Building Blocks
a sermon based on 1 Peter 2:2-10
by Rev. Randy L. Quinn
 

They were gathering together in the ball field to play some baseball. It was a day about like yesterday, it was a little cool, but the sun was breaking through and everyone wanted to get outside. So the children began to gather.

And when it looked like there were enough for two teams, two people appointed themselves captains and began to choose players for their teams. They did it the way kids have been choosing players for generations. The team captains took turns looking at the others and choosing one player at a time.

The first players chosen were the ones that everyone knew about. They had played in this same field before and there was no question: they were the best batters or pitchers or fielders. The next set of people chosen were known for the possibilities they had . . . no one had actually seen them play well, but they'd been around enough to know the rules and were becoming good players.

Finally, there were the others. These players are either known to be bad players who make awful errors -- like myself -- or they were new and unknown.

On this particular day, in this particular park, one of the last people chosen for the team was a new kid in the area. He was short, he was skinny, and his hair was messed up like he had just gotten out of bed. His clothes were a little messed up, too. (Like maybe he had been sleeping in them?) They didn't look clean, but at the same time they didn't have the stains of grass or mud to suggest to the others that they were dirty, either.

He was the very last person chosen for the team.

"OK, you're on my team. You'll play right field."

"Thanks."

"By they way, what's your name?"

"Morris. Morris Langford."

As the game progressed, the time came for Morris to bat. No one had hit a ball to right field, so there was no way of knowing how well he played the game. But he had a funny way of running on and off the field and the team captain began to worry about Morris at bat.

Meanwhile, in the dug out, the kids began to learn about Morris. He lived in a car. His dad was out of work, and his mom wasn't making enough to pay any rent. So they lived in their car. His parents dropped him off at the park when they went looking for work. And the more they learned, the more uncomfortable they became around him. Instead of becoming more friendly, they began to speak to him less and less. He was too different. He just didn't fit.

They figured out pretty quickly that when the game was over, Morris would still be in the park waiting for his parents -- if he really had any -- while everyone else went home to eat dinner. And no one would mention Morris to their parents. They all knew their parents well enough to know what they'd say, "I don't want you playing with those kind of kids."

There are Kids like that everywhere. Some are older and some are younger. Some have come through our home as foster children, some end up living with relatives. Sometimes there are parents, but often, the children are parenting the adults who live with them.

Adolescents who are in this state, often bounce from the home of one friend to another. And no one really notices them. They are cast offs from society with no purpose, no direction, no home.

Every once in a while, I'll see a pile of rocks. I don't always know the story, but often it looks like a farmer or gardener was preparing some land for planting and found the stones in the way. The stones get thrown into a pile while the task at hand is accomplished.

I can imagine that scene because I've found rocks in my gardens before. I don't know where they come from exactly, but I know they're there. They seem to grow in the garden. Or, as strange as it sounds, they seem to float to the surface of the soil from deep within the earth.

I don't know where they come from, but I know there is a better place for them than my garden. The task seems to be finding a good use for these stones so they don't end up back in the garden!

In some places I've been, these stones are used to make a fence. Or, a corner post for a barbed wire fence.

And then there are the stone houses and barns that must have been made from these same rocks found in the fields. I suppose there are hundreds, if not thousands of them still standing, but I only know of a few stone houses. Whenever I see one, I am captivated by it.

In my home town of Oak Harbor there is a stone house. It's made of regular rocks like you would find in a field anywhere. The rocks are smooth and rounded, not much different from this one except maybe a little bit bigger.

What I marvel about is how anyone ever thought to take stones like these and build something with them. They are so irregular in shape and size; they don't seem to stack very easily; they seem to cry out for independence and isolation rather than being put together and made into a wall or building.

Now a brick, I can see using that. Or even hewn stones that have smooth sides. Or the more modern variation of hewn stones, concrete blocks. These all make sense to be used in building something -- anything from a fence to a wall to a home or office or even a church.

That's probably why Solomon used hewn stones to build the temple (1 Kg 5:17). They stack easier. They seem made for a wall. It would take too much work to make a wall out of odd stones of various shapes and sizes, especially when they're rounded by the effects of time.

These are the stones that builders would reject.

But God has chosen them.

They are not perfect. They don't match up well. They are precarious when stacked together to form a wall. It's almost certain to fall down.

Peter, whose name means Rock, was called by Jesus to be the foundation of the church (Mt 16:18). Not a physical building, but a spiritual building. Peter, the fickle disciple. Peter, the fisherman.

If ever there was a stone that other builders would reject, it was Peter. How can the church be built upon the life of a man who would deny Jesus? As a building block, Peter was too rounded, too irregular to be used in the foundation; certainly there was someone who was more dependable, more reliable, more credible?

But God chose Peter.

A stone that others would reject.

Of course, in our text for today, Peter is reminding us that Jesus was the first stone rejected by the world's builders. He didn't fit the ideal either. He didn't seek political office, he didn't seek positions of power in the military, he didn't encourage his followers to overthrow the Roman government nor the temple priests.

What he did wasn't expected, so he was discarded. Discarded just like Peter. Discarded just like Morris.

But I want to remind you that there were other uses for these stones that God rejected. They could have been left in a pile. They could have been used as weapons of war. They could have been used to punish a wrongdoer.

There are several places where stones and rocks are mentioned in the scripture. Over 200, in fact. Rocks are used to build things. Stones are used to punish people. They are also used as metaphors for God, symbols of God's presence and protection.

Jesus, as the cornerstone has more in common with stones used to build than with stones used to destroy. I think it was intentional that God didn't send Jesus to be a stone that would be hurled against another human being as a way of inflicting judgment.

If that were the case, none of us would stand a chance. Not a one of us could stand up to the standards set by God for life. Not a one of us can claim to be free from sin. We have all denied God at some point in our lives. We have all turned our back on the needy. We have all made monuments and buildings more important than people and relationships.

That's why, when I think about it, I'm glad that Jesus came as a stone used for building rather than for inflicting punishment. We deserve the punishment, but instead God offers the gift of grace.

Peter says we are invited to be one of the living stones in this new building, this new temple, this new creation of God's that we call the church.

You and I.

Jesus is the cornerstone. Peter is the foundation. And we are called to become a part of this building, too.

And lest we think we are not good enough; lest we think we are too irregularly shaped; lest we think there is no place for us in this building; Peter reminds us that we do have a place here. None of us is perfect. We are more like Peter than Jesus. Yet there is a place for each of us.

Like the stones in a farmer's field, we may like it better in the fields of life, in the dirt of the garden, but we have been called to this place and this time to be something different. We are invited to leave our past behind and join in becoming the church.

Not just a pile of stones at the edge of the field, but a useful and meaningful community of faith with a sense of direction and purpose as well as a place for every person to be included.

God calls us from our past lives into a new way of living. God calls us to shed our former images of ourselves and begin to see each other as God sees us.

Peter quotes from Hosea, reminding us that once we were no people, but now we are God's people (1 Pet 2:10; Hos 2:23). Not because of what we have done, but because of what God has done. This is a gift of grace, to be called in from the fields, to be called from exile into the presence of God.

When it came time for Morris to bat, there was real concern by his team. They were behind, and there was a runner on second base. There was only one out, but a pop up would certainly cost them the game.

With some reluctance, the team captain let Morris bat.

He was a stone that could have been rejected. But he had a place on the team.

And so do you.

Thanks be to God. Amen.