Welcome to the ministry of First Reformed Church of Aberdeen, South Dakota. Our worship services are at 9 o'clock every Sunday morning. Now we join Pastor Hank Bone as he brings us God's Word. We turn our attention and our Bibles to the book of 1 Peter. We return to 1 Peter after a summer off to do our psalm series. We ended with completing 1 Peter 1. And we will enter into 1 Peter 2 this morning. But I want to begin our reading back in chapter 1, starting with verse 13. And I'm going to sort of violate the principle I'm going to preach about today. And that is, whenever you do the therefore, you've got to see what goes before it. But we're starting our reading at a therefore. But that's because we have another therefore that's ahead of this. So, therefore, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts as in your ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. Because it is written, be holy, for I am holy. And if you call on the Father who, without partiality, judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear, knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your aimless conduct, received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, who through him believe in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth, through the Spirit, in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently, with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and abides forever. Because all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of the grass. The grass withers, and its flower falls away. But the word of the Lord endures forever. Now this is the word which by the gospel was preached to you. Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, As newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Our God and our Father, as we hear your word, we pray now that you may add your blessing to the sense of your word through the proclamation of it. Cause your spirit to work upon our minds and our hearts that we may understand this infallible, inerrant word of God, which is able to save us to the uttermost in providing for us the gospel of grace through Jesus Christ. Amen. We love congregation of the Lord Jesus. As we return here back to 1 Peter after a several-month break, we take up the second chapter. In chapter 1, Peter's concern was to point to our life in Christ having been redeemed with His precious blood and through the new birth, having been regenerated by the Word of God. A key point made by Peter is that one of the marks of the Christian is a deep-seated desire to be holy. When God said, be holy for I am holy, he was laying before the believer not only a goal to strive for, but revealing the impact of the new birth upon the way your heart will now yearn for the freedom from sin, fueled by a heavenly love for God above and for one another here on earth. Pastor Peter understood the difficulties that come with being a pilgrim of the kingdom of God. He writes to those of the dispersion, those who were run out of Jerusalem. And so he invested himself in protecting the church, in leading them as a faithful shepherd. He loved the sheep, and he cared so deeply for them that he only sought their good. That is the heart of the true pastor. Peter yearned deeply for them to desire the right things in a way that every Christian should desire these things for themselves. In chapter 1, there is a beautiful blending of the things that you should do, the way you should desire them, and the intended design for the salvation of your soul. In every sense, Peter truly showed the desire to see God's grace and peace multiply to the saints. And in his expression, he connects to that deep yearning that is worked into each of us by the Spirit of Christ, God's grace and peace for the soul. The opening chapter provides several exhortations that challenge you as a believer to commit yourself to be open to instruction, to learn how to conduct your life. And in these many encouragements, the point is forcefully made that the Christian believer does the things he does because they are learned, well thought through, and consciously carried out. appeal is as much to your reason as it is to your heart. You can stand in your faith because it is based on learned experience, taught by the Holy Spirit, who pours out the love of God into your heart. That is the foundation that is laid as we enter into chapter 2, where Pastor Peter exhorts the believer that, having been born again, the Christian's practice is to reflect his profession of faith. Our three points will be the pretender, the profession, and the practice. So first, the pretender. He opens with this word, therefore. Therefore, lay aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking. As a student of the Bible, you're trained to pay attention to that word, therefore, as a marker of transition. It always points you back to what was just taught as the foundation for what will be taught going forward. In particular, what should be fresh in your mind coming into chapter two are the words of chapter one, verses 22 and 23, where he says, since you have purified your souls, Think about that for a moment. Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the spirit and sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible through the word of God, which lives and abides forever. The force of the phrase, since you have purified, points to those who have, at a particular point in time, committed themselves to the pursuit for the rest of their lives of a new and pure soul through conformity to the word of God. That's what it is to be a Christian. That's what it is to make profession of faith. Based on that commitment, as a Christian, you lay aside and cease to do those things that pollute your soul as the fruit of the work of the Holy Spirit within you. Think about Paul's words in Ephesians chapter 4, where beginning in verse 20 he says, but you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard him and have been taught by him as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off concerning your former conduct the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind. and that you put on the new man, which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness." Note