In the arms of majesty we hear him speak, we hear him speak to
us as his children. So he says, you are a chosen
race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own
possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him
who called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light.
Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people.
Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
The flower fades, grass Withers, but the Word of our Lord stands
forever. Let's pray together.
Lord, we would ask that you would bind this word tightly
into our hearts so that we would be transformed by it, shaped and
molded by your word, both in our understanding and in our
actions, and ultimately in our devotion to you.
We pray through Christ our Lord, we ask.
Amen. Please be seated.
It was somewhere, I think in middle school or maybe a little
before that, that I realized how tremendously influenced I was by
other people's opinions of me. I was very insecure, needy, kind
of a kid, like many kids, I believe at that age.
I don't know that I was uniquely that way, but I certainly shared
all those characteristics, those traits, and I was tremendously
influenced by what other people thought of me and I tried to
shape my life around their thoughts with the expectations
were with the results that you would expect.
Disaster kind of flowed upon so much of my life as I tried to
meet the expectations of people that were around me.
Part of maturity is learning to what extent and to who you can
put your trust in and whose opinion of you matters, because
people's opinion do matter at points, and some people's
absolutely doesn't matter. And maturity is learning to know
the difference. And it took me quite some time,
as it takes a lot of people to be able to discern the
difference between those two things.
Well, what about Hebron Church? What about the opinion people
have of Hebron Church? I have to tell you that this was
about 3 or 4 months ago at this point.
I had some visitors come up to me and speak and they just tell
me how absolutely warm and welcoming Hebron was.
That they felt immediately like a a family had embraced them,
that they were, they, they felt incredibly blessed by being
here, etcetera. My head just swelled.
I was so proud of all of you for interacting with them.
I just was overwhelmed with joy over that kind of opinion.
I'm not kidding you. Hours later, later that evening,
I was in a conversation with a couple that had determined that
they needed to worship someplace else because they had a hard
time breaking in. They couldn't connect with some
of the folks that were here, that they were isolated, that
they didn't feel that joy and that blessing that other people
express. So you got 2 totally different
paradigms, 2 totally different opinions on Heaven Church.
Over the past couple of months, I have been trying to put
forward what I understand is a biblical picture of our church.
What should our church be? And I put it forward both as as
what we are now to some extent and to what we need to grow to
be. So there's kind of a continuum
that kind of says, you know, we're moving towards this kind
of a picture. And at this point, my sure, my
guess is that you will have heard this if you've been
worshiping with us at any period of time.
This is kind of a statement that I think captures the biblical
witness, biblical call for Hebron Church that we are moving
towards if we have not yet attained it.
Hebron is a biblically based, Christ centered community of
disciples, A Reformed classically evangelical church
in the Presbyterian tradition, worshipping, growing and serving
Christ in the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh and beyond.
That's kind of a statement that I believe.
That's my opinion on what Hebron is or Hebron should be.
Now, to what extent does that shape and mold your own
thinking? Well, again, people's opinions
influence us appropriately and sometimes inappropriately.
And my opinion of Hebron should influence you appropriately and
sometimes inappropriately. And so we have to evaluate that.
There should be, however, little evaluation to the opinion that
God himself gives. This is God's description of
Hebron Church. Hebron Church is a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own
possession. That's Hebron church.
Now we know that to be the case because God's Word proclaims
that specifically to be the case.
I want you to notice a little bit here as we walk through this
description, just like what we've done before, I've tried to
hold forward the idea that the description that I gave about
Hebron is something that we are modeling ourselves upon, seeking
to be. And that means for us as a
congregation, but also for us as individuals.
And just like someone else's opinion influences us, certainly
God's opinion needs to influence us.
And So what we're going to see as we walk through this
description is not simply what Hebron is, but also what we as
individuals are to be. So as I as we look at this
verse, as we talk about this together, the idea is not simply
how is Hebron doing this, but how am I doing this?
So if you have your Bibles, if you want to open them up again
to first Peter chapter 2, first Peter is white towards the very
end of your Bibles, you should be able to find it.
As always, if you don't have a Bible, steal one of ours.
We have extra ones. We'll be happy to give you 1 and
have your Bible in front of you. First Peter chapter 2 beginning
in verse 9. And it starts with that phrase.
But, but, and it's kind of weird to jump into the middle of an
argument, but I felt like it would be best for us to do so.
