As we continue together in our service, we'll turn now to the reading of God's Word. We turn to 1 Peter 1. 1 Peter is found towards the end of the New Testament, after the book of Hebrews, and before and after James, and before the letters to John. Our scripture reading will begin in 1 Peter 1, verse 22, and go through to chapter 2, verse 5. And do we still read out loud together? Yes. So read the scripture passages together. Beginning in 1 Peter 1, verse 22. Let's read and say together. 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. coming to him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious. You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. That's as far as we're going for now for our scripture reading. We'll read more again for our second service, but our focus today and for this time period is from verses one to three. 1 Peter 2, verses one to three. And our focus from my own church, we picked this passage because we're beginning a new church year, a new calendar year. Our Bible studies were kicking off, our catechism classes were beginning again. So we just want to have a sermon that focuses us upon the importance of God's Word. And as we look at this passage together today, it not only will apply to the idea of personal study of the Bible, how we might study the Bible in our homes or on our own in our own devotions, how we may study the Bible as a church with our Bible studies, but it also applies to the importance of the Word of God. When we think of how we run our services, how we know what worship is about, one of the things we have at the center of worship is the Scriptures and the teaching of God's Word to the people. And if we think of evangelism, how we share the gospel, one of the things central to our evangelism is the word of God. How does the word of God play into our worship, our evangelism, and our own personal lives, and why is it so important? Why should the scriptures be so central, and why does the Bible need to be something we take time to study and understand? And as we come into this passage, we're gonna see a few things as we go We're going to see first, why the Bible is so important. Secondly, how we study it effectively. And third, we're going to see an encouragement to draw near to God in His Word. So an encouragement to study it. So first, why? Second, how? And then third, a final encouragement to study God's Word well. And as we begin, we read from verse 22. If you have your Bibles open, please keep your Bibles open to 1 Peter chapter 2. We began reading in verse 22, and we did for a reason. I'll begin with a bit of a story. I have a friend who served as a URC pastor in the United States, and he previously served in a church which was on a fairly busy road. On either direction down the street from his own church, his own church is maybe 300 people, a good sized church. But on either side of his church, down the road just a little while, were mega churches in the US. Churches of 2 or 3 or 4 thousand people. One a little bit down in one direction, one a little bit down in the other. And in the course of two or three or four months in a single year, each of these churches sent a representative to my friend, who pastored this church of about 300, and they both came to him by themselves, not knowing the other church had asked. They both came to him with the same question. And the question that came to him was this, how do you keep your youth? How come when we look at your church, you have so many young people and children in worship? We are very large churches, we have great programs, we have great activities, but we can't seem to keep the young people in the church. They all walk out. So the pastor thought about that question, and he prayed about that, and he says, well, I'll tell you, but I don't know if you're gonna like our answer. And I don't know if you'll put it into practice." And they said, well, if we can keep the young people, we'll certainly do whatever it takes. And then he began to explain how, as a church, they taught their children the Bible in a very focused and concentrated way from the youngest of ages. with Sunday school classes, teaching them with parents, teaching them in the home. Later, as kids grew up, they'd come in and learn extra time of the catechism to study church doctrine for an hour or an hour and 20 minutes. Don't know how long your classes are. Maybe it was three hours. And if you guys get away with one, you're doing good. We teach them in the week as well about the catechism which zeroed us in upon the teaching of God's word. How do we keep our youth? We anchor them in the scriptures. And it was interesting because the pastor proved a little bit prophetic. The churches heard what he had to say, but didn't think they could put it into practice in their churches. Now, why is the Bible so important? And why was that part of this man's answer? Well, if you look in 1 Peter 1, in verse 23, it says this. And why don't we read verse 23 together? having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and abides forever. In chapter 2, our text begins with the word therefore. And that word, therefore, tells us that when Peter calls the church to crave and desire the pure milk of the word, he is