2:4 Not only is Jesus Christ the source of the believer's spiritual sustenance, He is also our foundation. Peter not only changed his metaphor from growth to building, but he also changed it from an individual to a corporate focus. However unlike a piece of rock Jesus Christ is alive and able to impart strength to those who suffer for His sake.64Builders quarried and chiseled huge blocks of stone to support large buildings in the ancient Near East. Some of the Old Testament writers compared God to such a foundation (e.g., Deut. 32:4, 15, 18, 30-31; Ps. 18:2, 31, 46; 62:2, 6; et al.; cf. Matt. 7:24-25; 16:18). Peter modified this figure and used it to describe Jesus Christ.65
Here Peter began to give the basis on which the four preceding exhortations rest. These exhortations were: be holy (1:13-16), be fearing (1:17-21), be loving (1:22-25), and be in the Word (2:1-3). They grow out of our relationship to God who has begotten us.
The apostle referred to Psalm 118:22 that both Jesus and he had previously quoted to the Sanhedrin (Matt. 21:42; Acts 4:11).
2:5 Peter saw the church as a living temple to which God was adding with the conversion of each new believer. Each Christian is one of the essential stones that enables the whole structure to fulfill its purpose (cf. Matt. 16:15-18). Later Peter would say his readers were also priests (v. 9), but here the emphasis is on their being a building for priestly service, namely, a temple.
"This spiritual house' includes believers in the five Roman provinces of I:I and shows clearly how Peter understood the metaphor of Christ in Matt. 16:18 to be not a local church, but the church general (the kingdom of Christ)."66
"I Peter never speaks of the Church as ekklesia, but uses metaphorical images of OT origin."67
This verse helps us appreciate how much we need each other as Christians. God has a purpose for all of us to fulfill that we cannot fulfill individually. The Christian who is not working in relationship with other Christians as fellow stones, as well as with Jesus Christ as his foundation, cannot fulfill God's complete purpose for him. While every Christian has an individual purpose we also have a corporate purpose that we cannot fulfill unless we take our place in the community of Christians that is the church. Peter explained this purpose more fully below, but here he revealed that it involves worship and service (cf. Rom. 12:1; Heb. 13:15-16; Phil. 4:18).
