Stones in the Hands of God – a Sermon based on 1 Peter 2. 1-10 – preached on May 3, 2026
at First Presbyterian Church, Clarks Summit, PA.
The drizzle stopped by the time we exited the bus. We made our way up a steep climb toward a Neolithic, that is, a Stone Age mound. Built 5,200 years ago in 3,200 B.C., New-grange.com describes it this way: “Built by Stone Age farmers, the great circular mound measures approximately 279 feet in diameter and 43 feet high, covering an area of about one acre.”[i] Ninety-seven huge kerbstones, decorated by megalithic art carvings comprise the outer ring of a structure of stone laid upon stone. It is capped by green vegetation.
As we approached the entrance, our guide divided the group in half and bid twelve of us to follow him. Some of us, though not all, had to duck below the huge stone covering the opening to a passage leading into the mound. Soon we were in a narrow corridor surrounded by care-fully placed stones. Some of us, though not all, had to turn sideways at times and suck in a belly to squeeze through. Fifty-some feet into the depth of the mound we emerged into a cross-shaped inner chamber. The three chambers each held a large stone basin which once cradled the ashes of the dearly departed.
Intricate
megalithic art was carved into the stones and floor. Above us, precisely
layered stones formed the ceiling twenty feet above us. In contrast to the
drippy world we left outside, the chamber and the passage leading to it, were
bone dry. As we marveled at the ancient engineering and workmanship involved,
our guide flipped off the light switch leaving us in total darkness. After a
few moments, a gradual glow began to fill the passageway from the outside,
demonstrating what happens at dawn when the Winter Solstice arrives at
Newgrange each year.
In
day trips from our overnight homes in Dublin, Killarney and Galway, we had
amble oppor-tunity to observe ancient stones. Lush green fields dotted by the
presence of sheep and goats, were separated by straight walls of piled
stone. Near a relatively modern
farmhouse and outbuildings would rise the relic of an old tower or castle. We
passed a stone bridge you might recognize from the movie “The Quiet Man.” St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin and thousand-year-old
buildings atop the Rock of Cashel provided up close inspection of stones
mortared in place by skilled masons. In Galway’s St. Nicholas Collegiate
Church, built in the 1300’s, a few of us viewed carved stone angels that had
been defaced by Oliver Cromwell’s soldiers three-hundred years later.
Yet the most impressive structures
we encountered were along the windy, cliffhanging, perilously close to the
Ocean below drive around the Dingle Peninsula. One of them is pictured on the
cover of today’s bulletin. Called a clochan, it is a beehive hut built
by a monastic com-munity in the twelfth century. Constructed without mortar,
these humble abodes, like the passage mound at Newgrange, remain completely
dry, despite the pelting rains that blow in from the Atlantic.
With all these images of stones
arranged row upon row to make a hut-for-one, a sheep-fold wall, or an
awe-inspiring cathedral to guide us, consider the invitation offered to us this
morning in Peter’s first letter:
“Come to him, a living stone, though
rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living
stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy
priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.” I Peter
1. 4-5
Notice what Peter is doing here.
Calling Jesus a living stone, he labels us, living stones, too. It is a subtle
way to say we are made in God’s image. Then comes the invitation to put our
rocky selves at God’s disposal. Peter does not say: “build yourselves
into a spiritual house.” No, he bids us place ourselves in the hands of the one
an old hymn called the master workman: “...let yourselves be built into a
spiritual house.”
The
agency remains with God, and the purpose of the spiritual house is spelled out:
“to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ.” At the end of
today’s text Peter speaks of being called and qualified for a greater purpose:
“you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into the marvelous light.”[ii] In other words, we have a story to tell, in both word and deed. Peter’s invitation is to let God put our lives to work so
others may receive grace and mercy as we have.