how the Apostle Paul places a condition upon what he said with the word if. If indeed you have heard him and been taught by him. Peter did the same thing in verse three. If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. A key word here is tasted. In other words, if your personal experience, the idea of tasting, your personal experience matches the qualifications of one who has been born again by the Spirit of God, this is for you. The condition sets up the contrast between one's profession of faith based upon the life-changing conversion that comes with the regeneration of the soul from the one who is pretending. There are many descriptions of the pretender, the wolf in sheep's clothing, those who have slipped in unawares, false apostles, deceitful workers, hypocrites, etc. It's throughout Scripture. What are the marks of the pretender? Well, here, Peter forgoes the gross sins of paganism and idolatry. And rather, he turns his attention to marks that bring damage to the covenant community, to the church, to the body of Christ. He selects these five characteristics because they do damage to the people of God within the church context. He begins with malice, which is a feeling of hostility and strong dislike, hateful feelings. Remember that in verse 22, the mark of one who purifies their soul is a love for the brethren, back in chapter 1. A love for the brethren is a mark that you've been born again. But the pretender harbors these ill feelings of malice. Deceit is to deceive by trickery and falsehood. It is to plot harm to a brother or sister out of spite or jealousy, all the time wearing a smile on your face. You are pretending one thing while in your heart and out of sight, your intention and actions are the opposite. And hypocrisy, a hypocrite, is closely related to deceit in the sense that it is to give an impression of being one thing or doing something acceptable while in reality you are quite the opposite. This word is at the heart of the pretender. It is a word associated with an actor who takes on a role for the benefit of the audience. In church, they are quite the pious person. While away from church, they swear like a sailor. Envy or jealousy is a feeling of ill will towards someone else who you see as having some advantage that you would like to have. We saw that in the Corinthian church, right? As we think about the Corinthian church, they're divided up into little groups. We saw that a little bit when we had our Lord's Supper sermon. We speak tongues so we're better than you and we do this so we're better than you and they divided up and they had jealousy and envy running throughout their congregation. Evil speaking is what it sounds like. It is a catch-all phrase for slandering and putting down a brother or sister. Paul was concerned with this regarding the Corinthian church because it was rampant throughout. It's interesting because in our evaluating the different books of the Bible a couple weeks ago, when we came to the Corinthian church, I said, the letter of the Corinthian church is given to us so we know what not to do in church, how not to be church. And likewise, James 4.11 strictly forbids evil speaking because it is contrary to the law of God. These are all things that should have been laid aside by the Christian as marks of the ungodly. Peter says, therefore, laying aside these things. But there are those in the church that in these words Peter admonishes. They are the pretenders. If you're involved and engaged in these things, lay them aside. If you're going to profess to be a member of the church, lay them aside. To lay them aside means you have to evaluate yourself. You have to examine your heart. You have to look at yourself. Secondly, we note the profession. Verse 2 says, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby. Peter used this phrase, newborn babes, as the identifier for the true believer. Here in chapter two, Peter is going to draw your attention to who you are in your Christian identity. And interestingly, he begins with this idea of your need to see yourself as a newborn babe. In Matthew 18.3, Jesus said, assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. But the word that Jesus uses is a reference to a small child. Peter used the word that refers to the newborn, the infant, or even one unborn as John the Baptist who leapt in the womb when Jesus was present with Mary. Your starting point as a Christian is understanding that you are given new life in Christ as a beginning point, a starting point, no matter how old you are. The old man passes away. Who you once were as a child of the world is not who you are to be anymore. You have been born from above and so you must lay aside or strip off all the worldly evil of the soul. Listen to what it says in Hebrews chapter 12, in the opening two verses. Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, and he had given in chapter 11 that whole hall of faith. He says, by such a large cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." That idea of lay aside here is a picture of the runner, the distance runner, who's getting ready to start the race. And what does he do? I was a cross-country runner. You take off the sweats. You take off this. You get down. Your shoes are made out of the lightest nylon, so they're almost non-existent. There's basically a sole on your feet. You got the lightest nylon shorts, nothing baggy, nothing that'll collect sweat. You get down, in fact, in the time of Christ where they ran the marathons naked. They laid aside everything that might be a hindrance to them. And they're using this picture here in Hebrews to say everything at all that has an attachment to sin, you should strip off. The central word in this passage is found here in verse two. This is the one command word, the word desire. You are to desire. That's the command, you are to desire. And so now the question is, but what is it I'm to desire? You are to desire, you're to long for the holiness of God to be dominant in your life. The heart of the believer is to be pure before the Lord, to love the Lord as the Lord loves you. You know, we all have those instincts ingrained into us as the children of God. I want to be holy, but I'm not. I want to have that unconditional love that God has, but I struggle with that. I want to be forgiving. I struggle with that one. You know, we can kind of go down the list. But we have a desire for that, and we probably are more engaged in it than we realize because of that. But when we're not, it troubles us. This is also tied to a longing for communion with God through an investigation of the Word of God. That was the whole point at the end of chapter one. The Bible is no ordinary book, but it's the very pipeline of our relationship with our God. