.

So Peter is saying that some really surprising people have been made children of God in order to show God’s grace. But also surprisingly, some people who really should have known have rejected what God has done, and they have lost their position because of this rejection.

We might look at the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the people who refused to listen to Jesus and think, “Thank goodness I’m not like that.” But that’s exactly the problem. They were proud and didn’t understand what God, who is humble, was doing.

Now we have become the new religious insiders. But if we let that make us proud, we will stumble just as they did. Jesus reminds us that being part of this new temple means humbling ourselves, admitting our need for God’s grace, and continuing on in that humility. God lifts us up, but this means we should never lift ourselves up.

Conclusion

So what have we learned? We’re called to be superheroes. I don’t mean we should try to climb walls or wear masks and tights (you really don’t want to see me in tights), but we should realize we have been given a tremendous gift meant to bless the world. Like superheroes, we carry this great privilege inconspicuously. We can only do our job well when our true identity is hidden in lives that seem ordinary.

Jesus is our example. He is God’s incarnate presence, the exalted Son. The Lord of Lords, and yet, in outward appearance, he didn’t seem important in all the ways we humans discern importance. He was poor. He was humble. He didn’t come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. This is the same Son God spoke about at his baptism, saying, “This is my Son, in him I am very pleased,” and at the transfiguration, where the father said, “This is my Son. Listen to him.”

To follow Jesus’ example and listen to him, we need to let go of our own ideas of success. Our success must look like Jesus’ success: Our glory will be hidden, just like his was. Even if our lives seem ordinary to others, we can trust that God has extraordinary plans for us. Just as Jesus, fully God and fully man, stood as a bridge between heaven and earth, we will too. We are called to show the world God’s ways and bring the world’s hurts to God in prayer. We are being made into a temple where God’s presence will live. This is a reality we know inside, even if others can’t see it.

In Spider-Man, Peter Parker is motivated by his realization that “With great power comes great responsibility.” This is true for us too. God has been gracious to us, but not so that we can focus on ourselves. We have been made holy so that our changed lives can show God’s power and glory. Let’s remember why we have received mercy, and let’s allow God’s Spirit to live among us, so we can be his holy people who bring glory to his name.