A Taste For God

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"Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation" 1 Peter 2:2

Main Readings: 1 Peter 2 & Colossians 3

Supporting Readings: Psalm 34 & James 1

What does it mean, when someone puts a food in their mouth that they haven’t tasted before and, after chewing on it for a few seconds, swallow and say ‘that’s really good!’?

It means, doesn’t it, that they like what they just put in their mouths. It means, if you offered them another spoonful, or forkful, they would likely say, ‘yes, please!’

There are foods that some of us first tasted when we were toddlers, that we still enjoy with a ‘that’s so good’ response after 40 or 50 years!

Which is a testimony to how good we really found that food when we first tasted it. Other, foods – dare I say, sprouts – not so much.

There are foods – not sprouts – that are more or less universallyregarded as ‘good’ tasting. Chocolate is the one that springs to mind most readily.

The effect of chocolate on the taste buds is quite incredible. When chocolate is on offer, it’s hard to turn it down isn’t it?

We have tasted, and know, that chocolate is good. And that experience, which by now has been repeated many times, has such a strong influence on us, that we can find ourselves craving chocolate.

Easter is still a month away, and so this might be controversial, but I can testify that at least one easter egg has already been demolished in our house!

As we move into chapter 2 of Peter’s letter, we find him issuing us with a command in the negative.

The basis for that command is rooted in what came at the end of chapter 1. We can know that by the word ‘therefore’ at the beginning of verse 1.

And, we also find him issuing us with a command in the positive which has its basis in verse 3.

The negative command is to rid ourselves of a list of things – five in all. You can see the word ‘rid’ at the beginning of verse 1.

The positive command is to crave something – Peter calls it ‘milk’. You can see the word ‘crave’ in verse 2.

And the goal of these two commandments – which are really just two halves of one commandment, but we’ll get to that in due course – the goal is, to grow up in our salvation.

That is the same as saying, to mature in our Christian faith. It is the same as to say, ‘to travel progressively on this Christian journey’.

We began this Christian journey with infant-like faith in Jesus.

Faith that when he went to the cross, he was going there to die for us personally.

And in dying that he took up our sins on himself – receiving in himself the punishment of God that was due to us for our many sins.

We believe that God is satisfied to look on Jesus and pardon us.

And when we encountered that good news, we found that God tasted very good!

That’s how we began.

But having begun in this great salvation of God through Jesus, like small newborn children, we are called to grow up in our salvation.

That’s the goal Peter has in mind this morning – that we grow up.

So, we’re looking backwards and forwards. We’re thinking positively and negatively. We’re taking off and putting on.

We’re not standing still though. We’re moving from birth to fully fledged adulthood.

Remember what circumstances these believers find themselves in. They have come to faith in Christ in a very pagan environment.

The God of the Bible is not one of the gods the culture they grew up in - and now live in as Christians - recognises.

And in some ways, it’s not dissimilar to our own post-Christian culture today. Our culture may not have pagan gods, but it does not recognise the God of the Bible either.

The gods it recognises, it does not call gods. Nonetheless they do function as gods to the people.

We have the god of self. The god of success. The god of health. The god of comfort. The god of entertainment.

And we could go on. Our culture doesn’t call these gods, but they aregods.

These things function in the same way to them, that our God functions to us. Peter tells us what that function looks like.

He says it like this in verse 3: ‘now that you have tasted that the Lord is good’.

The people in our culture have tasted self-worth, and it tasted good to them. They have tasted entertainment, and it tasted good to them. They have tasted wealth, and it tasted good to them.

And they concluded: ‘why do we need the God of the Bible, when these gods taste so good to us?’

The Romans, just after Peter’s day, had a building in Rome called the Pantheon. You can still visit it today. It’s a circular building with stations around the perimeter, each containing a Roman God.

The people of our British culture have a pantheon of gods too. And they pursue them with worshipful intent.

Some people love television and binge it with worshipful intent.

Some people love money and pursue it with worshipful intent.

Some people love sex and lust after it with worshipful intent.

And a thousand other things besides. And in many cases – multiplethings simultaneously.

We’re not so different to the culture in which, the Christians, Peter was writing to, lived.

There was a pressure those believers were living under which threatened their real faith.

That’s what prompted Peter’s letter to them.

