Craving Spiritual Milk and Spiritual Growth
Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 2:1-3
Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter
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Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles
Message: Craving Spiritual Milk and Spiritual Growth
Airdate: 9/22-9/23/26
Programs: 2362 & 2363
We continue our series in First Peter today, and you can open your Bibles if you have one with you. And we get into the second chapter of this letter. And by way of introduction, you know, for about twenty years, the milk industry sponsored a series of advertisements. These were billboards, magazines, TV advertisements. Some of you old timers might remember this.
It was called either got milk or milk, it does the body good. Right? And so they one of the strategies they incorporated with this is that they would get famous people and they would have the milk mustache, right? And they would put them up there. And I just dug up a couple here to remind you maybe of how they did this.
You may remember him. You might remember him. And they did a lot of this kind of thing. And the idea was that, hey, if these famous people drink milk, look at how successful they've been and seemingly healthy they are, then therefore, who wouldn't wanna be healthy like them? So, therefore, drink, you know, drink milk.
Well, here's a question. What about spiritually? Is the same thing true spiritually? Will a normal, healthy Christian have a desire to grow? And maybe what we need in this, I got thinking, was a slightly different ad campaign for Christians.
And so here, I'll give you an example of kind of maybe what I was thinking possibly might work. This one, I think this will this will next one will really pastor Gary Butler here at Bethel Church. What would those insinuate? Well, if you want to be like Martin Luther or Gary Butler, then you better be drinking your milk.But how do we do that exactly?
Like how do Christians grow? And Peter brings us here today to one of the core values of our church, which is growth. And it's great when God grows us in in width. Right? Today, we birth a new campus and things like that that that seem to indicate a growing sphere of of of spiritual growth.
But what Peter is not he's not talking about this way. He's talking about this way. How do we grow deeper or how do we mature as Christians? And will a healthy Christian want that? That's where we're going today.
Our passage is First Peter two verses one through three. I'm gonna read God's word, and then we're going to get into it. Here's what Peter writes. “So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk that by it, you may grow up to salvation.”
“If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.” It’s important when you read the Bible to realize that those chapter divisions and those verse divisions, those were all added, like centuries after these letters were written. When Peter was writing this, he didn't say, okay. And now for chapter two of my book. He just was writing.
And so the context and what's said before often is critical to understanding what that person is saying when they're actually saying it. And so if we just look a little bit to the latter part of chapter one, we see that there really are three themes that Peter has been developing. One of them is the need for moral purity and obedience in the Christian's life. We see that in verses 14 and following. Verses 22 and following are all about us loving one another.
And then we have in verses twenty-four and twenty-five, teaching about the word of God. An authentic Christianity, you can study it in history. You can find it alive anywhere in the world. It will always prioritize those three things, the need for obedience, the the need for loving one another, and the role of the word of God in the hearts and the lives of the people of God. So what Peter does now is he's been talking about these things, and he he gets practical with it.
You can almost sense him, you know, thinking of the people that are listening to the letter thinking they they may not know exactly what I'm talking about. So how about if I get a little bit specific now with what it looks like or maybe what it doesn't look like to be obedient, to love one another, and to prioritize the word of God. And what he does here now beginning in chapter two is that he lists five I'm calling them toxins. Five toxins to any Christian relationship and certainly any Christian church. Notice that he begins with the word so, at least in the ESV, the the Greek word there.
It's just that word often translated therefore. And when you see these little conjunctions, it's easy to kinda skip over them. Right? You haven't really looked at a conjunction since grammar class, and you didn't even like doing it then. But when you read the Bible, these little words tell you what the author is intending.
And so he begins the chapter by saying, therefore or so, based on everything I've been saying here, this now is what I want you to realize. And what does he want us to realize? That when it comes to loving one another, moral obedience, and the role of the word of God, he begins now with five things that will destroy all of that, particularly the loving and the unity part. And he lists now these five toxins that any Christian should try very hard not to have a part of their lifestyle, and every church should work very hard at not having a part of being kind of the culture of the church. So let's just walk through these one at a time.
He begins with malice. K? Malice. Malice is a word it's a general word for evil of any kind. But because Peter is talking about interpersonal relationships, they translate it malice.
