Longing Leading to Growth: Precept/Source

Driving home: And as we noted last Lord's Day, the heart of these first three verses in chapter 2 is found in the words, long for the milk that you may grow.

The common saying 'you are what you eat' is used to draw an analogy between physical health and spiritual well-being, setting the stage for the sermon's theme of spiritual nourishment.

Now most of you sitting here this morning have perhaps at one time or another heard the saying, you are what you eat. Now I don't know if that's the title of a book written by one of the pioneers in the area of health and nutrition. I couldn't track it down, but I've heard the term or the little phrase many times. I think most of you have.

1:17 - 1:40 Read in full sermon

The point: Ask yourself: How's your stomach this morning? Is it ready to receive the milk of the word unto real profit?

The analogy of a healthy digestive system is used to explain why Peter first addresses putting away sins before commanding longing for the Word; a sick system cannot profit from good food.

However, Peter knew that in the realm of the spiritual, as in the realm of the physical, if there is, if there is to be growth by nutritious ingesting of food, you must not only have a wholesome diet, but you must have a healthy digestive system. You can put the best food in the world into a man or a woman, a child, an infant, and if that individual has a sick, a sour, a malfunctioning digestive system, no amount of the increase of the wholesome food will make that person healthy. And so before Peter focuses on the imperative, long for the milk that you may grow, he isolates and identifies wha...

4:34 - 5:54 Read in full sermon

Driving home: The word duty to a true believer is not dirty. Duty equals delight.

Martin shares a personal anecdote about his wife giving hints versus direct commands, illustrating that those who love someone delight in clear instructions on how to please them, applying this to Christ's commands.

There are times when I'll say to my wife, honey, what do you want me to do? Just state it. She's trying to be gracious and tactful and she sneaks around it and makes a hint. And I say, sweetheart, do you want me to do that?

10:18 - 10:30 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin introduces the core command: 'long for the milk that you may grow.' He emphasizes that this is a gracious gospel command, and true believers delight in obeying Christ's…

An anecdote about his ambivalent response to his wife offering a Werther's candy when not truly hungry is used to contrast a casual desire with the intense, felt craving of a newborn babe.

Often on a Sunday night on the way home and my wife knows we haven't eaten since the noon meal and she'll say, well, honey, do you want a Werther's? And I may say, yeah. Or I may, no. And my response often is very ambivalent.

13:27 - 13:41 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Peter wants all of his reasons whether they are beginners or veterans in the new life to act as just newborn babes with respect to their longing to be nourished with the Word.

The example of offering caviar or prime beefsteak to a newborn babe is used to illustrate that a babe longs only for appropriate nourishment (milk), not other 'better' foods, emphasizing the specific nature of the spiritual milk.

Peter wants all of his reasons whether they are beginners or veterans in the new life to act as just newborn babes with respect to their longing to be nourished with the Word. The point of the figurative language is this, a babe longs for nothing but its mother's milk and will take nothing else. You don't flatter a babe by offering it caviar. You do the babe and its yearning for the breast no good by offering it caviar.

19:04 - 19:37 Read in full sermon

Driving home: He has been saved, he is being saved, and he shall be saved.

A story about a Salvation Army lass asking a Greek scholar 'Are you saved?' is used to illustrate the three tenses of salvation (past, present, future) and explain how believers are both saved and 'growing unto salvation'.

A lot of you don't know much or anything about Salvation Army. Some of us know a lot. My father was a Salvation Army officer when I was born and I was brought up in the Salvation Army hall. I used to fight with my other friends and peers who would get the drumstick and bang the drum when we would sing the opening hymn.

33:06 - 33:28 Read in full sermon

The point: We are solemnly responsible to cultivate and nurture a wholesome appetite for the means which under the blessing of God produce our growth.

The example of a doctor asking about appetite when a patient feels malaise is used to prompt self-examination about one's spiritual appetite when experiencing spiritual dullness.

to cultivate and nurture a wholesome appetite for the means which under the blessing of God produce our growth Peter does not say as new born babes pray that God will grow you nor does he say pray that God will give you an appetite and a hunger he says as new born babes you long and he speaks in an imperative and uses a form of the verb that is stronger than the present imperative he lays this upon him in the strongest language possible yes only God gives the increase in the development of spiritual life but in essence he says you leave God to do his work and you get about yours and yours is t...

39:24 - 40:53 Read in full sermon

The point: If your belly is full of the hogwash that comes over the television as standard fare I'm not surprised you have little appetite for the pure milk of the word.

Indiscriminate television watching (including network and public television's 'rot') is given as an example of 'hogwash' that fills the 'belly' and spoils the appetite for the pure milk of the Word.

7 says the full soul loathes a honeycomb but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet if your belly is full of the hogwash that comes over the television as standard fare I'm not surprised you have little appetite for the pure milk of the word if you are engaging in indiscriminate television watching and I'm just talking about cable I don't have it I wouldn't have it I'm not saying you're sinning if you do I'm talking about standard network television not to speak of the rotten foul stuff that comes over so called public television begging for my money when they promote homosexuality in ...

40:53 - 42:22 Read in full sermon

The point: You young people indiscriminate listening to modern music if you've got your Walkman all the time stuck in your ears you'll have no appetite for the word of God.

A quote from Dwight L. Moody, 'either sin will keep you from this book or this book will keep you from sin,' is used to emphasize the mutually exclusive nature of sin and engagement with Scripture.

Dwight L. Moody either sin will keep you from this book or this book will keep you from sin you young people indiscriminate listening to modern music if you've got your Walkman all the time stuck in your ears you'll have no appetite for the word of God how can you listen to the music of hell with its vileness and its rebellion and its utter rejection of all that is noble and upright and godly I know label me as old fashioned and over the hill but my friend as newborn babes long for the milk of the word and you won't long for it if your spiritual and mental gut are filled with that kind of rot ...

42:22 - 43:52 Read in full sermon

The point: You young people indiscriminate listening to modern music if you've got your Walkman all the time stuck in your ears you'll have no appetite for the word of God.

Indiscriminate listening to modern music, described as 'music of hell with its vileness and its rebellion,' is given as another example of something that fills the 'spiritual and mental gut' and destroys appetite for the Word.

Dwight L. Moody either sin will keep you from this book or this book will keep you from sin you young people indiscriminate listening to modern music if you've got your Walkman all the time stuck in your ears you'll have no appetite for the word of God how can you listen to the music of hell with its vileness and its rebellion and its utter rejection of all that is noble and upright and godly I know label me as old fashioned and over the hill but my friend as newborn babes long for the milk of the word and you won't long for it if your spiritual and mental gut are filled with that kind of rot ...

42:22 - 43:52 Read in full sermon

The point: You do what David said in Psalm 34:8 oh taste and see that the Lord is good.

The analogy that one can see, hear, and smell at a distance, but only 'taste' by intimate personal appropriation, is used to explain the experiential nature of 'tasting that the Lord is good' for unbelievers.

that the Lord is good many of us here know it by experience added nothing to this how do you know you ain't tasted added nothing to that well there may not be to you but don't say that to me don't say that to many here the David who said oh taste and see that the Lord is good blessed is the man who trusts in him he was the David in my mind when he said you know you can hear at a distance you can see at a distance you can even smell at a distance let a skunk get hit on the road and a half a mile away but you cannot taste at a distance you can see objects at a distance you can hear things from a...

55:45 - 57:13 Read in full sermon