LIVING STONES - PRECIOUS STONES

Once while I was going through a hard time, God spoke this teaching to me to encourage my heart. I was reading a book by Watchman Nee that touched on this idea but then the Holy Spirit expanded it to me.

I was reminded of this teaching today at church as Pastor Trevor spoke about the heavenly city that is our eternal home.

1Peter 2:4-5

As you come to him, the living Stone— rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him—you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house…

Eph 2:22
And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.

We are living stones. We come in all shapes, sizes and colours but we are all one kind of stone or another. These stones are being built into a dwelling place for the Lord. We, in the Body, are being built together as the dwelling place of the Lord.

God has a purpose and a plan in mind for us as these stones-but what is it?

Rev 21 talks about the New Jerusalem- the city of God, which is our home after this life.

It says the city is made of pure gold - gold represents God who is pure - this is God’s city, the eternal city. This is our hope and our future home.

What struck me about this city though was verse 19-20

‘The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald, ²⁰ the fifth onyx, the sixth ruby, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth turquoise, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst.^’

The foundations of this heavenly city are precious stones.

Now I believe that what started out as just stones in Peter have become precious stones in Revelation. But how?

Precious stones are not like gold. Gold is always gold because God made it that way.

Precious stones are not made in one moment, they are formed through countless years of pressure and heat in the earth.

My understanding is that these precious stones tell us of the work of the Holy Spirit in us on the earth. Day after day in all our trials, God is working into us the image of Christ, who Peter tells us is the Precious Stone.

Our trials are not for nothing. God is pressing us and applying heat to us so that we become the precious stone he wants us to be.

Looking at the verses 19-20 in Revelation we see not one but many different precious stones. Different types of precious stones are made by applying different levels of heat and pressure over different periods of time. What the final precious stone looks like will depend on the different pressure and heat applied.

So for us, what we walk through in this life will develop in us the kind of precious stone we will be. God knows what kind of stone he wants us to be to fit into His heavenly dwelling place and He allows us to be squeezed and formed every day until we become that which he has in mind. Our trial is not for nothing!

So I just want to encourage you not to despise the thing that God is doing in your life even through trials because we know that to have the precious stone, we need the fire and pressure! Without the fire and the pressure, there will be no precious stone.

 What the Holy Spirit is forming in us will last forever. Our trials will not last forever but the character formed in us by the trials we face will come with us into eternity and become a precious stone in the New Jerusalem!

 God knows what He is doing and what he is shaping in us. We cannot look at somebody else and covet/despise their life because we don’t know what God has in mind for anyone else. Whenever we see someone in a trial, think what precious stone God is forming in them and encourage them to stay the course because God is at work.

 WE START OUT AS A STONE (AN OLD, BATTERED, GREYISH LUMP OF ROCK), AND END UP AS A PRECIOUS STONE THAT WILL LAST FOREVER IN THE CITY OF GOD!! HOW ENCOURAGING IS THAT?

Be Blessed ;)