One New Testament scholar notes that
declaring “the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into the
marvelous light” can refer to singing God’s praise in worship. But another
dimension of ‘declaring the deeds of God’ becomes evident when the letter
addresses the situaion of the
On the sidewalk outside our hotel in
Killarney, a conversation with our bus driver led four of us to take a walk to
see the statue of a local hero. Just
outside the entrance to a lovely city park stands the life size bronze figure
of Monsignor Hugh O’ Flaherty. At over
six feet in height, O’Flaherty is captured midstride with a book in one hand
and his hat trailing behind him in the other. Behind a pair of round-rimmed
glasses his blue eyes seem to twinkle. Four plaques tell the story of his life
and the exploits for which he is remembered and honored. It is a story full of
spiritual sacrifices, and a collection of living stones put together by God to
declare mighty acts of God carried out by ordinary people during difficult
days.
O’Flaherty’s father became the steward of Killarney Golf Club when the boy was eleven years old. There he developed skills and a life-long love of the sport. Graduated from the Presentation Monas-tery there, he began studies for the priesthood in at a college in Limerick. One of the plaques on the wall behind his statue traces his early career.
“Hugh O’Flaherty was ordained to the
priesthood in the chapel of his alma mater in December of 1925. In a short few
years he secured Degrees and Doctorates in Theology, Philosophy and Canon
Law...Although only in his thirties he was conferred with the title of
Monsignor. ...He filled various roles within the Vatican Diplomatic Service in
Palestine, Haiti & San Dom-ingo, and Czechoslovakia.
The
plaque goes on to tell how his love of golf found him often playing at a course
on the outskirts of Rome with well-known and well-connected members of Italian
society,and concludes: “Such influential acquaintances would prove very
useful during the Nazi occupation of Rome.
In the autumn of 1942 the Germans and Italians began to crack down on
prominent Italian Jews and
A second plaque on the wall
continues the story. “In the spring of 1943 his operation broadened to include
escaped Allied prisoners of war and shot down allied airmen. With the help of
brave friends like Henrietta Chevalier, he developed a network of safe
apartments in Rome in which they could hide. With a British escapee, Lt. Col.
Sam Derry, he established an organization that pro-vided them with food and
supplies and brought them ultimately to safety. By the end of the war “The
Roman Escape
Captivated by this story, within
hours of our arrival back in the US of A, I ordered a book by Brian Fleming, titled
The Vatican Pimpernel, which tells a lot more about O’Flaherty’s extraordinary
life and work. The title is derived from a label placed on O’Flaherty referring
to the 1905 novel The
Despite warnings not to do so,
O’Flaherty often left the Vatican to escort escapees to their safehouses or to
deliver food or money to those who were providing lodging. Fleming writes: “He
did not always use the clothes worn by somebody in the religious life and was
known to disguise himself as
On
one occasion when we went to collect a donation at a patron’s home, he barely
escaped a raid led by the Gestapo chief. Hiding in the basement he noticed a
delivery of coal was in progress. He grabbed an empty coal sack, stuck his
priestly outer garments in it, covered him-self in coal dust, and
The organization O’Flaherty and his
righthand man, Sam Derry put together puts me in mind of the many stones that
go together to make the foundation and the walls of a building. In addition to
the coalman, there was a woman who expertly forged documents and identification
papers for the escapees, there were farmers who had false bottoms in their
wagons, families in Rome and beyond who made room for those O’Flaherty and his
team brought to their doors. A pair of
clerks in the police station passed the location of impending raids so escapees
could avoid capture. Within and beyond the Vatican there were priests and nuns
who aided the work, sometimes sleeping on the floor so a visiting guest could
rest easy in a bed after days of weeks on the run.
