February 28, 2023: 1 Peter 2:6 - He Who Believes on Him Will Not be Put to Shame

“Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture, ‘Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.’” - 1 Peter 2:6

God Himself brought forth Jesus, the Messiah, the One on whom everything is built. God brought forth Jesus through Zion, through the tribe of Judah. Jesus is the chief cornerstone of faith, and without Him, everything will be brought down. God Himself foretold of the Messiah thousands of years ago through His prophets of old, in the Old Testament. Isaiah was one of those prophets, and prophecies of Jesus are all throughout this book that was written to the people of Judah, when the nation of Israel was split into two kingdoms, the northern kingdom of Israel, sometimes called “Ephraim,” and the southern kingdom of Judah. Jesus Christ fulfilled all the prophecies of His first coming, including the prophecies that most people would reject and despise Him, the One who was chosen by God and who is precious to Him.

God chose Jesus to be the Redeemer of sins for all who believe on Him. God chose an imperfect people, whom He set apart from the rest of the nations, to bring forth the Lamb of God, and nothing and no one was able to stop it from happening. Oh, yes, Satan, that serpent of old, tried to stop it but he did not succeed. Satan knew that Jesus would be born from a peculiar people and he did all he could to eradicate them from the face of the earth, to prevent the birth of Jesus, but he did not succeed. After Jesus came down from heaven and was conceived by the Holy Spirit through a virgin, Satan tried to kill the baby Jesus by having King Herod order that every baby boy two years of age and under to be killed, but Satan did not succeed in killing Jesus.

When Jesus was crucified on a cross, took on all our sins and cried out to God, saying, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” and as Jesus gave up His life, saying, “It is finished,” Satan thought he had won. But Satan did not succeed, for after three days, the stone was rolled away from the tomb and Jesus was resurrected to life by God. For forty days after He was resurrected, Jesus walked the earth and revealed Himself to many. And before He ascended to heaven, Jesus told His disciples, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8) As Jesus ascended to heaven and was taken up in a cloud, His disciples looked up, and “…two men stood by them in white apparel, who also said, ‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.’ ” (Acts 1:11)

Satan tried and tried to stop Jesus’ disciples from telling the good news of Him and His free gift of salvation from sins for all who would believe on Him, but Jesus’ disciples were faithful to Him, even unto death, with many dying a martyr’s death. But Satan did not succeed, for the good news of Jesus is still being proclaimed today, nearly two thousand years after Jesus’ death. The Bible, the word of God, still exists. Believers in Jesus Christ still exist; it wasn’t a temporary movement of people that were eventually overcome by those who came against them. No, this movement of faith in Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of all that was prophesied of Him from the very beginning, and it will never be destroyed. As Jesus told the apostle Peter, “And I say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades [hell] shall not prevail against it.” (Matthew 16:18) Light will overcome the darkness, and that light is Jesus Christ. It is only in Him that salvation is found. It is only in Him that true life is found. Life here on earth is a temporary stepping stone to our eternity in which the fulfillment of all the prophecies of our salvation through faith in Christ alone will have come: entry into His eternal kingdom, when our salvation is complete, our heavenly inheritance. Just as all the prophecies of His first coming were fulfilled, so will be all of the prophecies of His second coming.

We are in a period of darkness in our world, and it will continue to grow darker and colder, as the love of many grows cold and many turn to wickedness and evil. But the light, the light of Jesus will not be extinguished; it will never be put out. The light is always there for those who seek it, and those who seek Him will find Him. Just as in a room that is pitch black, when there is fraction of light coming through the door, we see that light, the light that guides our way in the darkness.

The unbelieving world knows that something is wrong, desperately wrong in our world today. What is wrong is sin. Sin, uncontrolled. Sin that is rising to a level on a worldwide scale that I believe has never been seen before. Sin is increasing because the love of God, Jesus Christ, is decreasing. He is the One who holds everything together; He is the chief cornerstone. When we abandon Him, we are left to our own devices, which is sin, and sin kills, it destroys. In a culture that is obsessed with death and not life and one that embraces self, self, self and rejects the One who died not for Himself but for us, we are left with a culture that we see today: empty, shallow, heavy-burdened, unfulfilled, and always searching for something but never seeking the One who can make us feel whole and complete, the only One who can set us free from all our sins that are crushing us, like the weight of a building that is built without the firm foundation and the cornerstone to sustain it. Without Jesus, that building will come tumbling down, and that is what is happening in the world today; it is all collapsing. Satan thinks he is winning, but he has already lost the war that Jesus has won; Jesus is the victor! He is our only hope, and He is our living hope. Jesus is the only One who can set us free from all our sins, all our shame. All who turn to Jesus Christ, who believe on Him as Savior, will be saved. As Isaiah the prophet said, “And he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.” I urge you, if you have not accepted Him as your Savior, that you seek Him today, while He still may be found, and that you will not be put to shame but will be freed from all your sins and will share in the eternal glory with Him, in His beautiful light. ✝️