There is a pressure that threatens our real faith which makes Peter’s letter absolutely applicable to us today too!

I put it to you, that the pressure we face as Christians in our current culture is not that they might lock us up for our faith in Jesus. Or hound us out of town. Or beat us in the streets. That’s not it.

It was for them; it’s not for us.

The pressure we face is that the very things our culture say taste good, often are actually good.

Our culture has moved past open-access pornography. It’s moved pastwide-spread alcoholism. We’re in the age of clean living. Of healthy lifestyle.

It’s not as unthinkable, anymore, to be T-total. It’s not as acceptable, anymore, to make women into sex-objects.

Those are, objectively good things!

That’s not to say our culture embraces only good things. It has learnt to embrace other base things too.

But the latest version of our culture places a higher value on restricting behaviour that causes harm to others for example.

The problem for the Christian is that our culture now embraces a lot of God’s good gifts as wholesome and beneficial.

And then it, one by one, makes them into gods.

And that’s evil!

Our culture consistently terminates its affections on those good things.

But it never traces them through to the giver!

The pressure Christians face is the draw to regard God’s good gifts the same way the culture all around us does.

And so become idolators!

That’s a massive pressure for every Christian in Britain today.

Take the gym for example. The gym is good. It’s easy access to an exercise regime which has measurable benefits for our health (something God wants us to look after as a gift he has given us).

So, the Christian watches on as the cultural non-Christian embraces this good gift of the gym with all the fervour of a worshipper.

And the Christian feels the draw to follow suit. That’s a pressure that blinds us to seeing an evil that really resides underneath.

Take pets for example – we’re thinking of getting a cat, so I’ve got us in mind.

The cat is made by God and exhibits his creative power. It’s going to be enjoyable to sit and stroke the cat. And the kitten will be adorably cute and cuddly. It’s a good gift.

The Christian watches on as the cultural non-Christian engages with the good gift of pets from God with all the fervour of a worshipper.

And the Christian feels the draw to follow suit.

Instead of us ruling over the cat, it rules us – our thoughts, our patterns, our commitments.

So, the pressure we are under is different, maybe more subtle – maybe more dangerous – than that which Peter’s people were experiencing, but it’s no less relevant.

And Peter’s letter is therefore no less relevant to us.

I’ve carved out some time there, to remind us – as we start the second chapter – why this letter is relevant to us today.

I want for you, what Peter had in mind for his people. And that’s why we’re going to stick with the careful unpacking of Peter’s letter, week by week, as we progress through chapter 2 – just as we did in chapter 1.

I want to say something about verse 1 and then head to verse 3 and work backwards to verse 1 from there. Because I think that will make sense of Peter’s appeal to us.

Verse 1 is very much presented in the light of the end of chapter 1.

The last verses of chapter 1 were centred on deep love for one another from the heart – remember that? Love for neighbour, was the goal of those verses.

And we identified that the command to love one another deeply was necessary because of the problem of ongoing sin – something we’ll never be wholly rid of until we die.

Who we have been made by the Holy Spirit, through Jesus, and the fruit of love that goes with that new identity, sits in tension with the remaining sin in our lives.

There’s a new power to fight that residual sin, but it takes intentional application on the part of the Christian.

And that means the Christian heart is a battleground.

It’s the reason why Peter peppers his letter with commands and verbs instructing the believer to act in a certain way.

So, as we come into chapter 2, Peter reminds us of some of the sin attitudes that stand in the way of love for our neighbours. He lists five.

‘Malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander’.

Now Peter heard Jesus say something really similar to the pharisees in his own day.

Jesus said, ‘it is what comes out of a person that defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come – sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly’.

So, you can see that Jesus’ list is longer than Peter’s. And it’s not like the other words Jesus chooses are any less impactful on love for one’s neighbour.

Clearly, they are all unloving behaviours.

The Apostle Paul has similar lists. But, again, none are quite so limitedas Peter’s here.

So why does Peter go for these five?

Well, I think it is that he has, focused in his mind, The Word of God. The speech of God, if you like.

And, whilst he believes all the things Jesus listed are worthy of a Christian ridding themselves of, here he’s going to major on things that have to do with speech.

Because then he can continue to draw out how the Word of God serves this ‘ridding ourselves of various things’.