But we did need to quantify or classify the fact that this
verse begins in the midst of Peter talking about who he is
talking about, those who have rejected the rock of Jesus
Christ, those who have rejected the call of Jesus Christ and
enlightened who the stumble over the rock, who are not able to
embrace the rock as their savior.
And in contrast to that, Paul, then Peter then shifts and says,
but you and he talks about who we are.
Now the you here is plural and it's emphatic, it's emphasized,
it's bolded. It's it's every Greek
expression. It was written in Greek
originally, every Greek intensity to try to emphasize
the you here. So what Peter is doing is he's
saying, look, all of you collectively as God's people,
this is who you are. And then notice the way in which
this phrase is this passage is phrased.
This passage is not phrased as a possibility or as a hope or as a
desire or as a goal to be aimed at.
This is very different than what I've been trying to articulate
when I say, look, we are a reformed body and I know that we
need to move more in that direction.
I know that we are classically evangelical, and I know we need
to move more in that direction. This is not that way.
What Peter says, what God says is this is who you are.
This is who you are. So what does he say about us?
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people of God's own possession.
Now my guess is if you have any self reflection at all and you
look around at everybody else around this room, you sit there
and think really God's own possession, a holy nation, a
chosen race. And the answer to that is yes,
yes, that's the way God sees you.
That's the way God sees Hebron Church.
Now he's not blind to our failures.
He's not blind to our struggles. He's not blind to our our
sinfulness and our failures. What God does though is he
identifies us as who we are as a people.
And once again, he's Speaking of Hebron Church as well as every
individual participant in Hebron Church.
This is who you are collectively, this is who you
are. You are a chosen race.
Now right off the bat, we've got a, we, we bump into a cultural
issue that that's relative for us.
When we talk about race in America in the 21st century, of
course we have in mind the two 300 years or so history in which
we have been dealing with racial issues, black and white and
Asian and Native American etcetera, etcetera, that when we
think about race, we tend to think about those genetic
characteristics. That's not what the scriptures
are speaking about. When the scriptures use the term
race, particularly in this particular instance, what is in
mind is a an aggregate collection of individuals who
all show share a certain characteristic.
So you gather together certain group of people that all have a
certain characteristics that then is labeled as a race.
That's a race in the biblical language.
And so when God here is identifying Hebron Church as a
race, he's not talking about our genetic qualities or
characteristics or our skin tone or anything like that.
What he's doing is he's looking at Hebron Church and saying you
collectively share a particular characteristic.
Now what is that particular characteristic?
That is our aggregate collection, that us together, we
are chosen. We are a chosen race.
My thought is, and it's the same I'm sure for all of you that you
got up this morning at some point and you said, oh, I get to
go to church today. Or some of you said I have to go
to church today. However you want to phrase it, I
get to go to church today. I have to go to church today.
I am part of this church community.
And so I gathered together with God's people.
And my guess is overwhelmingly, most of you think of that in
terms of your choice, what you chose to do this morning.
And when we look around at some of the empty seats and our
brothers and sisters who aren't present here, we think to
ourselves, why did they choose not to be with us at this
particular adventure, etcetera. And why did I choose or or I
chose to be part of Heaven Church because they're so nice
and wonderful and the pastor so good looking or whatever, you
know, whatever it is, it prompts people to choose and God
identify specifically a totally different characteristic trait
here. You are here because you were
chosen by God to be here. You are part of this community,
part of Heaven Church, because you are chosen by God to be
here. But not only that, but the
people you're sitting next to are here because God chose them
to be here. It was not your choice.
It is not your decision, it is not your process that separates
you out as a particular race in God's eyes.
It is the fact that He has chosen us to be present in this
place and I tell you that's a vastly shape that that's a mind
shaping experience or understanding to think that you
are present here in this place, not by your own volition, but by
God himself. God is the one who has chosen,
who is determined that it is right for you to be here and God
himself has chosen for that. It is right for you to be
sitting with the people that you are and throughout the week to
be involved in the Bible studies that you are and serving the
Lord in this place and being participated, being a
participant in the Ministries of Heaven Church.
All of that is ultimately because God has ordained it to
be the case. God has determined that it is
right for you to be here and that has to dramatically shape
your attitude towards being here.
Now undoubtedly in some sense, all of us were dragged here by
something, the car, our family members, you know, an
expectation or responsibility that we have.
All of those things weigh upon us and those earthly and human
experiences certainly are true. But what God leads out with it
says, look, this is the way I see you.
I see you as a group of people that all share this character
trait that I chose you to be here, I chose you to be here.
