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You also are like living stones. As you come to Christ, you are being built into a house for worship. There you will be holy priests. You will offer spiritual sacrifices. God will accept them because of what Jesus Christ has done (1 Peter 2:5).

We come to the end of our 4-weeks of reflections on Immanuel\\u2019s tagline, Together in Faith. The image of the church as \\u2018priests\\u2019 will be our conclusion. This image occurs several times in the Bible. As few verses after our text, Peter writes, \\u201cBut you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God\\u2019s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light\\u201d (9).

The opening scene in Revelation includes this, \\u201cTo him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father\\u2014to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen\\u201d (1:5,6). Later, John overhears the heavenly choir sing, \\u201cYou have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth\\u201d (5:10).

Through Moses, God established that the priests worked in the tabernacle and later the temple. The rest of Israel accessed God through the work of the priests. Living historically and culturally far from those days, it is easy for us to miss the import of this image. Today, everyone has access to God through Christ. We are all priests.

Deeply embedded in this image is the blood of Christ. Jesus is the great high priest of his people. His blood washes away our sin and gives us entry to God\\u2019s presence. We may come boldly and confidently before God because we come in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour, washed in his blood.

Christ has established his redeemed people as a priesthood for the purpose of praising and glorying God. We are \\u2018being built into a house of worship\\u2019; we are to \\u2018declare the praise of him who called us\\u2019; we are \\u2018to serve God\\u2019 and \\u2018to him give glory and power for ever and ever\\u2019. This is not just a Sunday thing. This is an all of life matter. As Paul wrote, \\u2018we offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God\\u2019 (Romans 12:1) and \\u2018so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God\\u2019 (1 Corinthians 10:31).

What does this look like in real life? In the days of the Reformation, Martin Luther pointed out that rather than every person being their own priest, we must remember that every Christian is someone else\\u2019s priest, and we are all priests to one another. When we comfort the grieving, when we feed the hungry, when we pray on behalf of the broken, when we study the word together, we are fulfilling our calling to be priests in God\\u2019s kingdom.

As a holy priesthood, we are designed and intended to pursue Christ together, united around a common confession: \\u201cBut God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other\\u201d (1 Corinthians 12:24-25).

This is one of the profound Biblical teachings recovered in the Reformation. Sadly, it has been neglected. Let us recover it hear at Immanuel. Let us understand the phrase, Together in Faith, in light of this doctrine. Its recovery during the Protestant Reformation brought many Christians to their knees in prayer while at the same time sending forth countless missionaries. This doctrine propelled the church upwards, the redeemed worshipping God together, inwards, Christians serving each other and outwards, the church addressing the needs of the neighbour and proclaiming the gospel.

Having named Christians priests, Peter continued, \\u201cDear friends, you are outsiders and those who are [wandering in the wilderness of this] world. So, I\\u2019m asking you not to give in to your sinful desires. They fight against your soul. People who don\\u2019t believe might say you are doing wrong. But lead good lives among them. Then they will see your good deeds. And they will give glory to God on the day he comes to judge\\u201d (1 Peter 2:11-12).

And we end in praise to God,

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3:17-21).