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Live by What Gave You Life: Craving the Pure, Word-Shaped Milk (1 Peter 2:2–3) · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome to Reformed thinking. Today we're doing a deep dive
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  into, well, a really vital few verses in first Peter chapter 2,
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  verses one to three. It's all about what sustains the
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  Christian life, the essential nourishment.
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  Yeah, it really is, and Peter lays it out with remarkable
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  precision. It's this tight connection he
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  makes between the new life God gives us, the well, the appetite
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  that shows that life is real, and then what that appetite is
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  for, which is God's word. Right.
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  Life comes from the Word, so life has to be sustained by the
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  Word. Exactly.
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  So our mission today is to trace Peter's logic here.
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  It's not just a list of ideas, it's a sequence.
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  It is a very deliberate sequence.
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  Identity first, then the preparation needed, then the
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  command itself, what the nourishment is, and finally the
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  purpose, which is growth. Identity, preparation, command,
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  nourishment, purpose. That's our road map.
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  OK, so Peter kicks things off not with telling us what to do,
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  but with who we are. He uses this phrase who started
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  Janetta Brefio, like new begotten infants.
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  Now, often when we hear infants or babies in a spiritual
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  context, we think, oh, that's a criticism like grow up.
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  Right. That's a common reaction, but
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  that's almost certainly not what Peter means here.
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  The little word hush, like or as, It's setting up an identity.
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  It's descriptive. So he's not scolding.
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  No, he's stating a fact about the believers reality.
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  He's saying look, because you are newly born and he connects
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  it straight back to chapter one, verse 23.
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  Where he just said we were born again again by the imperishable
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  seed, the word of God. Exactly.
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  The life is brand new, That word already Genoda, newly begotten.
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  It stresses that this is God's work, his initiative.
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  It's radical. So if the life comes entirely
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  from God through his word, then thinking of ourselves as
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  infants, it's actually a form of worship, like acknowledging
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  where life comes from. That's.
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  A great way to put it, It's a doxology.
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  Yeah. It confesses that our spiritual
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  life isn't self generated, it's received.
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  We're totally dependent. We're not self-made Christians.
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  We're remade. Correct.
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  And that dependence isn't a bug. It's the feature.
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  It's the fundamental reality. And Peter's choice of breffy,
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  the specific word for infants, Well, that immediately brings
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  something else to mind. The appetite.
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  Hunger. Yes.
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  What's the first sign of healthy life in a newborn?
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  They cry. They want milk.
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  Right, that hunger is the proof of life.
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  It announces itself Peter's saying that regeneration being
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  born again, it actually creates a spiritual reflex, an instinct,
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  the. Reflex towards Scripture.
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  An instinct of hunger for the very word that gave the life.
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  It's the God-given desire for the sustenance that matches the
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  new nature. OK, so that reframes the command
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  that's coming. It's not just you should read
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  your Bible, it's live out the life you've been given.
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  The cry that proves physical life becomes the pattern for
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  preserving spiritual life. And think about the implication
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  if that hunger, that reflex isn't there it.
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  Points to a problem, a spiritual health issue.
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  Yes, something's wrong with the infant, not the milk.
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  And this idea of constant dependence, it also forces us to
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  rethink what spiritual maturity looks like.
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  Yeah, let's unpack that. If we're always meant to be like
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  infants in this sense of needing the word, does maturity mean we
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  eventually, you know, move past the basics, Graduate from milk?
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  Well, Peter here suggests the opposite, actually.
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  Maturity isn't graduating from the milk, it's developing A
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  deeper, steadier, more conscious dependence on it.
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  So the same food, just a better appetite.
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  A more refined, more urgent, more consistent craving for that
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  same foundational nourishment which is the Word.
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  The posture never changes. Humility, openness, eagerness to
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  receive what God provides. We're always word takers as
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  someone put it so. This infant picture means we
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  have to reject any idea that we become spiritually
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  self-sufficient. We can't just invent our own
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  spiritual diet. Absolutely not.
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  We can't make our own menu. God provides the food that
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  corresponds to the life he gave. The second we start trying to
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  feed ourselves on other things, we contradict the very identity
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  Peter just established. OK, so identity established,
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  we're a newly born dependent needing nourishment.
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  But then Peter throws in a step before commanding us to desire
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  that nourishment. Verse one starts therefore put
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  away. That transition is key.
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  The therefore links it back to the new birth.
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  And this put away the Greek word is apothe minoy.
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  It's an imperative. It means decisively stripping
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  something off, casting it aside, a purge.
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  A purge before feeding? Why?