That has to affect our attitude in which it also has to affect
the way in which we view the people around us.
Now, I'm just guessing, but you're really happy that 20% of
the people are here because they're the people that you're
friends with, they're the people that you interact with.
Then there's another 60% that you're kind of that you kind of
pass and you say nice things with etcetera, etcetera, and
that's great too. And then there's 20% of the
people that you hope you don't run into in the morning, that
that's, that's my guess is that there's 20% that you're really
happy about the 60% in the middle.
And there's 20% that you're. But the reality is that every
one of them, the people that you really enjoy, the people that
are OK and the people that you hope to avoid, all of them are
here because God has chosen it to be.
So when you minister in this place, when you're involved in
Bible studies, when you're involved in the in the
leadership of the event, when we are ministering to the kids in
this place, when we're engaged in whatever we're engaged in, we
are ultimately doing so because we are a chosen race.
You can't avoid it. God doesn't say he wants us to
be that. God says you are this, you are a
chosen race. That has to affect our
attitudes. It has to affect the way we view
one another, and it has to affect our devotion, our
passion, and our love for the Lord.
He has chosen you in this place at this time, for this purpose.
You are a chosen race. You are a royal priesthood.
Royal priesthood. Now, once again, my guess is not
a whole lot of you feel like royalty.
Not a whole lot of you even appreciate the idea of a priest.
OK. If you have a Catholic
background or an Anglican background, Lutheran, or if you
read a lot of the scriptures, etcetera in the Old Testament,
you might have some perspective of what a priest is.
And so you think about the way they dress or what they do or
the way their actions in which they take.
All of that is derivative of the key characteristic of what a
priest is. What a priest does is connect
two separated parties. 2 warring parties stands in the middle as
a mediator and connect the two parties together.
Who are the parties that the priest is connecting?
God who is separated from man by their sin and man who was
terrified and separated from God by His Holiness and the priest
stands in the middle and connects the two together.
That's the rule of the Old Testament pre sets the
theoretically the role of of ongoingly the priesthood in
different community communions and that is what God intends for
Hebron Church Hebron Church listen to this.
You are a priesthood, which means every individual here has
that priesthood function, not in the collar that you wear or you
know, and, and, and probably some of you might be thinking,
well, Henry, it's easy for you to talk like that.
You're a preacher. You kind of is priestess kind of
thing. No, when God speaks this way, he
speaks to every individual in this room, every Christian in
this room, every member of the Hebron Church and says you are a
priesthood. What does that?
What's that mean? It means that our function is to
connect those who are separated from God to Him.
It is our job in life to go into the world and define those who
are separated from the Lord Jesus Christ and to connect them
together. How do we do that?
Of course, we do that through the gospel message of Jesus
Christ. We proclaim the salvation of our
Lord Jesus Christ to those who are separated from him so that
they too might experience the union, the connectedness, so
that they too might be connected to our Lord.
We are a priesthood. This church is a priesthood and
every member in it is a priesthood, and it's a royal
priesthood. Now, I have the same experience
with kings that you do, you know, historically and that kind
of stuff. I don't have much of an
experience with kings, but when we think of kings, my guess is
that most of us shift to, and there's a couple of Canadians in
the room that are thinking we have a king.
We, we shift when, when we think about kings, etcetera.
The idea is that we, we probably think primarily of the
privileges and the royal trappings and the wonders, the
glories of, of the kingship, etcetera.
And again, all that's true, but all that's derivative of the
primary role of a king. The king is responsible for his
people. If you want to see that, read
the Old Testament, the Old Testament proclamation of a
kingship. Sure, there's the wonders, the
glories of the kingship, etcetera, etcetera, But
overwhelmingly, the point of a king is that he's responsible
for his people. Responsible in what way?
We're priests, we are a royal priesthood.
It's not just that we get the opportunity to connect people
together, but we have that responsibility to connect people
with God, that that priesthood function is a royal priesthood
function. It is not just something that we
get to do. It's something that we must do
as part of our responsibility. And again, this must change our
attitude as we think of ourselves coming here to Hebron
Church. OK, I'm a member of Hebron
Church. I get to worship the Hebron, I
get to come and serve at Hebron, etcetera, etcetera.
And your attitude is driven by the fact that God sees me as a
royal priesthood. God sees me as one who comes
here with this specific intention to connect others to
the divine Savior, to have that priesthood function.