basing it in what has gone before. This is a conclusion made upon what he has just taught. If I said to you, hey, there's a big accident at the end of this street by the stoplight, therefore, when you leave, head this way and go around the other direction. The therefore tells you that what I'm teaching is based upon what I've already said. Peter is calling us to crave the pure milk of the Word because by it we come to life. Because in verse 23 it says, you've been born again through the Word of God. When we think of training our kids, when we think of evangelizing those who don't know Christ, we know that they don't just need to be taught, do they? It's just not a matter of intellect. It's not a matter of book learning. It's not a matter of just understanding something about God. We know if people are going to be saved, they must be born again. But the Bible teaches us that we are born again only through the Word. The Word that shows us Christ. The Word that shows us our sin. The Word that speaks to the cross. The Word that anchors us in the death and resurrection of the Savior for sinners. And as that Word is taught, God is pleased to work in His mysterious and supernatural way to create new life in the hearts of His people. Why is the Word of God so important? Why should we teach it in our homes if we're blessed with roommates or blessed with spouses and children? Why should it be central in our homes? Why should we study it as a church? Why should we teach our kids the Bible in Sunday school? Because if they're going to come to faith, if they're going to come to new life, they're going to do so by the Word of God and the Spirit working through the Word. And therefore, we wanna have the word of God central to everything we do. But it's not just about new life. As the text goes on, it says, therefore, anchoring at what has gone before, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and evil speaking. We're gonna have to leave some of this till in just a moment. And then it goes on and say in verse two, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby. I have the blessing of coming to this church once in a while and being able to join you, I don't know, once a year, once every six months, once every two, three years, it changes. But part of the fun of that is seeing how kids grow. and you come and you see children and they've all of a sudden gotten taller or they've become more mature and you see them and they're this big and that's a lot of fun. And if you've ever had that experience where you see kids and all of a sudden they've shot up and they've grown three or four inches since you saw them, what do you tend to say? There's a few lines we might use. We might say, boy, oh boy, what's your mom been feeding you? You ever heard that one? What's your mom been feeding you? You know, you just shot right up. Well, Peter is speaking of that type of growth, not only physically in our bodies, but also spiritually in our souls. Christians grow too. And some Christians can shoot up four or five inches every time you see them, and some Christians, they might not seem to grow at all. I don't know if you've had that experience where you may know people who confess to be Christians, But over the last 10 or 12 years or five or seven years, they've grown very little. There's very little change. They don't have much joy in the Savior. It seems like the same sins that were catching them 10 years ago are still catching them now. They're not very active in things for God. And you look at them and you say, what's going on? If you saw a child and it had been five or six years and the last time you saw them they were still the same height and the same shape, you'd say, wait a minute, what's going on? You're not getting fed properly. Sometimes we have Christians, they don't seem to grow at all. Why is that? Well, the Bible tells us it's because we need the pure milk of the word that we may grow thereby. When we see Christians growing in the Lord, when we meet someone and they just seem more beautiful, doesn't that happen? I love, I don't know if this is, I love seeing and meeting brothers and sisters in Christ. And I love seeing them grow. And I love seeing people grow in Christ and you just realize they are just They've become such beautiful, shining examples of the Gospel. They've grown in the Savior. And when you see that kind of growth, why does that happen? It's because God has been feeding them and nourishing them and teaching them by the Word of God. This Word of God isn't just educating us. It doesn't just teach our minds, it rebukes us. It corrects us. It points out where we've been sinning. It convicts us that God is alive. It calls us to realize who we are in Christ. It reminds us of the finished work of the Savior, and it doesn't let us go, does it? Every time we turn to the Word, it is what the Bible calls that sword of the Spirit, living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It pierces the division of soul and spirit, says Hebrews 4, verse 12. And so when Christians are handling the Bible, when they're being led to Christ through the Word, you see this maturing and this growing and this deepening. You might not be able to see it. Sometimes, if we look at