Peter continues to explain who you are as a Christian and what you need to do to apply these truths to your life in the first half of chapter 2. He calls believers to leave behind the selfish goals, methods and perspectives that drove their lives before they met Christ and instead intensely desire to nourish the new goals, perspectives and methods of the gospel that has saved them. This is done as God's people offer themselves to Jesus because He is the only sure basis for life and what he has done for us obligates us to set aside our lives to serve Him. The old ways of getting what we want, “malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander,” break relationships and do not satisfy. Instead, we are called to crave the gospel, the word about who Jesus is and what he has done for us. and apply it as we follow him. When we daily offer ourselves to serve Jesus, the Holy Spirit will “grow us into our salvation” so that we resemble Jesus more and more each day. He will then join us together with other believers into the the temple (a “spiritual house”) that displays Christ to the world.
What Jesus did for us when we first came to him should drive us to seek more of him and grow into what he made us to be. We should desire this like an infant desires milk. The natural response to what Jesus has done for us should be a regular approach to Jesus, through the Spirit, in commitment, prayer and study of the gospel testimony contained in the Bible. This happens in the context of the church body as the Holy Spirit takes the diverse gifts of individual believers and builds us into one “spiritual house” offering ourselves as “spiritual sacrifices” to God. This is how God will build his new “temple” spreading out all over the world to offer the benefits of salvation and following Jesus to everyone.
Peter emphasizes that Jesus has made us into a “holy priesthood.” We are now created to be his special people, a “chosen race” set aside to serve him, represent him and distribute the amazing blessings he has given us to whoever we come into contact with. We offer ourselves to Jesus because he is the only sure basis for life. The longer we serve him the more we realize this. So let’s “crave the unadulterated milk of the word” by daily commitment to Jesus and serving him, meeting with other believers so that we are built into his spiritual house, and connecting those around us to the Jesus who saved us and loves us.
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