It changes our attitude. It also changes the way we look
at each other. OK, once again, you're looking
at each other and you're sitting there thinking I'm worshiping
next to these folks or I'm serving next to these folks.
I'm in Bible study with these folks, and the reality is that
they have been chosen by God to fulfill a priestly function.
What's your role? Your role is to encourage them
to have that royal prerogative, that responsibility to connect
people to Jesus Christ. That's what it means to be a
royal priesthood. It changes our attitude, it
changes the way we view one another, and it certainly shifts
and changes our devotion and our love for the Lord.
Think about this. Our Lord has intentionally
identified you as someone that he counts on to connect others
to himself, to expand his love, to expand his Kingdom, to expand
his the reach of the gospel. Of course he can do it on his
own, but He has chosen to use you as part of the priesthood, a
royal priesthood. Here at Hebron.
Not only are we a chosen race and a royal priesthood, but we
are also a holy nation. Now that should make you giggle.
God looks at you and thinks, oh, you're holy.
All right. Now most of us understand the
nation, the notion of holy as being, you know, holier than
thou. And we fear the criticism of the
world that, you know, what are Christians are walking around
say I'm holier than you are and aren't I so holy and aren't I
wonderful, etcetera, etcetera. And what we're talking about is
our moral standing, our moral quality is so much better than
the rest of the world because they're steeped in sin.
And I am part of Hebron Church, and of course we know that's
ridiculous because the moral depravity.
That exists out there, exists in here.
It exists in all of these places.
The difference between those two is that we are holy in God's
eyes. Not perfect in God's eyes, but
holy in the sense of being set apart.
We are set apart by our God. That's what holy means, being
part of Hebron Church to if God is right by looking at Hebron
Church and say you are a holy, not you should be a holy nation,
but you are a holy nation. You are set apart by the Lord
for what? For what purpose?
We are a holy nation. The nation is bound together by
its political structure. And I am not talking about
Republican or Democrat or the United States or anything.
I'm talking about the political structure that governs Heaven
Church. Not our session, not our elders,
not the pastor, but God himself. We are set apart for God
himself. That's what being a holy nation
means, that in God's eyes that we, that he has determined that
we would be set apart as his people, as a nation to proclaim
that goodness that is carried forward and being a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own possession,
God's special possession. OK, well, wait before we do
that. Being a holy nation changes the
way you look at each other because you see the sin in each
other. You see the brokenness, you're
aware that it's there and you know that you're supposed to be
gracious toward them. We need to be gracious towards
them. But the way in which you see one
another, you are holy. This person has been set apart
by God in all of their brokenness, in all of their sin,
in all of their failure, They nevertheless have been set apart
by God for His purpose. You have been set apart by God
for his purpose and that changes the way in which we relate to
him, the way in which we love him, the way we are devoted to
him because he has set us apart, not made us holier than the rest
of the world, more morally godly or anything like that, but
because he has ordained that there is a particular purpose, a
goal, an intent for you. For Hebron Church, we are God's
own possession, God's own possession.
The word possession here refers to something that is near and
dear to his heart, but not just near and dear to his heart.
It's something that he values, something that he holds closely
and he that he is that that he values tremendously based upon.
Now there's two different reasons why you can value
something. You can value something because
it's a gift. Somebody gives you something
freely and it's a gift and you sit there and think, thank you
and you value it so much because you value the relationship.
So much of our lives is a gift. We get all of our lives as a
gift from the Lord, and of course we appreciate and value
it so much because the Lord Himself gives it to us.
But what the word here, possession, is that God has
worked hard for it. You are God's possession because
He has worked hard for it. And therefore He values you.
He possesses you, He protects you, He guards you.
So in the midst of being a royal priesthood, in the midst of
being a holy nation, in the midst of being a chosen race,
God possesses you, He holds you, and He values you because He has
worked so very hard for you. And of course, what's the work
that the Lord has done for you? This is nothing but Peters
casting back the imagery upon the cross of Jesus Christ.
This has to change your attitude towards why you are here and
part of this community. You are here and part of this
community because you are God's own possession, because he holds
you and cares for you that intimately and desires that
passionate from you. That has to change the way you
view one another. Why is that person here in this
church knowing their brokenness, knowing their sinfulness,
knowing that they're going to be cold to me again, they're going
to give me the cold children, they're going to forget my name
again. I always do that.
Or as something along those lines, how can, how can we?
Why is this person here? This person is here because they
are God's special possession and he has worked hard for them.
