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Stumbling Over Living Stones 1 Peter 2: 2 – 10 |
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Stumbling Over Living Stones In July of last year, Sony Corporation released a video game titled Resistance: The Fall of Man that depicts a science-fiction type story in which the interior of Manchester Cathedral serves as the scene of a gun battle between a U.S. soldier and extraterrestrial beings. Players get to assume the role of an army sergeant and shoot at the aliens. This was all done without any consent from the church, and, after learning about it, church officials asked that the popular game be taken off the market or at least that it be reworked to eliminate the cathedral as the setting. The church’s objection was not based on the fact that nobody asked them, however, or even that they were not paid for the usage. Rather, it was what the game presents about the church. A spokesman for the cathedral explained it this way: We are shocked to see a place of worship, prayer, learning and heritage being presented to the youth of today as a location where guns can be fired. ... Every year we invite hundreds of teenagers to come and see the cathedral so that they might appreciate an alternative to the violence that they experience in their daily lives; it is a shame to have a game like this undermining such important work. It is well known that Manchester has serious gun-crime problems, as can be testified by the sad shooting of three youths in the past 72 hours, and, for many young people, these games offer a different sort of reality. Seeing guns in Manchester Cathedral is not the sort of connection we want them or anyone to make. At last I heard, Sony offered an apology, but had not changed or recalled the game, and the church has said that while it welcomes the apology, that alone is not enough. The church has asked Sony to also make a substantial donation that will enable the cathedral’s education department to work more effectively with those aged 18-30 in resisting the culture of gun crime and other forms of violence in society. Probably some sort of compromise will be worked out. But whether it is or not, the church is right to have taken the stand it has. The effect of the Sony game is to say that churches are just like anywhere else and there is no reason not to have a shootout there. But the church staff is saying that churches have a different role and that their sanctity needs to be preserved in part as a witness of a way of life that God calls us to live. It’s different at church Has it ever occurred to you how different your life is while you are in church from how your life is almost anywhere else? For example, when you are in church, you are in a community where most people are actually working at loving their neighbors. Can the same thing be said about the actual area in which you live? In church, almost any effort you put forth to help out, from teaching a class, to pitching in on church-yard clean-up, to singing in the choir, to making the coffee for fellowship time, is really valued and appreciated. In fact, other members of the church will actually think of what you are doing as using your gifts and talents for the Lord. Can the same be said about the place where you work? In church, whether you are a captain of industry or a laid-off line worker, you are considered equally valuable to the congregation. In fact, there’s a good chance that both of you might end up serving on the church board, with equal voting rights. Where else in society does that happen? In church, you are in company with a congregation of people who will pray with you and for you, who will celebrate your successes and mourn your losses. That also happens in families and among close friends, but not in the world at large. In church, we regularly hear about and pray for the coming of God’s kingdom, a kingdom that is so different from the society in which we live that it may seem unreal — and yet we rely on its coming. In some places in the culture, such thinking is dismissed as “unrealistic” or “fantasy” or “pie in the sky.” Church really is different from the rest of the places we spend our time. It’s not perfect, but it is an earthbound attempt to model heaven-bound behavior. And so Manchester Cathedral is right in its objection to being depicted as a battleground. But we need to go further, for we all know that no church building is the real church. The real church is made up of the people who follow Jesus. Even Manchester Cathedral, which is a beautiful building, is not “the church,” but rather the house of the church that meets there for worship. The cornerstone and stumbling blocks Today’s passage from 1 Peter gives us a way to think about that. In these verses, Peter, speaking metaphorically, calls the followers of Jesus to be “living stones ... built into a spiritual house” of which Christ himself is the cornerstone. Now being part of a spiritual house is not a description we would normally apply to ourselves. It sounds strange to our ears. Nonetheless, it is a useful way to think about our role as a part of the people of God, and to help us understand that the “house” of which we are a part is to be a different sort of place, Peter says we are to be “a holy priesthood.” The spiritual house Peter is talking about is the church, and we are both stones in its walls and the priests in its service, offering acceptable sacrifices. Because
this whole house rests and depends on Jesus, Peter describes Jesus
as the cornerstone. Peter assigned this imagery to Jesus using three
verses from the Old Testament. First, he quotes from Those last two references tell something about the difference in our lives depending on whether we receive Christ or not. For those who believe, Jesus becomes the cornerstone of their lives. For those who do not, who reject the stone and don’t use it in their foundation, it becomes a stumbling block. Here’s a way to understand this cornerstone/stumbling block idea. A mission team traveled to a financially depressed area where they helped to build a house for a low-income family. When they arrived, they found that the concrete footer for the house had been poured the previous week by another work team, so the first job of the new team was to lay up the foundation, using cement blocks. But they were working under the direction of a professional builder, and he didn’t just hand out trowels and tell the team to go at it. Instead, he first set the blocks in all four corners, to the full height of the foundation. Next, he laid the first row of blocks all the way around. Then, and only then, did he let the team members lay blocks. You see what the builder had done: He made sure the cornerstones were square and true and the first round of blocks was set properly. That way, he assured that the amateurs on the team wouldn’t get the blocks too far away from where things were supposed to be to build a proper house. Get the corners right, and the rest can line up with that. That was the cornerstone lesson. But the team also learned about stumbling blocks. As some of the members worked directly on the foundation, other team members mixed the mortar and still others carried the block to the wall. The problem was, if they didn’t place them just right, those working on the walls tripped over them. The blocks were a nuisance underfoot. Our faithful witness Peter, however, casts a different light on stumbling blocks, when he puts it in the context of the church. Christians are the building blocks of the church, which is a place of strength for the community, but also an obstacle for those who go their way without Christ, Peter says. Manchester Cathedral illustrates that perfectly. That church is working in a community where there is a lot of gun violence, especially among the young, to teach more positive ways to deal with disagreements. In that light, the church is an edifice of hope built of living stones. At the same time, however, the church is a stumbling block to Sony, and for all the right reasons. And both of those functions are forms of faithful witnessing and modeling what the kingdom of God should be like. One of things we hear from this passage is that there is more than one way to witness as a church. We witness to the love of God and redemption through Christ as we do our best to love one another and work together as a community that accepts each other and tries to model the kingdom of God. At the same time, we also witness by saying we cannot accept certain things that the society accepts or even embraces. Sometimes we serve by uplifting others. Sometimes we serve by being an obstacle. Nonetheless our witness will often be ignored by the culture at large. But that doesn’t mean it is wasted. Do you suppose the members of Manchester Cathedral actually think that even if they get a large chunk of money from Sony their efforts are going to totally eliminate violence from that community? No. But they should make their witness that Christ is for all and do their good work in the community anyway. And that’s our mission, too. Because Christ is the cornerstone of our faith, then we need to keep proclaiming salvation in his name and working in his name as well. That may not cause everyone to turn to him or end war in the kingdom of earth. But let’s mix our metaphors and say that as living stones of his house, we need to keep telling of Christ’s love and salvation and keep getting in the way of that which is wrong. We may be effective. We may not. But God calls us to be faithful, and that’s what we should do. Let us Pray. |
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