The Living and Abiding Word of God

Transcript

GRM 544
11/09/1997
The Living and Abiding Word of God
1 Peter 1:22-2:3
Gil Rugh

In our regular Sunday morning studies we are studying the book of Colossians, and as we move through Colossians, verse by verse, phrase by phrase, word by word, in our normal study, we come to Colossians 3:18, which says: Wives, be submissive to your husbands and I decided I need an extra week to get my courage up to preach that. So we're going to be in the book of 1 Peter this morning. You thought I was kidding, didn't you?

We are going to 1 Peter this morning. I want to talk about a subject that I will pick up in our banquet this evening as well. So turn in your Bibles to 1 Peter, toward the back of your New Testament. A book that we studied together a few years ago on Sunday morning. Peter opened up this letter in chapter 1 by unfolding the salvation that God has provided for us in Christ. And at the end of verse 1, he reminded us that our salvation was the result of the sovereign work of God. We are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God, and we talked about this matter in our previous study in Colossians - the election of God, based on the foreknowledge of God. Verse 3 of 1 Peter chapter 1 says that God has caused us to be born again according to His great mercy, that God is sovereign in salvation. Because He is a God of mercy, He has worked in our hearts and caused us to be born again. Not only is the Father involved in this wonder of salvation, but in verses 6 to 9 he talked about the work of the Son and our anticipation of the coming again of Jesus Christ, to bring to completion the salvation that He has provided in Jesus Christ's death and resurrection. In verses 10 to 12 he talked about the work of the Holy Spirit as the revealer of this salvation. So in these first 12 verses of chapter 1, Peter talked about the work of the Father, the work of the Son, and the work of the Holy Spirit, the triune God involved in our salvation.

Then with verse 13 he says how this salvation is to impact the way we live, which is what we call the doctrine of sanctification, living lives separate from the world and sin, in service to the God who has saved us. He gives a series of commands. In verse 13 he said: “fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” You may have these marked from back when we studied 1 Peter. "Fix your hope" is a command. Down in verse 15 he commanded them: “be holy.” “Be holy.” The reason being the God who has redeemed us is holy and we partake of His holiness as His children. In verse 17 he gave a third command: “conduct yourselves” - in the middle of verse 17 – “conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay upon earth,” dealing with the way that we live our lives, to be a reflection of His work because we “have been redeemed,” verses 18 and 19, “not with perishable things, like silver and gold, things that you inherit from your parents. But we were redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, who is the Lamb of God.”


Now as you come to the end of chapter 1, beginning with verse 22, he really reviews in effect what he has said about salvation in verses 22 to 25. And then in chapter 2, verses 1 to 3, he summarizes what he has said about sanctification. He's going to draw our attention to the fact that both our salvation and our sanctification center in the truth that God has revealed, and there is no salvation apart from God's truth, there is no sanctification or growth as God's people apart from the truth of God. This is a re-occurring theme in the Word of God. It's a re-occurring theme in the ministry here, and it's one of my favorite topics. The truth of God is the focus and focal point of the life of the believer and the ministry of the church. It's one I return to again and again because I need the reminder that if I drift or stray from faithfulness in commitment to God's truth and the ministry of truth, nothing of eternal significance will be accomplished in my ministry. People will not truly be born again, and God's people will become stunted and shriveled in their growth. Now that being the case, you don't have to be a theological genius to know where Satan will attack if he wants to thwart and hinder the work of God in the world today. God's work in the world focuses in His Word, both for salvation of the lost and maturing of His people. So if Satan wants to hinder the work of God, he will attack the Word of God, in subtle, indirect ways, but ways that will nullify its effectiveness.

Let's look into these verses together, beginning with verse 22: “Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart.” And the command in this section is: “fervently love.” This section overlaps what we've been studying in our regular studies in Colossians chapter 3. So certain things we will not repeat. But this command to “fervently love” is an outgrowth, an outflow of the work that God has done for us in salvation. So the command to love is based upon the fact that you have experienced God's salvation. The salvation that I have talked about in the first part of this letter, the salvation that comes through the redemption which is in the blood of Christ, His death on your behalf. So he says, since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls. Obedience to the truth is key to the salvation. That's another way of expressing the fact that you have trusted in Jesus Christ. To obey the truth is to respond, in this context, to faith, or in faith, to the work that Jesus Christ has done. In John's Gospel, chapter 3, verse 36, and you may want to turn there, John 3:36, Jesus said, John writes: “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. You see, the idea, if you believe in the Son, you have life.” If you don't obey the Son, you don't have life. You see, faith and obedience - we're saying the same thing. To obey the Son is to believe in Him and continue to trust Him or continue to obey Him. Those who don't believe in Christ or obey Christ or obey the truth, because the Word of God is the message concerning Christ. That's the dividing line between those who have eternal life and those who don't. It has nothing to do with are these people better than these people? No, for “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” So we're all lumped together by the sovereign God in declaring that all of us, every one individually, are sinners. And God has graciously provided a salvation that is offered as a “free gift” to all mankind. Some turn from their sin and believe in the Savior; others don't. That's the dividing line between those who have life and those who do not.


