An Exposition Of 1 Peter, Part 8: The Pure Milk

An Exposition of 1 Peter, part 8: The Pure Milk

1 Peter 2:1-3

Introduction

In the last study Peter told us of the importance of sincere love among the brethren. Love must not be hypocritical. This is necessary for believers at all times as it is a reflection of the love of God. It serves as a witness to the world for the Gospel. People are starving for genuine love. they may test the love of the church members for each other to see if it is real. It is also especially necessary to have this fervent love for one another in times of persecution. Believers need to support one another in times of stress.

Part of the demonstration of steadfast love is in the effort required to nurture believers. It is to this topic that Peter now turns.

Exposition of the Text

Wherefore laying aside all evil and all deceit and hypocrisies and jealousies and all evil speakings — I have rendered this literally from the Greek as the structure of this phrase is interesting. “Evil,” “deceit,” and “evil speakings” have the word “all” (or “every”) before it, and “hypocrisies” and “jealousies” do not. “All evil” seems encapsulate the other four words as though evil is demonstrated by deceit, jealousy, hypocrisy, and backbiting (evil speaking). Evil can be describes as any action or thought that is contrary to the will of God. Peter has already told the churches that God had set them apart unto obedience. He reaffirms this in the passage we just study in that we are to obey the truth. He will come back to the necessity of obedience and submission later on in the epistle. Our call to obedience is in contradistinction to the opposite “disobedience.” All disobedience, no matter how it is manifested is evil in the sight of God.

Deceit is the work of Satan who is the great deceiver. A deceiver is a liar. One cannot use deceit and be obedient to the truth of the Gospel. A deceit is not necessarily an outright lie. Satan quoted Scripture to Jesus in the attempt to get Jesus to worship him or at least accept a vision of Messiahship that met worldly and Jewish expectations rather than the Father’s. It is misapplied truths which present the great temptation to believers as part of what is done seems to ring true. the end result of deceit is to turn one from the truth. All forms of trickery are to be avoided. The Christian is to be genuine.

The next term, hypocrisy is a form of deceit. Jesus commonly used this term against the Pharisees. Many Greek plays used one actor for all the characters or at least had some actors playing multiple parts. Instead of going off stage and changing costumes, the actor would have a mask of the faces of the various characters upon a stick. When speaking as one character, he would put one mask upon his face. when he spoke as another character, he would change masks and alter his voice. This form of hypocrisy falls a little short of deceit as the change of characters is transparent. But this is not what Jesus meant. Hypocrisy here is that the Pharisees were different on the inside than what they seemed to be to others. As Jesus noted about tombs, they were pretty and whitewashed on the outside but full of dead men’s bones inside. (Matthew 23:27)

Peter has already brought up “hypocrisy” before in 1 Peter 1:22 in describing the love that the brethren was to be genuine (without hypocrisy). We need to take this admonition seriously. Hypocrisy is what describes the Christian before he came to Christ — but no longer.

Jealousy among the brethren is also evil. Peter knew jealousy all to well. The twelve practiced this vice when Jesus walked with them. Jealousy is birthed by boasting. One example of this jealousy happened at the first Lords’s Supper on the night Jesus was betrayed. Luke 23:24 tells us that after the supper, the disciples argued who would be the greatest. The following verses in Luke gives Jesus’ answer. The Christian life is not to be modeled after the structure of earthly society. In the church, there is the great inversion that the one who is greatest is the servant of all. John 13 records how Jesus demonstrated this new reality in that He washed the disciples feet. We read in John 13:13-17 “You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”