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  Why these specific things he lists malice, deceit, hypocrisy,
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  envy, slander. Because functionally, they are
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  appetite killers. They are spiritual sicknesses
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  that they specifically dull our taste for God's Word.
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  They sour the palate. And they seem very relational,
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  don't they? They affect how we treat each.
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  Other exactly. They corrode the very community
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  that's supposed to share this nourishment together.
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  They poison fellowship, and that inevitably poisons our reception
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  of the word that calls us to fellowship.
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  OK, let's walk through them quickly.
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  First. Malice.
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  What's that about? Malice is like a general ill
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  will. It's a subtle desire to see harm
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  come to someone, or maybe just constantly replaying old hurts,
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  holding grudges. It's a bitterness.
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  And how does that kill appetite for the word?
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  Well, how can you savor the sweetness of God's grace and
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  forgiveness in the Word if your heart is bitty, nursing
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  resentment or plotting against someone else?
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  It makes the Word taste sour. Makes sense.
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  If you resent your brother, the word telling you to love him
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  becomes, well, hard to swallow. OK, second deceit dolos.
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  Dolos is about manipulation, using masks, twisting
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  perceptions, being too faced to get what you want.
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  It undermines trust. And the connection to appetite.
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  If your whole way of operating is based on manipulating
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  reality, how can you honestly receive a word that is reality
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  spoken plainly by God? You lose the capacity for simple
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  trusting reception. Which leads right into
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  hypocrisy, yeah. Hypocrisy is basically deceit
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  applied to religion. It's putting on a show of
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  righteousness for an audience for human approval instead of
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  pursuing actual internal change driven by the Word.
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  Why does that kill appetite? Because the hypocrite is already
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  getting fed by something else human praise.
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  They're satisfied by applause, not by God's truth.
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  The Word becomes just a script for their performance, not food
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  for their soul. True dependence is impossible
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  then. Wow.
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  OK, 4th is envies. Envy is that nasty resentment
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  when you see someone else blessed, gifted, or growing
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  spiritually, you mourn their good fortune.
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  That's definitely corrosive. It really is.
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  If you're bitter about how God is working in someone else's
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  life, how can you joyfully receive the word that says all
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  good gifts come from Him, often through community?
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  Envy turns the shared feast into a 0 sum game, right?
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  And the last one slanders. Slander is weaponizing words,
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  using language, true or false, to tear down someone's
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  reputation. It's the outward expression of
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  the malice and envy inside. So if the word is God's life
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  giving speech. Slander is the devil's speech
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  used by believers. Someone addicted to slander is
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  poisoning the community's air and simply can't taste the
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  healing power of God's Word. So these five things basically
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  relational dishonesty and self focus have to go.
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  But you mentioned some word play here between dolos deceit and
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  the word for pure milk later. Yes, this is brilliant.
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  The word for pure milk in verse 2 is literally without dolos,
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  without deceit, unadulterated Peter saying put away dolos,
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  deceit in your relationships so you can crave the adelon
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  undeceitful pure milk of the word.
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  So if you tolerate fakeness in your life, you'll tolerate
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  fakeness in your doctrine. That seems to be the connection.
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  If you're OK with being deceitful, your conscience gets
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  dulled. The pure, simple truth of
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  Scripture might seem boring or insufficient because you've
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  developed a taste for mixture, for adding human spin.
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  So repentance from these sins literally clears the mouth to
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  taste the word properly. It's active preparation for
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  feeding precisely. You can't demand pure food if
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  you haven't dealt with the poison you brought to the table
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  yourself. OK, so identity is set, the
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  palate is cleansed. Now Peter gives the main command
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  in verse 2. Like newly begotten infants long
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  for the pure spiritual milk. That verb long for epiphyseate
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  sounds pretty intense. It is.
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  It's not a mild suggestion. It's an urgent command, an order
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  of the heart. It means a deep craving, A
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  yearning. Think of that newborn's
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  desperate need for milk. Peter's telling us to adopt that
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  kind of intense instinctual hunger at our default mode
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  regarding the word. So it guards against just, you
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  know, dutifully checking the box of Bible reading without any
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  real desire. Exactly.
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  It's not meant to be a purely stoic cognitive task.
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  But here's a question that comes up If we're dependent infants,
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  how can Peter command us to have a desire?
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  Isn't that like telling someone to feel happy?
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  Isn't it moralism? Yeah, that's a really important
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  question, and the answer lies right back in the context in the
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  new birth. This longing isn't something we
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  conjure up by sheer willpower. It's grace enabled obedience.