There’s one more thing to tell about Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty. After the war, his helping efforts continued in a new way. The plaque on the wall puts it this way: “he turned his attention to the welfare of German and Italian POW’s...to ensure that they were not mistreated by the Allies.”[x] Brian Fleming adds this: “Kappler, Gestapo Chief, had been arrested and found guilty of war crimes...He was sentenced to
life imprisonment and placed in a prison half way between Rome and
And then there is this: According to
Fleming, “When questioned by friends as to why he was helping people ‘on the
other side’, his response is simple and direct: “God has no country.” That quote is emblazoned on the wall in Killarney,
above replicas of the medals bestowed upon him by Great Britain, The United
States, Haiti and Italy. O’Flaherty
rarely spoke of exploits, but those he saved along the way left the record of
his spiritual sacrifices.
As
our drizzly day in the Boyne Valley neared its end, our driver delivered us to
The Hill of Slane. Through freshly mown grass we climbed to the top of the
hill. We made our way toward a walled cemetery a statue of St. Patrick,
several high Celtic crosses and the ruins of a church. An internet post from
Heritage Ireland includes this description: “The Hill of Slane rises to
approximately 525 feet
At the time Ireland was ruled by a
series of local, some would say, tribal kings. according Heritage Ireland, “St.
Patrick famously lit the first Paschal fire on the summit of the Hill of Slane, defying the pagan High King Laoghaire at nearby Tara, marking the introduction of Christianity to the region.”[xiii] That
hilltop has been home to a 6th century monastery and a high tower
later destroyed by raiding Vikings. Today the remains of the 16th
century St. Patrick’s Church rise above the
At this, and many of the other ruins
we visited one could not help but wonder what happened to the stones that are
missing from such ancient buildings. The
answer, provided by our guide, Maura, is quite simple. They were carried away
and used by subsequent generations to build homes and barns and walls.
That led me to think again of living stones in the hands of God today, allowing ourselves to be moved about and put to new uses, new “spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God.”[xv] In our ever-changing, fast-paced, blur of a world, as we lament what seems to have
fallen to ruin, we are called to return repeat-edly to Christ, the living stone precious
in God’s sight, and allow God to place our stones where they are most needed
now.
The work of O’Flaherty’s
organization, with individuals playing their parts, large and small along the
way, is not beyond our reach if we allow God to put our stones in his spiritual
house. We can be the one who points out the hypocrisy of the internet bully who
darkens our screen. Our check registers
and appointment calendars can demonstrate the difference between calling Jesus
“Lord,” and living by his teachings. Every bag of food that gets carried out of
the dining room downstairs or the
Circling around the statue of St. Patrick on The Hill of Slane, Bill Carter led us in the singing of “Be Thou My Vision,” whose tune is named SLANE. Its lyrics reference God as our “souls’ shelter” and “high tower.” The final verse addresses God as “High King of Heaven.”[xvii] When we sing it, the lesser kings of this world are put on notice: we are God’s people. We respond to a higher authority. We are ready and willing to offer spiritual sacrifices, telling and showing “the mighty acts of him who called us out of dark-ness into his marvelous light.
[i][i] Newgrange.com, p. 2
[ii] I Peter 2. 9
[iii] Pheme Perkins, Interpretation – A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, First and Second Peter, James and Jude, (Louisville, John Knox Press, (c) 1995), p, 44
[iv] “From Killarney to Rome,” Plaque behind the O’Flaherty statue, Killarney , Ireland
[v] ibid
[vi] “The Roman Escape Line,” Plaque behind the O’Flaherty statue, Killarney, Ireland.
[vii] Wikopedia, “The Scarlet Pimpernel”
[viii] Brian Fleming, The Vatican Pimpernel, (Skyhorse Publishing, New York, (c) 2008, 2012), p. 48
[ix] ibid., p, 47
[x] ibid., “The Roman Escape Line”
[xi] ibid., Fleming, pp. 183-4
[xii] Heritage Ireland internet description, p. 1
[xiii] ibid.
[xiv] The Office of Public Works, plaque beside the cemetery wall, The Hill of Slane
[xv] 1 Peter 2.5
[xvi] Matthew 7. 12a
[xvii] Hymn 450, Glory to God, The Presbyterian Hymnal, (Westminster John Knox Press, (c) 2013