And that's a pretty good word. It's not a word that we use all the time. Do we understand what it means? To have malice towards somebody is the opposite of loving them. It is to have evil in my heart towards somebody else.
And because of that, you could view the first one in the list as kind of a general statement that summarizes all of them. Right? If you don't have malice in your heart, you're probably not slandering somebody. Right? Or you're not deceiving them.
So malice is kind of generally having malintent, a lack of love towards somebody else. If love is giving of yourself for their good and their joy to build them up and bless them, malice is the opposite of that. It is to view them negatively. It is to think and plot in my mind, how can I take them down? How can I hurt them?
How can I make myself look better than them? So we are to take just generally malice towards other people. We're to get rid of it. We're to put it aside. I skipped actually something I wanted to mention to you.
The word there for get rid of in the ESV, also translated, put away or actually, it's put away in the ESV. It's also translated get rid of. It is the word for taking off a garment. Okay? Taking off a garment.
And the imagery here is with these things, you are you're like clothes, you are taking them off and you're you're putting them away. Why do I do that? In fact, maybe to ask the question, how often should you do that? How often should you take off the clothes? First service thought that was a trick question.
But then I sniffed the air, and I realized they had no idea. People, you should do this daily, and some of you should begin applying that right now. Right? Daily, we want to take off the dirty clothes and to put it in the hamper and to why why do I do that? Because I want I wanna wear clean clothes.
I don't wanna wear dirty clothes. It's only in a desperate situation when you need to wear something do you begin going through those dirty clothes. I'm gonna put this on again. No. I want clean clothes.
That's the imagery of this. Put off these things. Why? Because I wanna put something else and something better on. K.
So put off malice. Secondly, put off deceit. Now I think most of us know what deceit is. This is to deceive. It is deception.
It is lying. The word in the Greek here is actually a word that fisher it's used for fishermen. I don't if you have fishermen here, but all of us understand the concept of fishing. Right? Nobody fishes with a bare hook unless they're really biting, and that's a lot of fun.
Always, when you're fishing, you have a hook, but it's hiding in something else. Right? There's a worm or there's a jig or there's a surface lure that looks like a frog or whatever it is. And that fisherman is putting that thing out, and he's doing all that he can to make it look real, to make it look like it's something the fish is going to like. But then in the end, it's something that the fish doesn't like.
Right? Because he sets the hook, and now the fish is on the line. The deception has done its deed. In our relationships, deceit deceit is anytime that we are less than honest with one another. Now we live in a day where lying or shading the truth is almost acceptable, right?
We listen to politicians. We listen to the superstars and all of that. We always wonder, are we getting the real story, right? Because there's such a pattern of of deceit but in the church, we are freed from that. Why?
Because we know the truth in Christ. Right? Now I'm in a place where I don't I don't I don't want to walk in darkness. I want to walk in the light, John says. There is this freedom from having to to be deceitful towards others and certainly to use my words in a way that would be damaging or would mislead you.
That is the key. He's not talking here about when you say, oh, I think I've I've got that appointment at noon on Friday, then you look at your calendar and actually it was Saturday. It's not where you're like, oh, I've gotta go and I've gotta ask forgiveness. But it was an honest mistake. K?
Here's the test. What is my motivation with my words? Am I using my words in some way to either mislead the other person or in some way to cause for them to see me in a way that's not true, to pump myself up in front of them? That would also would be deceit. We're to put these things away.
Third, hypocrisy. Now, I can skip that because you never see that in church. Actually, we see it so much that we have metaphors for this. It's to be two faced or to speak with a forked tongue. Have you ever heard that phrase?
What is that referring to? It's the snake. Right? And they got the the end of their their tongue. It's it can it's got little like, it's got two parts to it.
So the the snake's tongue, it can wiggle here and it can wiggle here. It's a forked tongue. And there are some people that are really good at saying one thing over here and saying another thing over here. They are duplicit. Literally, two faced is what hypocrisy means.