ourselves, we only notice what we're lacking. I like coaching. And I really like coaching soccer. I really enjoy coaching soccer. I coach, I've coached kids in grade 5 to 8 and lately I've been coaching kids in high school. And I see kids come back year after year. Last year I had a kid come to us and he'd tried out for the team three years in grade 9 and grade 10 and grade 11 and he'd never been a soccer player. He'd always been very uncoordinated, always missed the ball, and I assumed he wasn't going to be very good again this year. And then suddenly during the game, I saw him, and he was making passes and running into space and talking to his teammates in a way that just, I couldn't believe it. The funny thing was, all of a sudden, I saw him and thought, wow, this kid's gotten better. And I came to him and I said, boy, you've really improved over the last year. And he said, oh, I feel like I'm doing awful today. Sometimes when it comes to growth for ourselves in Christ, we only see where we're still falling short. We know all our sins. We know where we feel guilt over things we haven't done properly. We know where we're still needing to grow. But beloved, if you're in the word of God, and you're allowing the scriptures to lead you to Christ, You're allowing the Spirit to bring conviction and hope and believing what the Word says. The Bible doesn't return empty. The Bible doesn't fail in its purpose. God doesn't fail in His purpose. He will use the Word that you may grow thereby. And so whether we are thinking of how to bring up the next generation to know and love Christ, Whether we are thinking of how we're going to reach out in the world to help people who don't know Jesus now come to know Jesus in the future, or whether we're thinking of our own spiritual growth, how do we keep the joy of the Lord? How do we not grow dull in Christian living? The answer, according to the Bible, is one and the same. We need to study the scriptures. And we need to allow the study of the scriptures to not be formalistic, but to lead us to Christ, to lead us to the Savior. And as we do so, people find new life by God's grace, and those who are found grow in grace by God's grace. This is how God has chosen to build his church. So why do we study God's Word? And why do we have Bible classes? And why should you attend them? Why should you work hard in the study of Scripture? Why should you try and take time with your kids to teach them the Word of the Lord? Make sure they're growing in the things of God. Because God uses this Word to bring life and to grow it for His glory. That's our first point. Our second point, then, asks the question, how do we study the Word of God so it's effective? How do we study the Word of God so it's effective? You see, all kinds of people have studied the Word of God, but it doesn't always do the same thing for each person. In John chapter 5, Jesus was speaking to the Pharisees. And he says these words to them. The Pharisees were perhaps some of the greatest students of the Bible in some ways. They studied the Bible a lot, but it didn't do them much good. And in John 5, verse 39, Jesus tells a bit of the secret of how the Bible can be effective, or sometimes how the Bible is not. John 5, 39. Jesus speaks to the Pharisees and he says, you search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life. And these are they which testify of me, but you are not willing to come to me that you may have life. Jesus is pointing to a group of people who studied the Bible, but it doesn't seem to help them, because as they study the Bible, they don't go to the person the Bible points them to. They don't go to Jesus. So how do we make sure, as we study the Bible, it's effective? Well, Peter tells us in verse 1 these words. He says, therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word. When Peter is teaching us how to study the scriptures, he tells us that we can't study the Bible and hold on to sin at the same time. We can't study the Bible and hold on to sin at the same time. Now I know in some ways we all hold on to sin. In 1st John, John says, if anyone says he has no sin, he's a liar and the truth is not in him. That's absolutely true. There's a difference between living in sin and fighting against sin. Living in sin means we're kind of caving in. We're giving up. We're not fighting for holiness. We're allowing sinful tendencies and sinful idols to have hold of our heart. And beloved, Jesus said, no man can serve two masters. He will either love the one and hate the other or be loyal to one and unfaithful to the other. If we come to the Word of God and we're living for sin, it's not going to work for us. And so Peter says, as we come to the Bible, we have to lay aside all malice. Now, malice is an interesting word. It's not one we use a lot today in the English language. I don't think we use it often, the word malice. But it means to do something with an evil intent. When someone has malice, they are doing something for a secret reason. It might be like that door-to-door salesman who comes to you offering the best deal ever, but really they're trying to get the information off your furnace and switch over your loyalty to their business or something. You know what