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Hi, this is Pastor Tom, and I want to welcome you to our look at the second
chapter of 1 Peter, day one of our look at this second chapter. We're going to
look at verses 1 to 3 today. We started last week by talking about the fact that
God wants you to embrace the fact that you are different because you're a
follower of Jesus.

He wants you to be different. The world needs you to be different. It needs the
hope and the grace and the strength that only you can give because you're
different.

So last week we talked about the fact that in Christ we have a different hope,
we have a different faith, we have a different character. And here at the
beginning of chapter 2 we're going to see that Peter has one more thing to say
about our character. And what he talks about here is very simple instruction for
how to live the life that God planned for you.

He simply talks to you and I about what to get rid of and what to get more of in
your life. So let's look at what he has to say. First, Peter says here's what to
get rid of.

Verse 1, "Therefore rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy,
envy, and slander of every kind. " Now you might remember at the end of the last
chapter he told us that God has called us to be holy. And here he talks about
how that holiness affects the way that you relate to other people.

Five things that are not a part of your life as a follower of Jesus. Five things
to rid yourself of. Five things to take out with the trash in your life because
now you're following Jesus.

And he just goes through the list of how we now relate to people. He says no
malice, no deceit, no hypocrisy, no envy, no slander. So you don't live with a
sense of malice, a hatred towards somebody else.

You're a follower of Jesus. You don't deceive other people in your life because
Jesus didn't so why would you? You don't have hypocrisy in your life.

Jesus said not to have it. He didn't have it. So he says you're not to have it.

And no envy in your life. You don't live your life envying what others have.
You're grateful for what God has given and you don't live your life slandering
others trying to make yourself feel more important.

Now if you've been trying to live relationships in this world for more than five
minutes, you might struggle with some of those sometimes. He says rid yourself
of this because guess what? Sometimes we need to rid ourselves of these things.

They struggle their way or they slip their way into our lives. So how do I not
have those kind of attitudes in my relationships? How do I have more of a Jesus
attitude in my relationship?

Well in verse two he tells us what to get more of. In order to get rid of what
you need to get rid of, you need to get more of what you need more of in your
life. And in verses two and three here's what Peter says, like newborn babies
crave pure spiritual So that by it you may grow up in your salvation now that
you've tasted that the Lord is good.

So for you to grow, you need what Peter here calls pure spiritual milk so that
you can grow to be different. In order for you to grow to be strong, just like
you would tell a child, hey you've got to eat your vegetables if you're going to
grow up and have strong muscles and bones. God says to us here, you have to
crave pure spiritual milk if you're going to grow up to be able to rid yourself
of malice and hypocrisy and envy and all these things that can destroy you and
your relationships.

God means for you to grow to be different. In fact he says here, you've tasted,
you've seen that the Lord is good. You've had a little taste sometimes of the
goodness of God and how much he wants you to be different.

So that taste causes you to want to be even more and more different. It's like
you go to some ice cream shop in some city you've never been in and you taste
the best ice cream you've ever tasted in your life. Immediately you're on the
web finding out, is this ice cream shop in my town because I tasted it.

I saw that it was good. I want more of it. Well that desire that you have to not
have hypocrisy in your life instead to have love, that's because you've tasted
and you've seen that God is good.

But for you to grow to become more and more like Jesus, you've got to have God's
word in your life. You don't grow automatically. You grow based on God's word.

Crave pure spiritual milk. Again and again in the Bible, the scriptures talk
about God's word as being the spiritual food that you need. Even in the Old
Testament, Jeremiah 15-16, "When your words came, I ate them and they were my
joy and my heart's delight, for I bear your name, O Lord God Almighty.

" Now Jeremiah, if you read the book closely, he actually did eat the scroll
upon which God had told him to write the words. He had this really high fiber
breakfast, no doubt about it, and God's not telling us all to take it as
literally as Jeremiah was called to do as a prophet. He was called to do that as
an example to us.

That when you take God's word into your life, it comes into all that you are. It
affects all that you are. God wanted to make a point that when I take God's word
in, they become my joy.