They are one way to these people, and they're another way to these people. Is this a problem amongst amongst Christians? It's a problem in my life. I think to be a Christian is to struggle with a kind of reality that I'm following Jesus, I believe in him, I'm a Christian, I'm a Christ follower, But to also struggle with the reality of my humanity. Right?
And so some people's solution to that is to act one way here and to act another over here instead of embracing the gospel which says that I am a sinner saved by grace. The gospel frees us from the need to be hypocrites. Right? Somebody said the church is the only organization you have to acknowledge that you're a sinner to get in, and then you spend the rest of your time trying to act like you're not one. Right?
And so we all walk around and we're all good and we're all perfect and everything's fine, and I haven't sinned since I got saved thirty years ago. No laughter on that one. Indeed, hypocrisy. There was a recent poll amongst 20 somethings in The U. S.
That said that I think it let me get the number right. 86% of non Christian 20 somethings perceived Christians as being hypocritical. Apparently, 20 somethings are in a wonderful moral standing to judge the quality of the lives of others, which itself is hypocritical, of course. But I digress regarding the self defeating question there. But the point being is that many people obviously view Christians and see you driving to church this morning.
Right? And they say, oh, no. They're just a bunch of hypocrites in there. There's that kind of thing. That's not what Peter's talking about.
He's talking about the intentional, duplicit living that lives this way, sanctimonious, I'm a follower of Jesus, I'm righteous, but they have another face, another life. This, I think, is one of the struggles of second generation Christians who grow up in the church. Right? Because they see mom and dad at church, small group, whatever it is, and, you know, everything's cheery and happy. And I'm, you know, I'm we're all very, very, very, very committed Christians.
But then they see at home, and obviously no parents are perfect. But you realize this is why second and third generation Christians often struggle and maybe even reject the faith professed by their parents because they see intimately the two facedness. I could talk more about that. I don't have time. The point that Peter is making is that the gospel frees us from having to have two faces.
We're free to be who we are in Christ. We don't have to play act. We don't have to wear a mask. We can be real and authentic. I sent some authenticity in the videos for the baptism today, did you not?
That was that was very encouraging. Don't be sanctimonious. Don't act high and holy but secretly live another way. Be who you are. We are who we are in Christ, right?
Just be who you are. The third one is envy. Okay? Envy. Envy or jealousy.
Jealousy, they're they're like twin evil sisters. They're very similar. Slight difference between envy and jealousy. Envy? Envy says, I crave what you have.
Jealousy says, I crave what you have, and I don't want you to have it. Right? I'm jealous of you. Think of Joseph's brothers as an example of this with the coat of many colors. Envy leads to jealousy because the more convinced I am that I would be happy if I had what you have, the more I'm going to resent you for actually having it.
Jonathan Edwards about envy. Envy may be defined to be a spirit of dissatisfaction with and opposition to the prosperity and happiness of others as compared with our own. The thing that the envious person is opposed to and dislikes is the comparative superiority of the state of honor or prosperity or happiness that another may enjoy over that which he possesses. And the point that Edwards makes here, it's not just that you have the car, the house, the reputation, or the body that I want. It's that I sense that you're happy having it, and I resent you for that.
It's a key insight, I think. Love is the opposite of that, isn't it? Love doesn't envy other people for having things that I don't have. Love is self giving for the good and joy of others. And so if you have something that I don't have and you're happy about it, I can be happy with your happiness.
I can join in your happiness, not resent you for being happy. Why? Because I'm for you. Love is to be for other people. And when they succeed and when they have things that God allows them to have or whatever it might be, now we can be happy with one another.
This is why I think envy and jealousy in the church is a kind of apostasy because what are we what's our gig here? I mean, of all things, what are we saying? We are saying that Jesus is our savior and that our satisfaction is in him. Right? Amen?
Amen. That's what we believe. But when I have envy for a fellow Christian, I am saying that Jesus is not enough. I need Jesus and that car. My friend is driving.
Then I'd be happy because he looks happy driving that car. And speaking of that, I don't like the car, and I don't like his happiness in the car. God, take both of those away from him, and let him join my own misery. James talks about where divisions come from in the church. Jealousy, selfish ambition.
It can divide the church. It can divide this church. Put it off, he says. Get rid of it. The last one is slander.
