“Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded. Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word . . .” 1 Peter 2:6-8 KJV

I recently had an interesting experience. Someone I do not know contacted me about a religious question and in this way started a conversation. It started out calmly enough, but at the conversation progressed it became apparent that he was a ‘date setter’ who relished the fact that while Jesus said no one knows the day or the hour He didn’t specify the year. When I agreed with him that the verse doesn’t say ‘year’ but refused to therefore conclude that God is going to tell us the year he became more and more belligerent – I was being dishonest, proud, and refusing to submit. Before long he was stating that this was the ‘stone of stumbling’ that the Bible talks about and my refusal to ‘submit’ to his reasoning was reason for him to no longer talk to me. That conversation is over!

But it did send be back to the Bible to re-read the passage about the ‘stone of stumbling, and what a comfort it is! The chief cornerstone is Jesus Christ Himself, not a doctrine about times or years, not a secret thing that can only be understood by people who say, “well it says this, but what it really means is that.” Jesus said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” May we who have come to Him live rejoicing today in Him, not in walking in the sparks of our own kindling!!