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. And I don't think Paul only means that initial faith. I think he means our faith grows through that. As we hear it, as we place ourselves under it, as we allow it to have its perfect work within us, we continue to grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and our faith gets stronger. The object of this desire is the pure milk of the Word. Milk here is not the basic doctrine of the Christian faith, but as John Calvin said it regarding this passage, it is a mode of living which has the savor, the flavor of the new birth when we surrender ourselves to be brought up by God. What is the milk of the Word? It's that working of the Holy Spirit within us. that drives us and changes us and transforms us so that we're no longer conformed to this world, but we're transformed by the renewing of our minds. The picture here is of the infant child dependent upon its mother for the nourishment to grow and mature. As Christians, we are in the infancy of our eternal communing with God. Even the most trained theologian has only a small beginning of understanding the glory of God. In the church, many may make a profession of faith. But true faith is not only a certain knowledge whereby I hold for truth all that God has revealed in His Word in the Bible, but also a hearty trust which is worked in me by the Holy Spirit. It takes both. There may be people who know their Bibles out here, but they don't have the Holy Spirit. They're pretenders. But a true profession really is the result of that working of the Holy Spirit, opening the Word of God, the Gospel, to us. It takes both. And as Peter unfolds his teaching, what concerns him most is that those who profess to be followers of the Lord Jesus persevere in that profession to the end in the obtaining of salvation. There's an interesting kind of caveat here in Peter's writing. So often, as we look at scriptures, that when the Holy Spirit comes and regeneration takes place, that we enter into eternal life, that salvation, we have salvation at that point. But Peter is sort of taking, and he's drawing out a different sense, in that you must labor to the end. You must pursue and seek to the end that your salvation may be realized. Rather than resting on already having salvation, he says you strive to realize the fullness of that salvation. So his focus is more on the end, on your practice. In the church, as I said, many make a profession of faith. When Peter said, if indeed you have trusted that the Lord is gracious, he expressed a genuine concern that the life of the hearer reflected the power of regeneration. At the heart of your profession of faith is a confession that you have repented of your sins and have turned to Jesus as your Lord and Savior for eternal life. And you promise to live for Christ every time you come to the Lord's Supper. All of those elements are there. You, in a sense, reaffirm those original vows. You came into the church and you made profession of faith before the congregation and you answered those questions. Yes, I believe. Yes, I believe. Yes, I believe. Will you? Yes, I will. You promised to live for Christ. Which brings us really to our third point, the practice. He says that you may grow thereby. Desire the pure milk of the word so that you may grow thereby. Implied in the laying aside of all malice is the principle that you embrace something else. You might anticipate that there would be a list of virtues that are encouraged, as Paul does in Galatians chapter 5 in the verses 22 through 25. You know that. He lists a whole list of different sins and stuff that we're to flee from. And then he says in verse 22, but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the spirit, let us also walk in the spirit. And Peter's kind of saying the same thing here. He's saying, if we profess to live in the spirit, then let us have our practice match that living in the spirit. Let our walk be in the spirit. But Peter doesn't do that. Through the imagery of the newborn baby directs your focus to total dependency upon God. This is a form of baptismal imagery where we come to God to be cleansed and purified through union with the Godhead, to have his name placed upon us. This is the infant child in the arms of the mother. And that's how we view ourselves, that we are in the arms of God and we are joined to God for our nourishment and growth. The goal in this command is to desire the pure milk of the word. And the goal is that by that we might grow. We apply ourselves to grow. Some of us are young athletes. Some of us at one time were young athletes. And you may remember. I remember when I was a kid, we didn't have all these protein drinks and stuff like that. No, I had a big jar of Skippy peanut butter, and a stack of bananas, and Nestle's Quick. And it was, right? Because I was a scrawny kid wanting to play hockey. And I had to put on weight. And I was lifting weights, and running miles, and practicing. And I burned it off as fast as I could try to put it on. We worked hard. Why? Because we wanted to grow our muscles, and we wanted to grow as athletes. And Peter's saying it's no different as a Christian, that if we want to succeed, we should have that desire, that drive, that we feed our souls with that very thing that we need to see it grow. desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby." This is not the same milk mentioned in 1 Corinthians 3 in the first two verses or in Hebrews 5.13, which was a picture of basic teaching for new believers where they were, in a sense, really not where they should have been. He said, when I should be teaching you more solid meat, I'm having to go back and teach you