So when you come back to 1 Peter, chapter 1: “Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls.” “The truth” refers to what he will later call, at the end of verse 23, “the living and abiding Word of God.” It's the truth concerning Christ; it's the Gospel. It's what God has spoken to us, which is now our Bible. “Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls.” You know, to understand what God is doing in salvation in Christ, you must understand something about our lost condition. We are defiled within. To purify the soul means you cleanse the soul. You cleanse me in my very being, in my inner person, in my heart, as he will talk about at the end of verse 22, what has happened in our hearts. Jeremiah chapter 17, in verse 9 says “the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked above all things.” God says the problem with humanity is we are rotten at the core. We are sinners at heart, and we reflect our defiled condition by our behavior. Now in Christ, God has provided a way for us to be purified, for us to be cleansed, for us to be made clean within. Jesus said in John's Gospel in addressing His disciples in John 15:3 “You are clean through the word which I have spoken to you.” He didn't say, you are clean because you're Jews, you are clean because you have done the best you can. He says, you're clean through the word which I have spoken to you. That's why Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 1, verse 18, gave the invitation "Come now, and let us reason together," Says the Lord, "Though your sins are as scarlet, They shall be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They will be like wool." As God looks at us, He sees us completely and brilliantly - if I can use that word - defiled by our sin. It's glaring. But He says, I will take you and I will wash you clean. I will cleanse you. I will purify you. What do I have to do? I have to believe the truth. Well, we might be like Pilate and say, what is truth? Well, Jesus said, in His prayer to His heavenly Father in John 17, Your word is truth. Concerning Himself in John 14, Jesus said, I am the truth. Truth centers in the person of Christ and the revelation that God has given of His character as the Scripture.

“You have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren.” When God changes us on the inside, when he purifies us, he makes us new. The analogy in verse 3 of chapter 1 was “He caused us to be born again.” Saying the same thing as purifying our souls. One way to look at it is, we “have been born again.” We're starting over, so to speak. We are being made something completely new. “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, a new creation”, Paul said in 2 Corinthians chapter 5. “Old things have passed away; behold, new things have come.” We have purified our souls. I'm a new person. I'm not the old me. The result of that is, I am to have a sincere, unhypocritical love for other believers. We get the word philadelphia from this; in fact, the form of the word here is philadelphian. We just carried it over - brotherly love. Refers to family love, as it's used in the Bible. Love of family members. There is a reciprocalness to this love, an interaction in this love. We've been saved so that we might be part of God's family and have a relationship with one another and love one another, so He commands us “fervently love one another from the heart.” There he uses a different word for love. This is the word agape, or agapao. It's a self-sacrificing love. Since God has purified us so that we might be members of His family and have a family love for one another, then you have an intense, fervent love, self-sacrificing love for one another from the heart. We've been purified within. I'm not going to elaborate on this love because we just recently talked about it in our studies in Colossians chapter 3, that it is an expression of the love that God has produced in our heart. “By this shall all men know you're My disciples, if you have love for one another.”


Now he repeats in verse 23 what he's been saying. “You have in obedience to the truth purified your souls. Therefore, fervently love one another, for you have been born again.” You've been born again. You've purified your souls. These are two parallel statements. "Purified your souls" in verse 22 is a perfect participle. Perfect tense means something that happened in the past and the results continue into the present. It denotes something of permanence, endurance. You have been purified. That happened when you trusted Christ. The result is today you are purified before God because of the work of Christ. Well, "you have been born" again in verse 23 is also a perfect participle. Saying the same thing. You were born again. When? When you trusted Christ, with the result being today you are a born-again person. You are a child of God. So to say you've “purified your heart” is to say the same thing as you've “been born again”. Saying in different ways that God has saved you by cleansing you from your sin and making you new. You have been born again.