We got started with the Word, he wants to show us how we continuewith the Word.

So that’s why he chooses to list these five and leave others out – these have to do with words.

Malicious words; deceitful words; hypocritical words; envious words; slanderous words.

Let me try to paint you a church scene where these particular sins, that Peter lists, might play out.

Imagine the church recommends a younger man to lead its growing ministry. And they do so at the expense of an older man.

Both men are gifted; both are faithful. But, for reasons known the church eldership, they recommend the younger man.

Let’s imagine how that could play out in the heart and mind of this older man.

For sure, disappointment is going to be a natural response to the way things have gone.

But as the first few weeks of the new leader’s term unfold, the older man allows malicious desires to take root in his heart.

He starts to wish that the initiatives the new leader promotes will fail. Even expressing that desire to certain close friends.

Afterall, if they were to fail, it would show that the elders chose the wrong man – it should have been him all along!

Before this decision, the older man had been affectionate towards the younger man – discipling him in his younger faith. But now, love for him has been replaced with ill-will.

And, as time goes on, and the older man recounts, to people in the congregation, conversations with the eldership around future leadership opportunities.

But in those conversations, he starts to distort the contents of the discussions. Making out that certain promises or assurances were made to him that weren’t upheld when decision time came. In reality, no such promises were ever made!

In public, on Sunday mornings, the older man affirms the younger man’s leadership. But behind closed doors, to trusted individuals, he shares his real feelings about him.

And if the older man overhears anybody praising the new leader, inwardly he hates it.

In discussion with others, he compares his own performances in similar ministries, from the past, as a means of envious undermining.

And, finally, with slanderous tones, he starts to build an opposition group against the leader by assassinating his character with untruthsabout him.

That’s a hypothetical scenario – not based on anything. But it illustrates the point. All these sins that Peter wants us to put to death, if allowed to prevail, stand in the way of love.

Now Peter could have issued the command and moved on. He could have basically said, ‘this is what you must do – do whatever it takes’. And then just moved on to ‘living stones’ in verse 4.

He doesn’t do that. Rather, he has help for every single one of us, that delivers power into our hands to carry out the command he’s calling us to.

The help comes in the form of verses 2 & 3. With verse 3 forming the foundation for verse 2. So, we’re going to verse 3 next.

Back in chapter 1, verse 23, Peter majored on our ‘new birth’ which came about by the ‘living and enduring word’. That was the Word that was ‘preached’ to us, he said in verse 25.

Now, in chapter 2, here in verse 3 he says - basing what he wants usto see as a tool to help us overcome the speech sins of verse 1 – basing that tool on this, he says, ‘now that you have tasted that the Lord is good’.

Where did we taste that the Lord was good?

Well, surely it was where we encountered him. Where was that? It was in his Word. The Word that was preached to us.

The Lord tasted so good to us there, that we believed the content of the gospel, and were born again into a new and living hope.

And that’s why Peter is picking up the picture of new birth again, here in verse 2.

He uses the phrase, ‘newborn babies’. Babies who have come into being by the new birth, through the Word of God.

He says, ‘Like newborn babies crave pure spiritual milk’.

The image is of a newborn. How, no sooner is it born, than it is suckling on milk.

After it has tasted the milk for the first time, it wants that milk all the time. It can’t get enough of the milk. In other words, it craves it.

But also, the milk is necessary to create growth.

It’s a good job that babies want milk, because the milk ensuresgrowth. Any baby that doesn’t get milk is in big trouble. They are notgoing to make it!

Milk is necessary for growth!

So, what ‘spiritual milk’ does Peter have in mind?

The answer is: the Word of God again.

The New Testament writers use the word ‘milk’ four other times. And in three out of those four, the unmistakable reference is to the truth. Which is another way of saying the Word.

The fourth one refers to actual milk so we can discount that.

So, we know for sure, Peter has in mind the Word of God when speaks of ‘milk’.

Which makes sense given that everything else he’s been saying has had the Word of God at the heart of it.

In three of those other places where ‘milk’ is used, the writer is contrasting milk with solid food.

In other words, milk stands for the elementary truths of God’s word.

In all three cases it’s a criticism that the believers should, by now, have graduated on to the solid food of God’s word. Hebrews calls that solid food the ‘teaching about righteousness’.

Which they hadn’t done.