Okay? Slander. I would suspect most of us probably, we may not be able to define it, but we know it when we hear it or we should. Slander is not speaking to people but about people. Slander is it can be in front of people.
Gossip is always behind people's back. K? So you can know it's gossip if what they're saying is something that that person, if they were to hear it, would think negatively about. Or they would sense the way that it's being said is not uplifting or prayerful or encouraging. It's damaging.
It's seeking to tear that person down, tear down their reputation. You can know if you're slandering if the person that you're talking about was to come up and to hear you saying it, and you'd feel the need to go. That's probably slander. Slander is the opposite of love. Love seeks the good of others.
Love uses its words to build others up. That's the call that we have in Ephesians four twenty nine. “Let your words be for the edification of others, for the building of them up.” And that means, essentially, I think, people were to hear the person here's a test. If the person that you are talking about was to hear the conversation that you're having, would they think that you love them?
It doesn't mean that we don't we can't talk about other people, talk about life situations. That's just life. Right? But the way that we talk about them, is it tearing them down? Is it dragging down their testimony?
Or is it in a way that is intended to build them up? Here's another test. Do I need to do I feel the need to whisper about this? Like if you say, did you hear about this? And you don't even know why, but your voice comes down like this.
The whisper is probably an indication that this is something in the category of either slander or gossip. I ought not be doing it. Why? Proverbs says, “Whisperers separate close friends.” Have you ever had anybody whisper against you something not true or maybe just half true?
By the way, slander can be true. A lot of people take that cover. Right? You shouldn't be saying that. It's true after all.
As if the fact that it's true means that I have a right to repeat it in a way that drags that person down. It can be true. That's not the issue. The issue is my motive in the sharing of this. Is it love?
Am I for them? Am I seeking their good? Is my sharing of this with somebody else helpful, profitable, or am I contributing to a kind of gossipy culture? You say, well, I can't I cannot slander, but I can't keep people from slandering me. There actually is a great way to do this.
It works with gossips as well. Tell them, that's slander. You need to repent. They will never do it to you again. Right?
Never. Why? Because gossips and gossip and slander is essentially cowardice. We're called to speak the truth in love to one another. Ephesians four again.
Okay. That's mature Christianity. When we sort of drum up our courage and in love, we go to that person, we say, hey, I got I just I need to admonish you on on something. That's like robust Christianity. Gossip y, slander, Mrs. Olsen, Little House on the Prairie type stuff.
Know? Young people are like, what's Little House on the Prairie? Who's Curly? Who's Billy Graham? Everybody knows Gary Butler.
I digress. What are we to do with slander? Put it off. K? Put it off.
Oh, that God would increasingly either create or protect a culture in our church free from the gossipy, whispering, slanders that too often even God's people will be a part of. They say, okay. Well, that's nice, pastor Steve. How do I do that? My whole life, I've been, like, angry with people, hateful towards people.
I've used words that are damaging to people. I follow Jesus. Now, but how do I how do I get over these and a thousand other things that I know I'm supposed to be striving for as a Christian? And that's this growth thing. That's verse two and following here.
Peter, how do we grow? Again, notice what he says. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up into salvation, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. So the picture that he draws here is of a newborn infant. And I gotta tell you, I am so glad this was not planned, but in God's good providence, I am so glad that I can teach through First Peter after having become a father myself.
There were so many times and nights, early on especially, with our daughter, where this verse would come to my mind as I would see mommy and daughter doing the feeding, the late night feeding, and I would see or hear, you know, Keira Lee indicating that the time had come. Children, they they don't know any words, but they they communicate effectively, don't they? Right? That's code for feed me now. Right?
Feed me now. You ain't sleeping till I get some food in my belly. So I'm excited to be able to talk about this. I think about my daughter in this verse. You know, one of the things that was fun with her too is that once she was able to somewhat communicate, we started doing the little hand signals.
You know, you can teach babies little hand signals. And our signal for more was this. K? So she'd be eating, and we go, more. And then she got to the place where she could go, more.