They become my heart's delight. In Matthew 4-4, Jesus talks about God's word
being the food we need. He said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live on bread
alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

'" So Jesus compares God's word to the daily bread that you need. The spiritual
nutrition that you need is in God's word. Any time that God's word is taught or
preached or read or you study it or you read it, then you are fed by God's word.

If you're in a church where the Bible is taught, you're being faithfully fed.
That's the food that you need. Sometimes you'll hear people say this statement,
"Well, that preaching, it's not feeding me.

" Well, that's inevitable if the Bible isn't being taught in a church. But when
the word is being taught, you are being fed because the food is in the word. If
the word is shared faithfully, you're getting the food.

You've got to be careful of the trap of thinking, "That doesn't feed me," when
the real issue is simply that the word is being taught in a different style than
you're used to. Sometimes believers get a taste of God's word being presented in
a certain style. And so when they hear it being taught in a different style,
they think, "Well, I can't learn from that.

" I mean, maybe you're used to a paper plate teaching of the word of God. And
you find yourself in a church that's serving it on fine china. And you think,
"Well, that's not feeding me.

" Is the word being taught? That is the question. Now, you may be thinking what
a lot of believers think, and that is I'd like to be fed from God's word, but
the truth is I just can't seem to understand it.

I mean, even when it's preached or when I read it, look with me again at 1 Peter
2. 2. Crave pure spiritual milk.

I love that picture because the picture of milk is the kind of food that even
new believers, the kind of food that a baby would drink, so the kind of food
that even new believers can benefit from. If you're having a hard time
understanding the Bible as you begin reading it, and who doesn't as they begin
reading it, here's what you do. You find the simple and the clear truths that
you do understand in the Bible, and you start to live on them.

You don't get caught up in what you don't understand as yet. You just live out
what you do understand. So God says get rid of malice and deceit.

Don't be a hypocrite. Don't have envy. Don't slander other people.

God says love your neighbor. Think about good and pure things. These are truths
that anybody can understand, and you can begin to live those right now.

As you drink those in, as you start to live those in your life, you'll find
yourself growing stronger and stronger and understanding more and more. Do not
fall into the trap of thinking I'm not going to live the clear truth that I see
until I understand everything. That would be like a baby saying I'm not going to
drink this milk unless you first give me that steak.

They're not ready for the steak yet. First you drink the milk, and then you grow
to be more and more. And the truth is, no matter how old you are as a Christian,
there are still some simple truths that you've got to learn in your life to grow
into the deeper truths of God.

Frankly, I still have a difficult time understanding some of the truths in the
Bible, but I'm not going to let that keep me from the blessing of living out
what I do know. Now when we talk about being fed by God's Word, this pure
spiritual milk that you need, we're not just talking about other people feeding
you. Yes, you do need to listen to Bible studies and sermons, but you also need
to learn to feed yourself.

That's part of growing. Babies cannot feed themselves, but as they grow they
learn to feed themselves, and then they learn to cook for themselves, and
eventually they start cooking for others. And that same process needs to happen
in your life as you grow.

Others feed you, and then you start feeding yourself, and then you start feeding
others. Crave pure spiritual milk so that by it you might grow up in respect to
your salvation. You might grow into being all that God has called you to be in
Jesus Christ.

That's the power of God's Word. That's why I'm glad you're a part of drive-time
devotions, because each day we're talking together about God's Word and how His
Word can transform our lives. Let's pray right now, just thanking God for His
Word.

We are grateful that you have given us your Word, this gift, this milk and this
meat that we need in our lives so that we can live out the life that you called
us to live. Please, Lord, keep us from the temptation of trying to live life on
our own power and instead help us to see that the power, the strength comes from
you. And the milk we need, the food we need is from your Word.

And so we look to your Word right now. We ask that your Word would help us even
this week as we study it to learn how to be the man, the woman of God that we
want to be, that you called us to be. We have tasted, we've seen that you're a
good God.

We want to live that good life that you have for us. We want to show the
goodness of God through our lives so others can get to know you. And so we ask
for this.

We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Join us tomorrow.

We're going to talk together about how God builds our faith together.