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  It's rooted in the fact that we have been begotten by the Word.
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  1.23 The logic is crucial. Because God gave you new life
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  through the Word, you now have the capacity to desire the Word,
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  and therefore you must exercise that capacity.
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  So regeneration changes our affections, our wanter.
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  It renovates the affections so they can be summoned and
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  directed rightly. God gives the new heart that can
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  desire His truth, and then He commands that heart to do the
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  desiring. It's supernatural in its source,
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  but our responsibility in its exercise.
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  So the command assumes the ability he already provided, and
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  it directs both the intensity it has to be real longing, and the
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  object it has to be for this specific milk.
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  Correct. And notice the verb is plural.
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  You all long for. This isn't just a private
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  individual thing. Right, it's for the whole
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  church. It's ecclesial.
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  It's communal. The Word is the Church's common
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  diet. While personal reading is vital,
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  Peter implies that this appetite is often best stimulated and
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  satisfied when we gather as God's people to feed together,
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  especially under the public preaching of the Word.
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  So skipping the shared meal can actually weaken our individual
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  appetite. It almost certainly will.
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  The collective hunger reinforces and shapes the individual
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  hunger. We rely on this together.
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  Peter is really specific about what we're supposed to long for.
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  The pure word shaped milk. Let's break that down first.
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  Milk. Galah.
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  Why milk? Milk here is the symbol of
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  essential basic life sustaining nourishment.
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  It's indispensable. Now we have to be careful here.
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  How so? Because in other places like
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  Hebrews 5, milk is contrasted negatively with solid food to
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  talk about immaturity. Oh right, milk for babies, meat
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  for the mature. Yes, but Peter isn't using that
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  contrast here. His focus is purely on the
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  nutritive quality. For Peter, in this context, milk
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  represents the foundational, always necessary sustenance of
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  the Christian life, the Word of God itself, including the core
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  gospel message that gave us life in the first place.
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  So we never outgrow this milk. Never.
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  The same word that creates life is the word that sustains it.
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  Maturity isn't finding a different food source, it's
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  having a better capacity to digest and appreciate the
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  richness and purity of the same food.
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  OK. Then the second descriptor, pure
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  adelon. We touched on this, linking it
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  to putting away Dolo's deceit. Adelon means unmixed,
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  unadulterated, without deceit. This is Peter insisting that our
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  spiritual diet must be Scripture as Scripture, not Scripture plus
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  human opinion, or Scripture diluted with cultural trends, or
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  Scripture season with appealing sentiments.
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  Just the pure thing itself. This sounds a lot like the
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  reformed emphasis on the sufficiency of Scripture.
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  It connects exactly. If the milk is pure and it's
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  what we need for growth into salvation, then it must be
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  sufficient. It contains everything
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  necessary, adding anything else. Human traditions suppose it new
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  revelations. Worldly wisdom is to adulterate
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  the pure milk. It implies God's provision isn't
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  quite enough. And does this purity push
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  against, say, constantly seeking new spiritual experiences
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  outside the Word? I think it it promotes a kind of
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  cessation is sobriety. Yes, the Holy Spirit grows the
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  church primarily through the established sufficient written
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  word. We don't need extra spiritual
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  flavors if the milk itself is pure and powerful.
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  Got it. Now the trickiest term, perhaps
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  logicon, often translated spiritual or maybe reasonable.
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  But you suggest word shaped. Why?
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  Well, look at the immediate context.
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  Peter just spent time reminding them they were born again
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  through the Logos, the word of God. 1.23 So when he describes
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  the milk they need is logicon the most natural connection is
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  that it's the nourished that corresponds to or shaped by the
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  logos that gave them life. So nourishment fitting the word.
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  Nourishment consistent with the word, pertaining to the word,
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  shaped by the word. It means true spirituality isn't
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  just vague feelings or even just intellectual ascent.
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  It's having our desires, thoughts, habits, worship,
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  everything patterned by God's revealed speech and scripture.
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  So it guards against both mindless emotionalism and dry
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  rationalism. Exactly.
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  It demands submission of the mind to the words truth, but
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  recognizes that this word is living and active, requiring
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  hard engagement and leading to obedience.
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  Head and heart-shaped by the Logos.
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  OK, so the nourishment is the sufficient unadulterated
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  scripture demanding whole person's submission fitting for
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  those born of the word. And Peter doesn't just command
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  this longing, he gives the reason, the purpose.
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  He uses that little Greek word Hannah, which means in order
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  that or so that. Right, long for the pure word
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  shaped milk so that by it you may grow up into salvation.