I'm going to develop this analogy of birth, and it's going to carry into chapter 2. You are born again. How? “Not of seed which is perishable, but imperishable, that is through the living and abiding Word of God.” The picture here, remember 1 Peter 1:3. God the Father has caused us to be born again. And in this spiritual birth, God is the Father; His Word, the truth, is the seed; and God has ordained that we be born again by the seed of the Word of God. How does that happen? You hear the truth of God concerning your sin and concerning Jesus Christ as the Savior, and by God's grace, you believe it, and when you do, you are born again. You are purified in your soul and in your heart. Now the contrast here - you are born again not of seed which is perishable. Look up in verse 18, “knowing you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver and gold,” things you could get from your physical parents, “but you are born again with the precious blood of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” Same contrast - you're “not redeemed with perishable things; you've been born again not of a seed which is perishable.” You see, Peter is writing to Jews, Jews who have made a profession of faith in Christ, and the Jews thought because they were physical descendants of Abraham, they were saved.

In John chapter 8, when Jesus had a debate with the Jewish religious leaders, they claimed that they were saved. We have Abraham as our father. We are not born of fornication. We are true physical descendants of Abraham. That means God is our Father. Wrong, because a physical relationship does not provide a spiritual relationship. That is an ongoing problem. It's a struggle for us as a church, as well as others. We have to remind ourselves. We're raising second and third generations in this church. Just because your kids have been in this church since they were born into your family does not mean they have a spiritual relationship with God. But in our hearts and minds even we as Christians want to have that confidence they're saved. I have to remind myself, they have to get saved the same way I did. They have to, by God's grace, come to understand and believe the gospel for themselves. They are just as lost as the kids born in families to parents who never darkened the door of a church. They have an advantage to be raised in an environment where they will hear the truth, where they will see the truth lived out, where they will be encouraged to believe. Hopefully, they'll be raised in an environment in a Christian home where they'll be like Timothy, “where from a child you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise to salvation.” But the children who are raised in this church will have to be saved the same way everyone else is saved. There is no salvation by physical association. They'll have to come to believe the truth; they will have to be born again, “not of seed which is perishable, but imperishable, through the living and abiding Word of God.”

James chapter 1, verse 18 says that in the exercise of His will, God's will, He brought us forth by the word of truth. This is a tremendous statement. We are born again by the truth of God. What God uses, the means God uses, is His truth. I was reading in interview, comments from an interview by a well-known evangelical leader who made the statement - he believed that people who were sincere in their hearts but had never heard the Word of God would be saved because they had a desire in their heart to respond to God. I couldn't believe he would say such a thing. There is no one born again apart from the seed of the Word of God. No one. Nowhere. People always say, well, couldn't God do it if He wanted? No. He could not do it because He doesn't want to. How do I know? He said so in His Word. I mean, His Word has revealed His will. To be born again you must be born again by the living and abiding Word of God. The Word of God is living. It has life. It is life-giving. Jesus said in John chapter 6, verse 63, the words that I speak to you are spirit and are life. This book is alive. Hebrews 4:12, the Word of God is alive and powerful. I have to remind myself of that, that the Word of God is alive. It has life in it. It can bring about life for those who hear and believe. That's why Paul said in Romans chapter 1, verse 16, “I am not ashamed of the gospel”, which is the Word of God concerning Christ, “for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.” So this is a living word; it is alive. It is abiding. It is enduring. It is permanent. Jesus said, “heaven and earth shall pass away, My words shall not pass away”, in Matthew chapter 24, verse 35.