I'm saying? that they have evil intent. You wouldn't think you'd have to tell people not to study the Bible with evil intent, but we do. If you remember some of your church history, hundreds of years ago, the Roman Catholic Church, in the time of the Reformation, sold something called indulgences. Do you remember what those were? Do you know what those were? An indulgence was something you could go to your local priest for, and you could pay the priest a certain amount of money, and he would give you an indulgence. And what that was, was it was permission to sin without guilt, without penalty, without punishment. Because you made an offering, because you did something for God, he would essentially give you freedom in committing some kind of sin, so long as it wasn't too bad. And boy, those Roman Catholics, man, they were terrible, weren't they? We would never do that, would we? Do we ever have to be warned against studying the Bible with malice? Well, any time we come to the Bible and we study God's Word thinking that we can get it out of the way, I try to give God my time so I can go do what I want to do now. If I've done my devotions, I've checked it off, I'm holy for the day, now I get to live however I want. Whenever we view God's word as a checklist, something we need to get out of the way so we can live for ourselves, we're doing it with malice. We're doing it with an evil intent. Our hearts aren't submitting to the word, and in fact, almost all the introductory words there talk about the state of our heart. Malice, deceit, hypocrisy. All three of these words speak of saying we're something or pretending we're something we're not. Sometimes in the course of a pastor's life, we have times where we counsel people with addictions. And we all struggle with sin, but sometimes an addiction can really grip a heart, and people can be addicted to alcohol, or to bad pictures, or whatever the addiction might be to. And sometimes we have to counsel people in those situations. And when we're counseling them, we'll say, you know, Pastor, I want to stop, or I think I want to stop, but I just don't stop, and sometimes I find I just can't help myself. And I don't know if I can keep coming to God anymore. I don't know if I can keep going through this, because in the end, I don't even really want to stop my sin. And I love when people say that. You can fire me and tell me never to come back. I love when people say that. Because I say to them, that's great. Now you take what you just told me and you tell God that. Because God doesn't want you pretending. God doesn't want you coming to Him with deceit or hypocrisy as if you can stop the sin that is pulling you down. God wants you to come without any deceit, any hypocrisy. Be open. Confess your sin to Him. Acknowledge your struggle. Admit that you can't stop the things that He wants you to stop doing. Admit that you need help to love Him as He wants you to love Him. Just tell Him. You want to know how to make the Bible study effective? You don't come at it with a lie. You come out as saying, Lord, I love your word, but you know I have struggles and difficulty putting it into practice. I want to be more kind when my temper gets the best of me. I don't want to envy, but then I see my neighbor with their nice car, and I just think about it all the time, why am I not given as many good gifts as someone who doesn't love the Lord? Just go to him. Your Bible study becomes effective As you are honest with the Lord about who you are, in your strengths and your weaknesses, in your struggles, in your needs, as you come to God acknowledging how much you need Him, beloved Lord, God is gonna give you the help you can't give yourself. That's why it's so beautiful when the addict finally says, I don't even think I want to stop my sin, but they go to God with it because God's the one who needs to break that sin. And he does. How can the Bible study be a place where we grow, where we come to God, where maybe we find new life? When we're honest with the Lord, acknowledge our weakness, and we go to him, to Christ, the Savior, for help. The Bible also calls us to take off envy and all evil speaking. It's kind of interesting because the first three deal with honesty before God and we can understand those things, but the second kind of deal with sins before men. Envy is when you see what someone else has and you want it. It can be material things like a nice car or a good education or high grades or popularity. It can be spiritual things. It can be character things. Boy, I wish I was as bold as they were. I wish I could speak like they could. I wish I was as kind as they were. Envy is when you see what someone else has and it leads you to discontent with what God has given you because you want what someone else has. On the other hand, evil speaking is also about how we react with other human beings. Evil speaking is just the idea, and you know what it is, it's when you talk poorly of someone, when you gossip. When someone is being praised, and you say, yeah, but they're not always like that. You should have seen them the other day when this happened, I saw them lose their temper, and boy, do they ever have a temper. That's evil speaking. Now what's remarkable is that