The Beginning that Never Ends

1 Peter 2:2-10

Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture:

“See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious,
and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

This honor, then, is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe,

“The stone that the builders rejected
has become the very head of the corner,”

and

“A stone that makes them stumble
and a rock that makes them fall.”

They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen family, a royal priesthood, a holy people—God’s own people—in order that you may proclaim the excellence of him who called you out of darkness 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.

Sermon

On my first day of orientation at Princeton Seminary, I found myself in the chapel with my classmates. We shuffled into the pews with one another, still unsure of each other’s names, and still trying to get our bearings.

We were pretty smart people on paper, and as I learned quickly, meant that we were some of the dumbest people in the real world.

We settled down as the service began.

Just as we sat down, up we go at the behest of the seminary’s music director. The music starts, as we hear him sing: “Come with me, for the journey is long. Come with me for the journey is long.”

We’re goaded along and sheepishly begin singing with him. How long could we possibly sing these two phrases?

Well… a minute passes. A few more minutes pass. “Come with me for the journey is long. Come with me for the journey is long. Come with me for the journey is long. Come with me for the journey is long.”

Right when we think we’ve made it to the end?

“Alright, everyone start stomping — left, right, left right. We’re on a journey!”

Far, far, far too later, we find ourselves sitting again.

Our eyeballs had rolled so far back into our heads that some of us weren’t sure we’d ever see the light of day again.

But we sure did remember that the journey was long. For the years that followed, we’d quote it to each other, sometimes sarcastically, sometimes seriously: “Come with me, for the journey is long.”

What we learned in those years at seminary—and the years that followed—was that we can’t out-think our journey. No matter how much we learned, we never arrive at the destination. There is always a road ahead of us, a road that never runs out, that never stops, that never fully arrives somewhere. We’re always walking the journey of faith.

But what’s odd is that within the last two hundred years, American Christianity fell victim to a myth: it started to think that faith was a destination, not a journey. American Christians fell for the idea that if we believe the right stuff, and think the right things in our heads, then God will let us into heaven and keep everyone else out. Faith became a set of beliefs that we settle on and arrive at — God wants us to be right above all else, rather than move to the rhythms of grace.

This first epistle of Peter has something to say about that myth.

What do we hear at the beginning of this morning’s passage? “Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation.”

And then, later in the passage? “let yourselves be built into a spiritual house.”

We hear in this epistle that salvation isn’t something to be achieved by us, or something to be acquired by us. No, instead, salvation is something we grow into, something that is built within us.

And who is the one growing and building us into salvation? God, of course!

Peter quotes the prophet Isaiah: “See, I the Lord am laying… a cornerstone.” Later, Peter calls us a family chosen by God. He says that God has given us mercy, given us grace.

So God is the one who plants us, waters us, tends us, prunes us, and nurtures us into salvation. And by salvation, I mean that eternal peace with God — freely loving God, just as God freely loves us. I mean eternal reconciliation with all of creation and all of our Creator. I mean the fulfillment of God’s covenantal love.

That salvation isn’t conjured up when we believe the right things. Because faith in God isn’t an arrival — it’s the journey that is shepherded, grown, and built by God in the Spirit. Faith is a posture, a movement, and a way of being.

“American Christians fell for the idea that if we believe the right stuff, and think the right things in our heads, then God will let us into heaven and keep everyone else out. Faith became a set of beliefs that we settle on and arrive at — God wants us to be right above all else, rather than move to the rhythms of grace.”

At this baptismal font, we all take our first step on this long, long journey. Here, in its waters, we are born into new life after being baptized in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But contrary to what we might demonstrate in our lives, this font is also where we are called to continue growing into salvation. Because faith isn’t an arrival, or a set of beliefs — faith is this journey that Christ propels. So here’s the paradox: baptism is the beginning that never ends, a beginning that is always in front of us. It’s always ahead on the journey, always calling us deeper into what God started.

Each and every day, and every time we gather here, we are beckoned by this font toward salvation, toward confession and forgiveness and learning and praying and serving.

“So here’s the paradox: baptism is the beginning that never ends, a beginning that is always in front of us. It’s always ahead on the journey, always calling us deeper into what God started.”

So… “come with me, for the journey is long.”

Go with Evelyn, and Roger, and Annabelle, for the journey is long.

Go with ordinary sinners and ordinary saints across all time and space, for the journey is long. Go with those who have feasted at this holy meal across generations and across millennia, for the journey is long.

Go on this long, long journey, knowing that though we will never arrive on this side of heaven, we will one day find our journey fulfilled: fulfilled at the table of our Lord, feasting with saints in the light, and resting our wearied feet with joyful hearts.

Thanks be to God.