Understand, what we are doing of permanent and eternal value as a church, is not building a nice building, is not creating a nice environment. Nothing wrong with those things. But you know, if Jesus Christ does not come in a thousand years, this building will be gone. Who knows what this site will be? What we are doing of eternal value and importance and significance is we are giving forth the Word of God, and it is enduring. Heaven and earth will pass away. God's Word will stand true for all eternity. That's why the church is to be “the pillar and support of the truth”, 1 Timothy 3:15. We are raised up to do something of eternal importance and significance. The travesty and tragedy taking place in the church today, I'm talking about the evangelical church, is we think that we have come up with a better idea, replacing the truth with methodology. And we have developed methods that bring a response and the result is people who are making decisions and their faith is in our methods, not in the message. Paul said he could not and would not do such a thing. He said when he came to Corinth, he didn't come with the wisdom of the world because he did not want their faith to be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. So we give forth the Word of God, so that by God's grace, people might respond to truth and experience salvation. One commentator put it this way “The implications”, I'm commenting on this statement, “the implications for evangelism are obvious. Ultimately, it is neither our arguments, nor our life example, that will bring new life to an unbeliever, but the powerful words of God Himself, words which we still have preserved today in Scripture. It is in reading or hearing these words that people are given new life.” There is no salvation in any other way or any other place. Just as we proclaim, “there is salvation in no other name, for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.” So, you understand that's the truth of God. Unless the seed of God's Word falls on the heart, there can be no salvation. We can move people to decision, but no true eternal salvation occurs apart from the impact of the living and enduring Word of God. The contrast is drawn, verse 24, using a quote from Isaiah chapter 40, verse 6 and verse 8, “For, all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord abides forever.” All flesh, all humanity, in a general and broad way, can be compared to grass and the glory of the flower of the field. What happens? He doesn't deny there's, that there's a certain glory associated with certain human endeavors. Human beings design buildings or accomplish things, and say, that's beautiful, and it is, but that's a beauty of a transitory nature. We now watch films or read books about what, the beautiful monuments of a few millenniums ago. We say, who would have thought, when they built the magnificence of this structure, that someday people would be looking at it as a ruin? And that's its value. Its only value is its archaeological value because it's uninhabitable. It is a ruin. That's the transitory glory of man, “but the word of the Lord abides forever.” The word of the Lord is eternal. Why should we give up what is eternal to replace it with what is beautiful and appealing to people in this moment of time, this moment of time? Could we make our services more appealing, more popular, more attractive? I believe we could. Could we do anything of eternal duration other than give forth the eternal word of God? No. How tragic that the church would give up what it alone can do to replace it with the transitory glory that the world offers.

“And this is the word which was preached to you.” Same thing he said up in verse 12, that this was the gospel announced to you through human messengers by the Holy Spirit. Remarkable. The same word. Do you realize, there is nothing different? If Jesus Christ Himself would descend and stand on this platform and speak, it would be no more the eternal truth of God than what we have in this book. And you don't even need a red-letter edition because it's all God's Word from Genesis 1:1 to the end of Revelation. It's wonderful. I have to remind myself, this is the Word. I'm going to prepare a sermon. I have an opportunity to speak. Give truth. Give truth. Give truth. That's eternal. In a hundred billion years, that will be lasting, whether they thought you were good, or you weren't good. Whether they enjoyed you or didn't enjoy you. That's passing, but if I give you truth, that will endure for eternity. Would the church want to do anything else but give forth truth, give forth truth, give forth truth? That's all that counts for time and eternity.

Now that focused more on our salvation, reminding us how we're saved. We have to be careful. I studied in the '70s in the church growth movement, in a program on the west coast. And they had developed methodology that could assure a growing crowd regardless of what was preached. I said, well, if we do that, how will we know whether their faith rests in the wisdom of men or in the power of God? We know that you can get crowds. Some of us have spent part of this weekend watching crowds. Wonderful. Fun. But that's not what the ministry of the church is all about. Get a crowd. The ministry of the church is to give forth truth. And God, by His grace, transforms lives with the truth. Be careful about helping God out. Wrong methods corrupt the message. We are called to preach and teach truth. We say, oh, we change the methods, we don't change the message. But they fail to understand in changing the methods, they have changed the message. Truth has to be given forth.