But that’s not Peter’s point here. He’s not making a comment about their spiritual maturity by using the word ‘milk’. He’s talking about nourishment.

If you have tasted that the Lord is good in the Word of God – which you have – then crave; long for; desire more of that Word!

Why would you leave off something that is not only good for you – it causes you to grow; but tastes good as well?!

Babies don’t do that! They don’t leave off their milk. They got a taste for it day one, and they crave it more and more.

God tasted good in that Word at day one. Now surely, crave more of him from that same source on day 100, or day 1000.

Really, deep down, your soul is longing to taste more of God. It really is! If only we knew and believed that to be true.

But we get caught up with the culture, like we said earlier. And we start believing that other things would satisfy the thirst in our souls, that only the God of our salvation – revealed in his Word - can satisfy.

Jeremiah said it like this, ‘My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken me [who is found in the Word, Peter says] the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns [entertainment, career, wealth, whatever] broken cisterns that can hold no water [nothing of God!]’.

That’s a massive mistake that we do not want to make!

Having tasted that the Lord is good, let us go the cistern of his Word and find more and more of him there.

Notice the spiritual milk of the Word is ‘pure’. God’s Word is holy of course.

The sins of verse 1 are unholy. They are impurities that need to be purged out, according to Peter.

So, the Word of God actually functions to reveal to us the goodness of God in his purity, and thereby, to see the horrors of impure, unholy sins that stand in the way of the love for our neighbour that Jesus called us to.

If we leave off the Word of God, we will become muddled about sin.

We will start to make peace with attitudes and behaviours - and Peter would want us to say, words - that are unholy, and at odds with the new identity God has created in us.

And at odds with the God, we tasted at the beginning and found to be so very good!

Peter can say, ‘rid yourselves of malice and deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander’ because you have a mighty tool in your hand, with which to identify and slay those sins.

The Word of God is a double-edged sword which penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart! Hebrews says.

It can be used to slay those sins. How do I know?

Because when Jesus was tempted unto such sins in the wilderness, it was with the Word of God that he countered every single temptation!

Every promise of warm friendly fuzziness that malice makes can be countered with a superior promise of God.

Every assurance of delight that deceit makes can be sliced apart with a superior assurance from God’s Word.

Every pledge of pleasure hypocrisy makes to your soul can be cleaved with a superior pledge from the mouth of the Lord.

Every guarantee of gratification envy constructs can be thrust through with a superior guarantee from the pure spiritual milk of the Word.

Every oath of indulgence slander can conjure, can be bested with the sword of God’s enduring and abiding book.

Oh, friends we leave off God Word at our peril!

What Peter calls us to do in verse 1 is a call to evidence in our lives that we really are growing up in our salvation.

The cross is not the end of the Christian journey; it’s the beginning of it. It’s our starting place.

It is as essential to our Christian existence as is being born from our mother’s womb is essential to our physical existence.

We are not meant to remain babies. We are meant to grow up in physical life. And, likewise, we are meant to grow up in our salvation.

We are meant to believe on Jesus for the forgiveness of all our sins, and we are meant to take the power he has given us in the Word of God – and by his Spirit – and destroy the misdeeds of the body. The very misdeeds we have been forgiven by Jesus!

That is growing up in our salvation!

Peter wants us to be filled with the knowledge of the will of God through all the wisdom and understanding that comes through his Word and is applied to our hearts by his Spirit.

He wants that to happen, so that we may live lives worthy of the Lord and please him in every way. Bearing fruit in every good work – such as, putting to death malice and deceit, hypocrisy and envy, and slander.

And growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might, so that we might love each other deeply from the heart.

That’s his message to us this morning!

The problem is sin. The solution is the milk of the Word.

That milk is not new to you. It was in that Word that you first encountered your soul’s deepest desire – God - in all of his goodness!

And if we continue in that Word the result will be Christian maturity.

We all need this word, brothers and sisters. And I pray this will have been a spur to you this morning.

If you can identify with any of those speech-oriented sins this pastweek – I know that I can!

Then, first of all repent of them.

Second believe on the Lord Jesus to cover them by his shed blood.

But third, know, that you need to go to the Word and encounter the God of all goodness and purity and holiness there.

And having done that, you will find real power to contend with those sins in the week that lies ahead!