So adorable. More on that in a little bit. Let's understand let's understand though, first of all, what is the milk that he's talking about here? Long for the pure spiritual milk. Our first clue is what the milk produces, what it does.
Notice the rest of the verse. That by it, you may grow up into salvation. The spiritual milk he's talking about does for the Christian something analogous to what the mommy's milk does for the infant, which he describes here as being that we grow up into our salvation. And by that, he doesn't mean that we become saved by drinking this milk. He is talking about that growth into maturity, the growth into adulthood.
Like a child will grow and become stronger and taller and move into adulthood. Spiritually, we all begin our our life in Jesus immature. Right? We grow up. At least we're supposed to.
And there is something about this spiritual milk that contributes to the growing, like mommy's milk contributes to the infant. That's the analogy that he's drawing. It's not a hard one, but just to make clear to be sure, are you all with me? Okay. Now when we see this, I think, in context, it all points to and in the same direction.
Look at the preceding verse. “But the word of the Lord remains forever.” That's verse 25 of chapter one. He's been talking about the gospel. He's been talking about the word of God.
So at the very least, we can say the milk is the gospel of Christ. But I think more accurately, is broader than that. It is the word of God. It is what we call the Bible. God's inspired revelation to us is to the Christian milk like mommy's milk is to the infant.
So we can literally look at the Bible as a kind of right? It is milk to us. It nourishes us. It spiritually feeds us. It causes us to grow.
Now don't let infants here throw you off because there are other passages that talk about, like Hebrews five where the writer of Hebrews says, don't be infants. You need you need meat, not milk. Or you need milk. You shouldn't eat meat is what he says there. That's a totally different illustration.
K? The people that Peter writes to have been Christians, some of them for thirty years. They are mature Christians. And yet, Peter says, you need spiritual milk. You need the word of God.
Well, not the only way. The primary listen, Bethel Church. The primary means to growth that God has given us is the hearing, the understanding, and the applying of God's word to our lives. Should I say that again for emphasis? There are other ways that God grows us for sure, but the primary means by which he grows us is the hearing, the understanding, and the applying of God's word.
That is how we drink this spiritual milk. Here's another passage that basically says the same thing. Colossians three sixteen. Put it up here on the screen a second. “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.”
Drink it. K? How? Teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your heart to God. If you said, hey, Steve.
Give me one verse that describes what you hope is the experience for the members and the people of Bethel Church, I would have a hard time beating that one. Why? What does it describe? A congregation and a community where the word of God is so evident, so a part of the experience that it's dwelling richly. And the fruit of that is that it produces a kind of speaking to one another that echoes the wisdom of God's word.
Our words are not slander. Our words are not malice. Our words are not intended to drag each other down. But like the word of God, they are there to build us up and to encourage us. And that we are actively doing that and employing that great means of growth with one another.
The fruit of that is joy, which sounds like singing and thanksgiving. Who would want to be a part of a church like that? Where does that come from? The word of Christ dwelling in you richly. It grows up the congregation.
It's the same thing that Peter says. Drink deeply from the word of God. It will grow you up as a person and as a church. Alright. Now here's the question.
Where does that craving come from? Where does it come from? Because we all know the natural person does not crave knowing the word of God. Many of you probably remember times in your life where, you know, you just the the Bible and people that listen to a sermon or reading some book or whatever, they'd be like, I'd rather do anything else but that. The natural man does not desire the milk of the word of God.
So where does our craving come from? Well, here's where the analogy, I think, is so helpful with infants and milk. And just to share from my own experience with this, I, as as many of you know, I I got married later in life. We had our daughter, essentially a year later. And so we were doing marriage new.
Now we're having doing parenting new. And there were a lot of things about the whole thing that we were quite nervous about, as most parents, new parents are. One of the things that we were uncertain about was the whole breastfeeding thing. Right? Like what's that going to be like?
And how does that all exactly work? And on the surface, you look at it and you say, people have been doing this for like thousands of years. How hard can it be? Well, I'm here to tell all you single men out there, there's way more to it than I even began to realize. And part of it was, I think, because we had a hard time with it.
Okay? We had a hard time with it, at least initially. And so we got this lactation nurse from the hospital that's doing coaching. And there's books you can read and tips and all this stuff. And we're trying to do it right, of course.