What about the growth of believers? We move into chapter 2. Not only is truth everything for salvation and salvation never occurs outside the context of the giving forth of truth. So true growth for God's people never occurs outside the context of the ministry of the pure, unadulterated Word of God. So you have chapter 2 of 1 Peter: Therefore, putting aside all malice, all guile, hypocrisy, envy, and all slander, like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word, that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord. The key command in these three verses is "long for" in verse 2, long for as newborn babes, long for. And everything is arranged around that command. “Long for”. Putting aside these things “if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord.” We won't elaborate on the things that are to be put aside because that parallels what we talked about in a recent study in Colossians chapter 3, where the characteristics of what we were before God's salvation, those things are to be put off like old clothes, discarded, the sins of the old person that I was before I was born again, what I was before I was purified in my soul. Put aside that behavior, that conduct, malice, guile, hypocrisy, envy, slander. I have a totally re-oriented life now. The focus is on my God, who is now my heavenly Father, and His person, His character, what He has revealed of Himself for me. I am to long for Him, for the revelation I have of Him. Now when he gives the command to long for, it's in the context, still the analogy, the seed that causes the new birth is the Word of God. Now I'm to be like a newborn babe, verse 2. He's not saying they are immature or they're new believers. He's drawing a comparison. Like a newborn baby has an intense craving for milk, so you ought to have that same intense craving for God's truth as His people. That word "long for" is a strong word. It's a strong command, aorist imperative, and the word itself is a strong word, it means to long for something greatly, to crave it. You know, just like a baby. That baby is born, he's put to suckle and what? The appetite for that milk is there and he wants more and he wants more and the coming weeks and months, what? That desire for the milk and the craving for it is expressed clearly. That’s part of having been born into the human family. So it is, we've been “born again by the living and abiding word of God”, now we have a longing for what we have tasted as he'll say in verse 3. “Like newborn babes, long for.” The psalmist wrote in Psalm 42, “as the deer longs for the water brooks, so my soul longs for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.” It's a kind of longing that now comes from my heart, from my soul for the milk of the word. It's the spiritual milk we're talking about, which is the Word of God. I am to have a longing for it, but you note here key word, the pure milk, and that word pure means unadulterated, unmixed. For true growth to occur in our lives as the redeemed of God, we must feed upon God's Word in its purity, unmixed with other things, unadulterated. We do that so we may grow in respect to salvation.

For the Word of God to be effective in producing growth in the life of a believer, it must be unmixed. Now we understand this when we talk about salvation. Paul wrote to the Galatians, and in Galatians chapter 1, he said if anyone adds anything to the pure message of salvation by grace through faith in the finished work of Christ, that person is under a curse, even if it's an angelic being. If you corrupt that message, if you believe a corrupted message, you are not saved, is the substance of what he writes to the Galatians. Do you understand the same thing happens for our growth? For the Roman Catholics, for example, I use them, because of the clarity of the example, I could use the Mormons, could use Jehovah's Witnesses. They all what? Give forth the Word of God. You hear them quote Bible verses, but people don't get saved. People don't grow. You know why? Because that Word has been adulterated. It has been mixed with human ideas, and it cancels the power. It destroys the life of the Word. How many Jehovah's Witnesses have come to the door, but no one ever gets saved with their message because it's an adulterated message. They quote many Bible verses, but it is a word adulterated. Its power is cancelled. There is no life left.

I say that because the church has lost its focus. We think it's fine, as long as we include the Bible. I was devastated a few years ago when we got into a conflict as a church over whether the Bible should be integrated with psychological ideas. I got into that whole battle with my eyes closed. I told Marilyn, this is not going to be an issue. All I'm going to have to do is clarify that what these people are saying in their own writings is they want to integrate, mix something with the Bible, and it'll be a non-issue for Indian Hills people. It wasn't a non-issue. Everything gets blurred. I read those writings years later, down to today and they're still saying the same thing. All truth is God's truth, so we take truth wherever we find it and we integrate it with God's Word, which means we have adulterated the Word of God. It is a subtle work of the devil to nullify the power and life of the Word of God.

It doesn't matter that people have good intentions in doing it. It doesn't matter if someone mixes some lethal poison with the baby's formula, but they had good intentions. They thought it was vitamins. It's still lethal. People say, well, don't you think their intentions are good? I don't care. I can't see their heart. What do I look like? I'm not God. I'm responsible for the purity of the message that God has entrusted to my care. Jeremiah 17:10 says, I, the Lord, search the heart. I try the mind; I know the motives. I don't know. Paul says, I don't, he says, he didn't even know his own motives, let alone other peoples'. And he couldn't understand how people kept telling him what his motives were. So we want to stay clear here. The evangelical church is devastated today because we have a little portion of the Word mixed in with all kind of other ideas and trappings and messages. And then we give it forth and supposedly we are seeing wonderful results. But you understand, if you're going to grow in respect to your salvation, you need the pure, unadulterated milk of the Word.

Does that mean every one of my interpretations is the right one? No. It means this Word is pure. My goal with this Word, and the intention I have as I study it is to understand it as it's been given and give it to you with nothing else. It wouldn't be more effective and more helpful if I mix some of the ideas we have found about human development with it so it would be more effective in your life. The Word of God itself is enough. Now I believe that as a doctrine. Do we practice it as a church? If you're going to grow, if the church is going to grow, if God's people are going to grow, they need to feed upon the pure, unadulterated milk of the Word that they might grow.

