Read with Me
1 Peter 2:1-3 (HCSB)
So rid yourselves of all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all slander. Like newborn infants, desire the pure spiritual milk, so that you may grow by it for your salvation, since you have tasted that the Lord is good.
Listen with Me
The “so” at the start of this paragraph refers back to the reality pointed out to Peter’s readers in 1:22, that they have been born again of imperishable seed. It is on that basis that Peter urges his readers to work on their own spirituality.
The reality of being reborn, of having the Holy Spirit living and working in each of us is the basis for all the scriptural exhortations to personal holiness, here included. Peter’s urging to his readers to rid themselves of all these negative and sinful actions and attitudes is no mere self-improvement plan. It is an urging to work in the power of the Holy Spirit to consciously turn away from all evil and to actively remove those things from our lives that will drag us down and away from complete unity with Jesus.
Whereas Paul and the writer of Hebrews each chastised their readers for being so immature as to require spiritual milk instead of meat (1 Corinthians 3:2, Hebrews 5:12-14), Peter urges his readers, as a foundation for transformative action, to crave pure spiritual milk so that they can grow strong. Although the symbolism is the same, the context is different.
Paul and the writer of Hebrews were each shaming their readers for being less mature than they should have been, of continuing to live in a state a spiritual infancy instead of moving on to spiritual maturity. Peter, however, is writing in the context of the reality of the new birth. Just as the best food for a newborn, the food most fitted for them, is pure, clean mother’s milk, so the best food for born-again Christians is pure spiritual milk, formulated specifically to help them grow strong enough to handle the meat that is given to more mature Christians.
Whereas Paul and the writer of Hebrews were dealing with readers who refused to grow up, Peter was writing to Christians who seemed to have no appetite, or who only had an appetite for spiritual “junk food” that was stunting their growth. For these, he urged them to expose themselves more and more to God’s pure spiritual milk, so that they could develop a positive craving for it, so that they could begin to grow and mature properly.
Pray with Me
Father, it is interesting how the context really does change everything. We are often encouraged to sneer at those who are at the level of needing spiritual milk instead of the real meat of gospel. But milk is entirely appropriate at early stages in our spiritual life, just as it is entirely appropriate at early stages in our physical lives. And some people have been spiritually stunted because they never were given the spiritual milk they needed when they were babes in Christ, and so have aged as Christians without maturing. For those, we need to help them find the rich spiritual milk you have made available until they develop a taste for it, a positive craving, and then help them grow to maturity from there. Thank you, Lord, for this new light. Amen.