We're very conscientious about all this. But we we had a hard time making it all work. You know what the key to the whole thing was? It wasn't the lactation nurse. It wasn't the coaching.
It wasn't any pamphlet that we read. The key to the whole thing was that Keira Lee was hungry. If she didn't have an appetite, we could have had all the coaching and all the other that we that we wanted. Something would have been desperately wrong, wouldn't it? She was hungry.
God puts within babies this basic instinct to want mommy's milk. And to see that, observe how strong that desire is is part of what I'm saying here. I often at night and different times where, you know, and they're sort of clawing and they're wanting of milk. I would think of this verse, actually. Like newborn infants crave the pure spiritual milk of the word.
How inclined was our daughter to go, I don't know, day, two, couple weeks without any milk? Not gonna happen. Right? In fact, one of the things you have to do as a parent is you wanna get that child on a regular feeding schedule. Right?
Why? Because the regular feeding is part of what nourishes that child. If it's hit and miss, how healthy is that baby going to be? I wonder, dear friends, does the analogy apply to us as it relates to the intake of God's word in our life? What does it mean when it's hit or miss?
And what does it mean when I don't care that it's hit or miss? When I can kinda go, I'll take some of it. I'll get a little bit here. I'm good for a month. Why does the writer of Hebrews say, “do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together as some are in the manner of doing?”
What was he thinking about? There is something that happens in our life spiritually when the word of God is opened and read and proclaimed. And it goes beyond just kinda like sermons, but the personal experience of reading the Bible, studying God's word, memorizing it, meditating on it, being with other Christians, and talking about truth and talking about God, God grows us up. Why? Because as I'm doing that spiritually, I'm and I'm growing up into this salvation.
I am maturing, and I'm growing. And if there is not a desire for that, that's one sick baby. Right? And it's also a sick Christian at best. What should our gatherings be like?
If you listen if you had spiritual ears right before the service, what should it sound like as everybody's coming in? I I say that to be a little silly to bring the point home. Right? We're hungry. We're hungry.
We wanna be fed. And it's not I don't do the feeding, by the way. I'm just a person. No pastor really does the feeding. It is the spirit of God through the word of God that feeds the people of God.
And so who do we give glory to? We give glory to him. Right? He is the one that is nourishing us by his word. How important is the word of God in your life?
Is it a kind of daily experience that you're having? And if not, why not? And if you don't care, what might that indicate? Where does this craving come from? In fact, I think just if we were to be honest, for some people, you know, drinking from God's word is like an eight year old boy having to eat his peas.
Right? It's like, oh, is it almost done? I don't want to do it. I do it because I'm told I have to do it. I don't see that in this verse here.
It's not it's not a kind of duty thing. He's talking about a delighting thing, isn't he? Where does delighting in God's word come from? And this is where I think verse three is the key here, and it's kind of my epiphany in studying this passage together. Notice again, what does it say?
Crave the pure spiritual milk of the word that by it you may grow up to salvation. Verse three, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. Peter here quotes from Psalm thirty four eight, says, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.” And he draws the analogy. He says, “if you have tasted that the Lord is good.”
If you have tasted. So what is the connection then of the longing and the craving in verse two with the tasting in verse three? And what is this connection between these? And on this point, you all know the answer. You just don't realize it.
I'm going to help you realize it. And to help you, I have a couple of pictures that I want you to look at here. I'm not sure if this is effective in this service, but it definitely will be in third service today, right before lunch. But I asked the guys to say, hey, just put up some pictures of some good looking food. And that may not be your favorite there, but we all can agree chocolate covered strawberries, we're in good stead there.
Right? So maybe we'll just talk about chocolate covered strawberries a second. What is the experience of eating a chocolate covered strawberry like? Let's just walk through it a second. First of all, normally it's not sitting there in the fridge.
You come upon it, somebody surprises you with it. You go to some kind of a gathering and they have chocolate covered strawberries and all of a sudden you're like, awesome. Right? You begin to think about the chocolate covered strawberry. There's a sense of anticipation about it.