God He cares not only about our honesty with himself, he also cares about how we are with others to grow in the Word. We can't treat our fellow image bearers in Christ poorly and expect to grow nearer to the God who made them and who loves them. James says that, remember? When he says, you know, the tongue is this restless fire. Out of it come both blessing and cursing. With it, we bless our God and King. And with it, we curse our neighbor who is made in the image of God. Brethren, this should not be so. When we come to study God's Word, if you've found that God's Word has grown cold, if you come to God's Word and you're not growing in the Lord anymore, and you read it and you feel like it feels a little bit lifeless, beloved, check your heart. Are you honest with God? Are you coming with prayer and acknowledging your weakness? And are you harboring sin against your neighbor? Are you treating those made in the image of God with cruelty. Repent of these things. Confess them. Ask mercy from God. And find the Word of God becomes sharper once again. It goes on to say, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the Word. And this is always a fun thing. I don't know if we have any crying babies today. We needed crying babies. I don't know who is not doing their job. But somewhere in this room we should have had babies crying, you know, because We need to hear, for an example, an illustration. I'm sure you've heard it, right? When babes are just crying out, they're hungry, and they let you know. A baby's life is pretty simple. It fills diapers, it fills bellies, and it sleeps. That's kind of how they function. The Christian's life, when it comes to the Bible, it parallels a young child. We just need the Word of God. We need Christ who's shown in the scriptures. When a baby is hungry, when it's scared, how comforting it is for it to be taken by its mother and nursed. In our fears, Psalm 56, when I'm afraid, I will trust in you and God, whose word I praise, and God I trust. What can man do to me? The psalmist is scared. What does he do? He goes to the scripture. He goes to the Lord. He needs Christ. And so he runs the Bible. When we come alongside and try and shepherd people in the name of the Lord, we recently had one of our dear seniors and his wife passed away very, very unexpectedly and suddenly. When we go to give consolation and help to someone who's just lost a loved one, they don't need the words of a man. They need the words of their God. The God who speaks to them in their distress, the God who helps them in their concern. As newborn babe, says Peter, crave the pure milk of the word. Turn there all the time, but then notice he also says the pure milk of the word. We have a blessing in today's world to be in a place with lots of information. You can go home and you can probably look up this afternoon 1,000 sermons online. That'll be fantastic sermons. That'll be a great blessing for you to find, but I bet you you could also go home and look up about 20,000 sermons online that are not so good. That might not be that faithful. When we want to grow in the scriptures, we need to have the pure teaching of God's word. That's why we want to be part of a church community, isn't it? That's why when God saves sinners, He doesn't leave them by themselves. He joins them with a body of Christians. He lets elders and pastors and deacons in authority there. Why? To guard the flock, to make sure the teaching that is given is pure, that is faithful, that we're learning about Christ in accordance with His word. If you want to grow in the scriptures, you need to be putting aside sin, coming to God with honesty, Knowing your need for the Savior, knowing your need for help, craving his word, and then having the pure milk. Teaching that will anchor you in what is true. And the blessing we find there of studying the word of God with others. And as a church that has those called to protect and defend the flock. And then a final encouragement. A final encouragement. Our last point is in verse 3. When Adam and Eve fell into sin, way back in Genesis chapter 3, the first sin of the human race, and God came into the garden, what did Adam do? When God came into the garden, what did Adam do when he had known that he sinned? Do you remember? What did he do? He hid from God. He hid from God. Peter is talking about the importance of coming to the Lord. And we come to know the Lord through his word. But he knows also, there's a problem with our walk with the Lord. And that is that when we need him the most, when Adam needed God the most, he was the most afraid to go to him. Have you ever had that? We have a new song we're singing in our church. It's called, Jesus Strong and Kind. And it's a beautiful kid's song, essentially. It talks about how Jesus says that if I thirst, I should go to him. Jesus says that if I hunger or if I'm scared, I should go to him. And then the very last verse, it says, Jesus says that if I'm lost, he will come to me. It's a beautiful little turn. I should come to Him, I should come to Him, I should come to Him, but if I'm lost, He will come to me. You know, the human heart is designed in such a way, and sin is designed in such a way, and the devil's lies are designed in