the rudimentary principles. Those were admonitions that they were not where they should have been. But that's not what's going on here. The pure milk in view by Peter is the drinking deeply of the pure doctrine of God's word that brings you closer in your walk with him. The pure word is contrasted to that word in the very beginning, deceit. They're like opposite words, pure versus deceit. And in that sense, what you should glean from that is that this pure milk is truth through and through. It's true altogether. There's no deception in it. As we progress through this chapter, the instruction will be intended to guide you in a better understanding of your Christian identity. It's crucial that you gaze into the mirror of God's Word to see yourself not only for who you are, but who you're supposed to be. I don't know if you've ever thought about the Bible that way, but it's talked about as being a mirror. What do you do for a mirror? What do you do with a mirror? How many of us used a mirror this morning? All of us, right? Whether it's combing our hair, brushing our teeth, whatever. We looked in the mirror. Why did we look in the mirror? To see what we looked like. We use the Bible the same way. We read the Bible and we say, how does this describe me? How do I see myself based on what it says? How am I to understand who I am? And in a sense, as the Christian, you can read the Bible and you can understand who you were, who you were before you were born again. I was that guy who had malice and envy and deceit and hypocrisy and all those kinds of things. But I've laid those aside, and now I'm striving through a deep study of the word of God to draw close unto God. to see my life changed and transformed, where hatred once prevailed, now love is there, where I was unforgiving, now I'm forgiving, where I was kind and compassionate, where I'm now kind and compassionate, in all of those very ways. We see that process, and the Bible becomes as a mirror to us, and we can also see in there what we wanna be. Right, ladies? Why do you have all those little containers on the counter in the bathroom? so you can see what you wanna be, right? The good news is that while you're never happy in this life, in the next one you will be. You don't need any of that stuff. You look in the mirror and you'll see the glory that God intends for us. The hypocrite masks and hides who they really are, but the one who is in Christ seeks the light that they might bring about spiritual change in their life. The Christian is not a pretender, but one who seeks to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. You know, just another thought. We too often allow the world to have way too much impact on how we think. We spend a lot of time on our outward looks. How much time does the Bible spend on your outward looks? Actually, the Bible, here's the time the Bible, ladies, do not have your beauty being in braided hair and embroidered, da, da, da, da, da, right, outward, but by a peaceful and contrite heart, inward beauty. And men, when you look at women, look for the true beauty, not the outward beauty. Every Christian young man needs to learn that lesson. Don't get into the trap of evaluating the opposite sex by the world's standards. And ladies, don't let yourself be evaluated by that. Understand it's not the shape of your body, but it's the purity of your heart. That's what's important. The Christian life is one where your desire as a Christian is to be conformed to the image and likeness of Jesus Christ, Romans 8.30, so that you walk worthy of your calling as a prisoner of the Lord, Ephesians 4.1. The Christian life is one of matching your practice in life with your profession of faith. If you are a part-time Christian, then you're not a Christian at all. And that's the point. The church will not simply be one aspect of who you are, but is at the core of who you are. You're not a Christian and a teacher, or a farmer, or a husband, or a wife. You are a Christian who is a teacher, or farmer, or husband, or wife. And as such, you go to the Bible and seek to conform to the way you are to be a husband or a wife accordingly. Husbands are to love their wives and give themselves for them, and wives are to be submissive to their husbands as helpers suitable for who they are. The older women are to teach the younger women how to love their husbands. We all share the same office as Christians, the office of believer. But we all have different offices according to God's design for our calling in this world. And we have to ask ourselves, who am I in Christ? Has he gifted me? Where has he placed me in this world to serve him? And when I identify that, then I say, and how am I to go about serving him in a biblical way? As we grow in our Christian understanding more and more, our desire should grow to draw near to God. I think Peter draws from the words of Psalm 34, 8 in this passage, where he says, oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who trusts in him. Oh, taste and see. Remember that word taste has that idea of experiencing, right? You don't go to see his candy and look through the cupboard and say, oh, that one tastes good and that one tastes good. No. You go to the cupboard and you go, can I have a taste of that one? Can I have a taste? You don't experience it through the glass. You experience it when it goes in the mouth, right? That's true of anything else. When we go to Costco, what's our favorite thing? Sample tables, right? I got to Costco Saturday, and I was kind of hungry. And Patty says, go hit the sample tables. We're waiting for the pizza to be done. Right? We experience it. And that's what he's saying here. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who trusts in him. I would add to that by saying, and ending with this, if you desire to live in a way that your practice reflects your profession, then live by Proverbs chapter three, five through six. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths." When we get in trouble is when we lean on our own understanding. And the way we get out of that is when we lean on God's understanding, when we acknowledge Him and we trust in Him. And we see ourselves as that infant, wholly dependable upon our God. Amen?