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  Let's talk about that goal. Grow up into salvation.
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  What salvation is he talking about?
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  Aren't believers already saved? Good clarification.
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  Yes, believers are justified save from wrath, but salvation
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  in first Peter often points towards the future, the final
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  completion, the eschatological consummation.
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  Think back to chapter 1, verses 5913.
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  It's about the full inheritance, the glory to be revealed.
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  So growth is movement towards that final state, maturing
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  towards glory. Exactly it's projectory and
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  Peter tells us the means the instrument for this growth on O2
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  buy it or in it referring back to the milk the word.
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  This is where God's action comes in, right?
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  The verb may grow up can imply divine agency.
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  God is the one who ultimately causes the growth that fits with
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  the monarchistic root. God alone gives life, but the
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  way He grows us, The route is through this appointed means,
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  the Word which we are commanded to actively desire and consume.
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  So God grows us, but he does it through our active use of the
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  means he provided. Precisely, the word that gave
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  birth is the word that builds. It shows the practical side of
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  Scripture sufficiency. If we want the end result growth
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  into final salvation, we have to embrace the appointed means, the
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  word. If we neglect the means.
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  We shouldn't expect the growth. It's that straightforward.
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  But Peter adds something more immediate, doesn't he?
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  An experiential confirmation, if indeed you have tasted that the
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  Lord is good. He's quoting Psalm 34.
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  Yes, this is crucial. The tasting is the spirit given
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  experience, the relish, the awareness of the goodness of God
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  Himself, which comes through engaging with His Word.
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  It's sensory language. You move from just knowing facts
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  about the Lord to experiencing His character, His sweetness,
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  His reliability. And this taste comes from the
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  word. The sequence is vital, Peter
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  says. Long for the milk so that you
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  grow if you have tasted. The implication is that the
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  longing for and feeding on the Word leads to or is confirmed by
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  this tasting of the Lord's goodness revealed in the Word.
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  So we don't chase the experience first, no.
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  We pursue the Word, the objective truth, out of
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  obedience, rooted in our new birth, and in that pursuit by
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  grace, the Spirit grants the subjective experience, the taste
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  of Christ's goodness. The experience flows from
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  Scripture, not the other way around.
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  It stops faith becoming purely feeling driven.
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  OK, so if someone is doing this, longing for the Word, tasting
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  the Lord's goodness, what does that grace practically look like
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  now? Well, Peter gives us clues right
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  here. Growth by it should mean first a
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  noticeable decrease in those sins from verse one less malice,
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  deceit, hypocrisy, envy, slander in our lives and relationships.
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  Right cleaning house continues. It also means growth in what he
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  commanded back in 1.22, sincere brotherly love.
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  It means more steadfastness when facing trials, which is a major
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  theme in First Peter, and it leads directly into what he says
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  next in verse 4, drawing near to Christ.
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  The living stone growth is concrete transformation
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  patterned by the Word. It really is a cycle.
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  Then. The word gives life, creating
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  appetite. That appetite drives us to the
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  word. Feeding on the word fosters
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  growth, and that growth includes purging the very things that
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  kill the appetite in the first place.
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  Beautifully put. It's a closed loop of divine
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  grace operating through the means God Himself appointed.
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  Our part is the Spirit enabled resolve to keep coming back to
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  the table for the food that is our life.
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  Hashtag tag. Tag out trip.
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  So looking back at first Peter 2.1, the three Peter gives us
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  this incredibly practical yet profound road map for spiritual
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  life. It all starts with the word
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  giving life, which defines us as dependent infants needing
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  nourishment. And that identity demands we
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  actively clear away the relational junk, the appetite
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  killers, so we can truly crave the nourishment.
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  Which is the word itself, pure, unadulterated, sufficient, the
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  only thing that can grow us toward our final salvation and
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  glory. Yeah, that cycle is really the
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  core identity fuels the appetite.
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  The appetite seeks the pure Word, and the Spirit uses that
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  word to grow us and make Christ himself taste sweet and feel
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  strong to us. It leaves us with a pretty
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  pointed thought for the weak, doesn't it?
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  If you find God's word tasting maybe a bit bland or unappealing
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  right now. Peter's diagnosis wouldn't be
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  that the milk is bad. No, he tell us to revisit verse
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  one to take a hard look. Is there some malice, some
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  deceit, some hypocrisy, some envy, or maybe some slander
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  lingering that's souring the taste buds?
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  What specific sin needs active repentance needs to be put away
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  this week so you can clear the palate and really savor how good
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  Lord is in His Word. Something to definitely reflect
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  on.