Desiring the Word

1 Peter 2:1-10

Desiring the Word

Doctrine in an inescapable category. You cannot avoid it or be neutral about it. If not a Christian doctrine you will be teaching a non-Christian doctrine. Ministry is used to build up and strengthen new believers and refocus the older believers. Every Sunday between Resurrection and Pentecost is to focus on doctrine and ministry. Doctrine and ministry go hand in hand with one another and cannot be separated. 

What is the basis for doctrine and ministry? The answer is the Word of God. We are to be a people who crave the Word, the Truth. We are supposed to be a Word-oriented people. We are to have a love and desire for that spiritual milk. Not a fleeting desire, but a whole life deeply rooted into the Word the entire time. Not just the New Testament, but the Old as well...when Paul talks about the desire for the Word, the Old Testament was all they had at the time. The Christian life is to be one of constant growth and constant maturity. The only way to be able to truly do this is to delve into the Word and make it a regular habit to influence your life. We rid ourselves of all evil things (verse 1) and then come to Him (verse 4). This is what forgiveness is to look like. The putting off of the old man and the putting on of the new man. The Stone is living because it signifies the life found in Christ. Once united in Christ we take on the name of a living stone to carry on what it is to be as an image of Christ to others. We (spiritual stones) are being built into a living House (the body of the Church). Whenever we come into the church to gather and provide worship for Him we are coming together to build a spiritual house inhabited by Christ. Not only that, but a holy priesthood. Not as individuals, but as a community. He is our High Priest and we are His little priests. We represent the people to God when we lift up others in our prayer life. We ought to be honored to be priests to Him and holding up others to Him in prayer. We are to bring Him our spiritual sacrifices. The reason for this is that Christ was the last physical sacrifice and so we offer up our souls and characters to Christ as spiritual sacrifices. If we did not offer them up we would be as filthy rags. Do we acknowledge and accept that we are part of a spiritual and living House? We belong not only to God, but also to one another. Our sacrifices are only acceptable as offered up with Christ, our Redeemer and Mediator. Malice is to intentionally hurt someone else; deceit is to hide truth to make others believe something else; hypocrisy is to pretend to be good when not; envy is to bring others down or to wish them ill for something they have that you do not. A chosen generation, His special and holy people. We are to look different, we are set apart to bring forth the praises of Him who has brought you out of darkness. You must realize they will hate you for being a walking sign of His Word. You must realize it is always worth it. The place to always start is the Word. 

"Unlike the modernists of old, our liberals are quite happy to let us believe in the Virgin Birth or the Bodily Resurrection, or for that matter praying in tongues, presumably on the assumption that it keeps us occupied and out of their way. They only object when we dare to argue for moral limitations and ideals they have long ago abandoned. They will tolerate the most extravagant supernaturalism, as long as it is not assumed that the supernatural makes binding statements about human sexual behavior." -David Mills

"The situation is desperate. It might discourage us. But not if we are truly Christians. Not if we are living in vital communion with the risen Lord. If we are really convinced of the truth of our message, then we can proclaim it before a world of enemies, then the very difficulty of our task, the very scarcity of our allies becomes an inspiration, then we can even rejoice that God did not place us in an easy age, but in a time of doubt and perplexity and battle. Then, too, we shall not be afraid to call forth other soldiers into the conflict." -J. Gresham Machen "American Reformed Theologian Circa 1930"