April 22, 2013

Dog, drink that milk. by Taylor Ours


I write this post to reflect again upon the importance of the Bible: the Word of God. Dakota’s message 2 weeks ago and Courtney’s blog post from last week both provided us with important facets of reading the Bible. By writing this post I would like to add more fuel to the flame, so to speak, by adding another treatise on reading the bible.
1 Peter 2:2 like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation.
            Consider the Above passage. Peter writes saying as babies, desire the milk: The spiritual milk. So the question arises what is the spiritual milk?  This we can determine based on the context of the passage. Just a few verses earlier in chapter 1, Peter speaks of the Living and Abiding Word of God, that is imperishable and never fades, and this Word is the Good News that was preached to you. (Summary of 1 peter 1:23-25) Now returning to 2:2, this verse is continuing that dialogue on the Word of the word of God. Now Peter under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit uses an analogy here to demonstrate to us the importance of the Word of God.
            God is likened to our mother, bearing the life giving substance, the milk, which is likened to the Word of God. We are compared to babies. Now consider this analogy. A baby: helpless, young, small, weak, in desperate need of protection, no ability to sustain themselves without their mother. Their mother is their everything.  They look to her for care and comfort and nourishment and life. Without her, they DIE. Now we are likened to these babies. And it says long for the Milk. The Greek word is epipotheō. It means to desire, to pursue with love, to long after, to yearn for, (and my favorite) to intensely crave! Do you, do I intensely crave the Word of God? Oh not nearly as I should, oh that I would long for the scripture as a baby longs for milk.
 Now consider a baby once more. This is such a rich deep analogy for the word of God, it creates such great imagery.  I grew up in a family of 10 kids and I had firsthand experience of seeing my little brothers and sisters long for the milk as babies. If they didn’t get fed they would CRY! They would cry until they got the milk. Nothing else would satisfy their longing. A toy wouldn’t make them stop crying, nor someone holding them. They desired one thing: the pure milk of their mother. When was the last time we cried because we didn’t read the word of God?
Another detail, Babies eat every 1 to 3 hours depending on age and all that. What if we drank every three hours of the word of God? What richness that would be. Yet I suspect many of us don’t drink of the pure spiritual milk every three days if not every three weeks.  Now why do the babies drink? Two reasons given here: That firstly we might grow up into salvation (v2). As babies drink to grow so do we. To grow in our faith: sanctification as Courtney wrote of. To conform to the image of Christ. And secondly in verse three quoting from the Old Testament (psalm 34)
If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. (1 peter 2:3)
Just as babies have tasted that the milk is good, we have tasted the Goodness of the Lord. We have seen his steadfast Love. We have experienced the immeasurable riches of his grace. We have seen his Love demonstrated for us on the Cross where he died for us while we were yet sinners that we might have life. We have tasted his goodness and THIS is what brings us back to the scriptures a new each day. It brings us back yearning for a new revelation of his love and Goodness. The psalmist speaks of this idea in talking of the worth of the word:
The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces (psalm 119:72)
The Word of God, the Law of the Lord, is a greater treasure then all the wealth in the world! Now is that truth a reality in my life?  He goes on to say in verse 103:
 How sweet are you words to my taste, sweeter then honey to my mouth!
What truth these verses speak. I would encourage you to go back and read through the entirety of psalm 119. It speaks of the worth and value of the Word of God.
               Now we must understand this is no ordinary book, the bible that is. It is the Word of God, which was written down by men under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. It is the WORD OF GOD!! Of the LIVING GOD! Not just a god, but the great IAM, Yahweh, the ruler of the universe and he has lovingly given us these words so that we might know him, we might seek his face. I must grind this axe; we must get the idea out of our head that this is not just a thing that we have to do again in a begrudging manner. We say, “Oh man I better read my bible again so I can be a good Christian”, and mark a big check mark off of the Be a Good Christian List. We read the word for maybe four minutes, while barely paying attention to what we are reading. NO! WHAT? What blasphemy. What ignorance.
             Let us learn from babies, and their example of desire for that life giving substance. I read the Word for many reasons, but the one that triumphs all the others is that I desire to KNOW GOD. (Phil 3:8) therefore I come anew each day by the grace of God, desiring and thirsting for a new revelation of God from his precious life giving word. We must have that mindset. Many days it is not mine either, for sin blinds me and lies to me, saying that the world is way better then reading the word. That it is more enjoyable to check Facebook then to drink of the pure spiritual milk. I have tasted and seen that the Lord is good; but the flesh causes me to so easily forget it.  Oh lay outside the flesh and Drink!
             Are you drinking of the milk, regularly? Daily? Constantly? Do you long for it? When was the last time you CRIED because you had not read the bible that day? Oh do we INTENSELY CRAVE to read the scripture?

            We are so easily satisfied by so many worthless things, when truly only one thing can fully satisfy us. We have the greatest treasure of the universe, awaiting us to seek him, and we have his words sitting in front of us collecting dust on the bookshelf, yet we foolishly neglect the milk that awaits us. Taste and see that the Lord is good! He will continue to satisfy our hungry souls.
             Oh I am not there yet, I strive with you all too long for the word of God more and more. Our pray must be God give me a deeper longing for the Word! Let me realize its true worth. Make me crave it. Pray out this scripture. Pray out psalm 119. And God will answer and give us this desire, if we sincerely want it.
You know what you got to do. Dog go drink that milk.

Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation—  if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.  (1 peter 2:2-3)

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