2 Timothy 3:16, All Scripture is God-breathed. Now it doesn't say all truth, wherever you find it. All Scripture, the truth, which is God's Word, is God-breathed and profitable. Skip to verse 17 of 2 Timothy 3, “in order that the man of God may be perfect, equipped for every good deed.” When it comes to salvation, when it comes to sanctification, the Word of God is what you need, the Word of God is all you need. You say, what about the functioning of the spiritual gifts in the context of the body? What enables that to be effective? The ministry of truth. But the exercising of our gifts takes place in the context of truth. Do you know what the devil does? He sucks the Word of God out of the church, and the church continues to function and be busier than ever and doing more than ever. The only thing that's missing is the power of God in the life-giving Word. Like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the Word, that by it you may grow with respect to your salvation. Jeremiah 15:16, “Your words were found, and I ate them, and Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart; for I am called by Your name, O Lord God of hosts.”

And that leads to verse 3, “if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord.” I mean, if you've tasted the kindness of the Lord, you had that sample, when? If you've tasted the kindness of the Lord, you experienced Him, you sampled Him, you tasted Him in your salvation when you believed in Christ. Now the result of that if that was a true tasting of the Lord was what, a developed appetite like that newborn baby, put to suckle and what, develops the appetite, so in salvation you have come to taste of the Lord and His kindness. What happens? I want more of Him, more of Him. I long for Him. His Word becomes my food, the delight of my life. Now, a moment of honesty. I don't wake up every morning saying, I just can't wait to get into the Word. Quite frankly, some mornings I get up and I open the Word and say, you know, I just don't feel like it. And I'll read a few verses and you know, I'll say, I might as well be reading the morning newspaper. It's not doing anything for me. Well, you know, some people who come to Indian Hills can't understand why we've got to spend all this time studying the Bible. I've heard it before. Some people left the church and they said I got tired of hearing Gil repeat himself. Well, it's not my fault. You know, God can say things as many times as He wants.

First question, have I tasted of the Lord? Really. Maybe I have no appetite for the Lord because I've never really tasted of Him. I'm like that stuffed bear that's in the nursery there, or that little doll that's all dressed up in matching clothes to the baby, except the doll doesn't have any life, the baby does. The doll has no appetite for the milk, but the baby does. Some of us are all dressed up, sitting in the same auditorium, in the same room with the milk. Some have an appetite for it, and some don't. I have to say, have I tasted of the kindness of the Lord in salvation? Has my soul been purified? Have I been born again? Well, if I'm not a child of God, I don't have a desire for the milk of God, His Word.

I may be a child of God and have some things in my life that are hindering healthy growth. Those are the things of verse 1 of chapter 2, that have to be put aside. Like your baby, and you know, you say started out eating well but now has no desire for the milk. I can't make him eat. He won't eat anything. What do you want to do? You want to take him to the doctor. Something's wrong. You just can't let that go on. You say, well, it's still a baby. It does a lot of things. Moves its hands, cries, opens its eyes, closes its eyes, so it doesn't matter whether it eats or not. It matters greatly. Something's wrong if it won't eat. So I need to look at my life and say, well, I know I've tasted the kindness of the Lord. I've experienced his salvation, but I just don't have the same appetite for the Word. Well, have I allowed things to come into my life, some things that others don't see like envy, hypocrisy, as well as other sins. You know what they do? They're like a disease that comes into the body. They begin to dull my appetite. What happens when you get into sin? You sin on Saturday. The first thing you want to do is get to church and study the Bible on Sunday morning? Not likely. You feel like I've got more limbs to clean up in my yard this morning. I better do that. I don't feel like going to Bible study on Thursday night, you know, those Christians are alright, but you know, they have their own problems. Pretty soon, what? I'm trying to find ways to put distance between myself and the Word of God and the people of God. That's a sign something's wrong. I need to be honest before the Lord. Sometimes, you know, I don't study the Word just but I don’t feel like it. Sometimes I look at my life and say Lord I don't know what's wrong. I don't see any overt sin in my life, but I have to be honest, the Word seems cold to me. I just make myself get into it. Well, I'm just going to block out the next hour. I'm going just to sit and read your Word. I'm not going to do an analysis of it, but I'm going to read it and just read it and read it. Sometimes the end of that hour, I fold up my Bible, and I say, well, it doesn't seem to have changed, but I have to do some other things now. But you know I find if I discipline myself, honestly and openly before the Lord, it makes a difference. The appetite begins to reassert itself, and I find myself saying, how could I go for days and be satisfied not to feed on His Word. And I find the appetite grows. That's why I have to keep nourishing it. That's why it's given as a command that I am to long for it. It doesn't say as a result of your salvation you will have a natural craving. There's an element of that, but I am also commanded to be craving the Word, which means there are certain things I have to do, like put off the old sins.