such a way that when we need God the most, when we need Christ the most, we least want to go to Him. When we know we failed, when we feel our sin, when we're ashamed of what we've done, that's when we don't want to read the Bible honestly, do we? We might go through the motions. We might still come to church. We might even open the Bible. We might still pray, but we don't really read the Bible. We don't really pray. We close off God. We hide from Him. We go through the motions. We say the words we've always said just as a protection because we don't want to come before the Lord. And it's beautiful how God encourages us to come to Him honestly and openly not only with commandments, but by saying at the end, if indeed you've tasted that the Lord is gracious. How often the Bible does not the grace of God win the heart of God's people. He gives commandments that should be obeyed, that are good commandments, that are righteous and true. He gives warnings and threats of judgment that will come if we remain hard of heart. But when we look at the cross of Jesus Christ, when we look at the love of God for sinners, that's when our fears begin to fall away. That's when we actually begin to want to do the very things God commands us to do because we know the God who commands it loves us. When we come to God's word, what do we find? If we come to God honestly and openly and truly, what will we find? If we have walked in sin, we'll find a grace that is greater than our sin, won't we? If we've had a season where we've been falling away and we're ashamed to come back to God, and we do, and we say, Lord, I don't wanna be a hypocrite, I have to acknowledge here and now, I've not been living for you, I've been hiding from you, I've been closing off your word, I've been ignoring you when you speak, but here I am, what will God meet us with? When I'm lost, he will come to me. The great story of the prodigal son is not of a young man who finally found the way home. When he comes back to his father, he says these amazing words. He says, Father, I've sinned against heaven and against you, and I'm no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired hands. He didn't know how to get back into the father's house. He thought his only hope was as a servant. But when he had no hope, the father runs to him. The father embraces him. And when that prodigal son begins his rehearsed speech and says, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you and am no longer worthy to be called your son, the father cuts him off. And he says, kill the fattened calf. Bring out the best robe. Put a ring on this man's finger because this my son was lost and is found. He was dead and he is alive again. Why should we keep going back to the word of God? Why should we keep going back to God even when we know we've sinned? Even when we've known that we've grown heart of heart, that our love for Him has been lost for a while. Why? Because we have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Because in Christ He shows an unending love for sinners, of whom I am chief. And it doesn't matter if we haven't grown in a year or we haven't grown in ten. You come back to Christ, You go back into the Word of God, you acknowledge how far you've fallen, you will find this God wraps you up and He feeds you. So the next time someone sees you, they're gonna say, man, oh man, what's your mom been feeding you? And you say, it's not my mom. It's my Savior. He's given me Himself. And I've never been the same. God uses His Word to lead His people to Christ, to give them new life, to grow them in Christ, to call them to holiness and sincerity, and He does this because He is gracious. He is gracious. He loves us with an everlasting love. So I want to encourage you not to grow distant from the God who has given you so much and who loves you so dearly. Open your heart to Him. Allow the Word of God to convict you. Be honest with the God who knows everything about you anyway. And find as you come to Him and you open His Word and you pray and you ask for mercy and grace that He gives you far more than you could ever imagine. And by his grace you grow as a son and as a daughter of the Most High God, because he is gracious and his love endures forever. Let's join together in a word of prayer. Father in heaven, as we come to you this afternoon, we pray that you will indeed allow us to know you and to come near to you. We acknowledge, Lord, that so often in our spiritual lives, we can go through the motions. We're scared to confess our sin or scared to confess even our boredom with the things of God, that we may have grown indifferent to you. We ask you'll forgive our sin. It is not you, but us. That is the problem. Lord, we pray you will help us in our weakness. You'll meet us in our hard-heartedness. Lord, we pray you will help us to know your word and your truth in a way, Lord, that conquers our hardened hearts and allows us to feast upon that living bread who is Christ himself. Grow us in the things of the Lord. Build up your church. Allow us to know the joy of knowing Christ. And may this all be to the praise and glory of your grace, by which you have made us accepted through the Beloved, your Son, Jesus Christ. In his name we pray. Amen.