He has worked hard for them. Now, why if God looks at Hebburn
Church and he says this is Hebburn, God's chosen, chosen
race, royal priesthood, holy nation, people of God's own
possession, why? Why are we here at the end of
verse 9? If you have your scriptures, you
look at the end of verse 9. It's that great word there that
identifies that we're talking about a purpose clause so that
you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called
you out of darkness and into his marvelous light.
What is the purpose of being God's own possession?
What's the purpose of being a holy nation?
What's the purpose of being a chosen race?
It is so you might proclaim the excellencies, proclaim the great
things of our God who has called you out of darkness into this
marvelous light. I think that every Christian
should have PTSD. And I I say that very aware of
the fact that we have cheapened the word PTSD.
We have cheapened that to the idea that, oh, if you have a bad
experience with somebody, you've got PTSDI hate that because the
history of the word, of course, is connected to the military
trauma, trauma of men and women who've gone through the most
horrific experiences. They come out.
That's what PTSD is. And I think Christians should
have it. You know why?
Because every believer in this room, if you like it or if you
don't, if you remember it or if you don't, every believer in
this room was pulled out of darkness and into God's
marvelous light. Most of us don't remember it.
Most of us don't want to reflect on it.
Most of us can't desire to leave it behind.
But the reality is that every one of us have been pulled out
of darkness. And I just don't mean wow,
there's just no light here. And isn't this terrible?
That darkness is the is the description of hell itself and
of what it means to live separated from Jesus Christ,
what it means to be completely uncreated in who God desires for
you to be. Darkness is a picture, is a
characterization of everything that is evil, wicked, and
hellish in this world, and God has called you out of that.
We should have PTSD. We should have that in our
memories so strongly that it so affects us.
Or is it possible that we don't have PTSD because we forget that
we've been called into marvelous light?
So many of us are so used to living in the light right now
that we know that we have forgotten that it's marvelous.
We've forgotten what God has done for us.
We have forgotten that crucial idea of being called out of
darkness and into marvelous light.
But that's happened for Hebron Church.
That's happened for every believer in this room.
We've been called out of darkness and into his marvelous
light. And we should remember.
That should impact us. That should affect us in such a
way that we proclaim His excellencies to the entire
world. Isn't that a marvelous picture?
Don't you want that? Don't you want to I, I Don't you
want to remember the hell that was before you, before Jesus
Christ, so that you can proclaim His excellencies now?
How is this possible? This sure sounds like I've been
laying this on Hebron Church, that God's saying this about
Hebron Church because I think there's no other way of looking
at this text other than saying that that's exactly what takes
place. But please don't miss verse 10.
If you have verse 10 before you, once you are not a people, but
now you are God's people. OK, that's, that's the summary
of the of the previous verse. What does it mean that you're
the chosen race? What does it mean that you're a
holy nation? What does it mean that you're a
royal priesthood? OK, Once you were not a people
there, there was there was nothing.
There was no character trait that identified you as who you
really are. There was no character trait
that identified you as somebody created in God's image and
redeemed for His purpose. But now you are.
And what's the difference? Once you had not received mercy,
but now you have received mercy. What's the difference?
The difference is not you. The difference is not me.
The difference is the cross of Jesus Christ.
What is it that causes you to be a chosen people, chosen race?
It is a cross of Jesus Christ. The mercy that you have
received. What is it that enables you to
be a royal priesthood? It is mercy.
What is it that enables you to be a holy nation?
It is mercy. Why is it that you can proclaim
His excellencies? Why is it that you have been
pulled from the darkness? Why is it that you are now
blessed by being involved in this marvelous light?
It is the mercy of Jesus Christ. It is the cross of Jesus Christ.
That is to what defines Hebron Church from beginning to end.
It must because it does in God's eyes.
Let's pray together, Gracious Lord, we pray that you would
open our hearts and our minds more and more to the reality
that we have in Jesus Christ, that we are indeed a royal
priesthood, A chosen race, a holy nation, a God's own
possession. Lord, we hear that call.
We recognize that that is how you view us.
Give us the grace, Lord, to act faithfully according to that, to
proclaim your excellencies to this world because we've been
pulled from darkness into your marvelous light.
We pray through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen, My brothers and sisters, if you could stand together with
me and let us proclaim that which we believe, what do we
believe together? All believers are united to
Jesus Christ by his spirit and faith and have fellowship with
Him in His grace, suffering, resurrection, and glory.
United to each other in love, believers are obligated to
nourish one another's mutual good, both spiritually and
physically.