But you know, be careful. I don't want to delude myself. I want to be sure I've first tasted. Then I want to be sure my life is clean before the Lord. Well, I'm better than some people. That's fine, but that doesn't end it. My disease is not as serious as someone else's. That doesn't help. My cancer may not be as advanced as someone else's cancer. That doesn't mean that the physical damage to my body is not of great potential. So it is spiritually. I tolerate these things because everybody envies and it's hard to measure envy. It's hard to measure the love of money. But you know, I let these things come into my life. I'm satisfied to dabble. I often wonder, why do new Christians just born into the family of God want to study the Word in the morning, in the evening, in Bible studies, but people who have been Christians twenty years figure Sunday morning's enough. I get about all I need. I've heard it all before. Is that the way it ought to be in my relationship with the God who loved me and saved me? I used to like more of Him. Now I'm satisfied with less. You know, I need my little taste in the morning, once a week. That pretty well tides me over because my life is full. But you know, if He's my food, my life is to be full of Him.

So what are we about as a church? We are a place that's a center of truth. We are a pillar in support of the truth, not the only pillar in support of the truth. I know there are people in the city who think Gil Rugh thinks Indian Hills is the only place that stands for truth. I am glad for every other place that stands for truth in the city. So tell them when you leave. But as the pastor and shepherd of this church, this is the only one I'm responsible for. My responsibility along with you is to see that this does not change. I trust that no matter what else changes, what kind of buildings they build after I'm dead and gone if the Lord doesn't come, no matter adjustments they make, one thing will always characterize Indian Hills. What I delight to hear is people say, you know, I listened to a tape of you from twenty years ago, and you haven't changed, and I say, oh, good glory. I better not change. What have I been called to do? Preach the eternal, enduring, living truth until He takes me to glory. Until people get tired of it? Until they're looking for a new fad? No. This church better stand for truth in season and out of season and how privileged we are.

What else would we want to do? We look at the honor given to us. God said, here is my living, eternal truth. I'm putting it in your hands, in those earthen vessels. Now, give it forth. Don't change it, don't alter it, just give it forth. “What I have taught to you, Timothy, you teach to faithful men who will teach others also.” Just keep giving it out like it is. How do we get that simple instruction messed up? Well, we think we can improve. May God by His grace help us to appreciate what we have. May our appetite be an increasing craving. Lord, I regret that I don't have every day to devote to taking in your truth and then giving it out to others, to ministering to others. I have to spend a little time putting food on the table. But even there, Lord, I can represent you, I can give forth the gospel of salvation to those I come in contact with. I have other things to do in my home that even there the desire is to see the beauty of Your character manifest, but oh, Lord, what a delight it is to have the times to take in Your Word. I hope our kids see that in us as their parents. You know one thing my parents have is boy, they just love the Word of God, they can't get enough of it. They always want to go where they're going to be taught the Word. They love to talk about the Word. It's just their life. Remember we're raising a generation that is going to have to be saved first-hand. And they're going to raise a generation that's going to have to be saved first-hand. May the reality of the truth of what we study be clearly seen in the way we live and in the ministry that we have.

Let's pray together. Thank you, Lord, for the greatness of Your person. How awesome it is to consider that You, the living God, have given us Your truth. You have drawn us to Yourself, caused us to be born again, through the living and abiding Word of God. You nourish us and nurture us on this truth. Lord, progressively, as we feed upon the Word, as we study the Word, as we behold Your glory in the Word, we are being transformed into conformity with the image of Your glory by the sovereign work of Your Holy Spirit. Thank you, Lord, for calling us together as the church of Jesus Christ today. Lord, may this church be known as a center of truth, that whatever else takes place, whatever else goes on in all of its ministries, one thing is sure and settled and unchanging. They give forth the truth. And may it be all for Your honor and glory. We pray in Christ's name. Amen.