Right? And then the time comes where you actually get to eat it. And so you lift it up by the little green things on the end. I don't even know what they're called because you want to get as much strawberry and chocolate as possible. And you bring that fruit, that magical molecular combination of some chocolate bean from South America and a homegrown strawberry.
Somehow God intended South American chocolate beans to magically, molecularly combine with fruit grown in Indiana. You bring it to your mouth, and you're like, this is going be fantastic. And you take a bite. Right? And that flavor comes into your mouth.
And oh, how good it is. You sigh. You chew, which is the way that we kind of combine the flavors. And those two go together fantastic. You chew, you chew, you chew some more until every molecule of savor has been enjoyed by your taste buds.
And then we all do what? Swallow. Yes, we swallow. Some of you don't. I've seen you eat.
And then what is the next thing that happens? There is desire for more. That desire is verse two. The tasting is verse three. And the connection is this.
When I have tasted of the goodness and the beauty and the glory and the mercy and the kindness and the love of God in Christ, when I have tasted of that in salvation, there is in my heart a desire for more, more if I have genuinely tasted it. In fact, we can say this. When I taste something, the better it is, the more I want more of it. So that growing up for me, when I when my mom made liver, which to this day is my all time least favorite food, I'd rather lick Broadway than eat liver. K?
Some of you agree. When I taste liver, there is no desire that arises in my heart. But a chocolate covered strawberry or a blueberry pie or a number of other things that I'll not talk about because I don't have time. Instinctively, there is more. I don't even think about it.
I want more. I want you to see the word if there. He doesn't say because you have tasted that the Lord is good. He says, if you have tasted. And I think Peter intends that if to be a kind of arrow into the conscience of the professing Christian who thinks nothing of going weeks without the word of God.
What do we say about a child that drinks mommy's milk but then doesn't want anymore? That's a very unhealthy child. That that child is in serious trouble. What do you say about a Christian who has tasted of the goodness of God, which is the gospel? And that's all that they want.
There's no craving or desire for anymore. I say that not to unnecessarily put any kind of a guilt on anybody here, but to just to honestly ask the question. In a day and even in our church where I just see people sort of haphazard about the hearing, the understanding, and the applying of God's word and yet resting somehow very comfortably with the fact, I must be a Christian. Why? Because I prayed this prayer.
I made this profession. Okay. But in that, did you taste the goodness of God? Did you taste the love of God? Did you taste the forgiveness of God?
Because if you have tasted of those spiritual delicacies, you will want more. So this is both an encouragement and an admonition to the growing active Christian who loves the milk of the word of God and a challenge to the marginal Christian about what healthy Christianity looks like. And I wanna ask you, my dear friend I'm looking around this room here. But can I hold that up like a mirror to you and for you to look into your heart of desires and to honestly ask the question, do I want more? And if the answer to that is yes, here's a great way forward, to do all that you can to drink in the word of God, to be a person of the word.
And this goes into being in the word daily and having opportunity to talk about spiritual truth with other Christians, to milk the sermon for all that you can, Christian literature, etcetera, etcetera. It's not a sermon about those things. It is an encouragement towards those things. But it is also a challenge asking the question, do you crave it? And if there is no craving, what does it say about the tasting?
Have you tasted of the goodness of God? So look into your heart, my dear friend. Ask yourself, is there a desire for more? And might a lack of desire call you to some kind of either repentance or maybe perhaps like one of our baptizees who shared that she had kinda tried out Christianity, but now my sense of it, I don't know her story personally, but now there's been a resurgence and a desire to step forward in a new chapter. And maybe that's what God would have for you.
And wouldn't that be a wonderful thing? Taste and see that the Lord is good. He is good. He's tasty. He's succulent.
He satisfies. Let's pursue that. Amen? Amen. Amen.
I'm gonna ask you to stand with me for prayer. Heavenly Father, God, thank you for this passage and all that it teaches us. I pray that we would be a church where the word of Christ is dwelling richly amongst us. Lord, create in us a desire for more, that we might know you more, that we might love you more, that we might serve you more, that we might grow up as Christians into maturity. We thank you and pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.
* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording..
