By: Mark Engler, Mt. Vernon Christian Church, Mt. Vernon, MO
TITLE: Are You Still A Baby?
THEME: Sanctification
TEXT: 1 Peter 2:1-3
PROP: Christians will become stagnant if they don’t grow throughout their Christian
life.
INTRO:
Are you still a baby? That’s the title to my sermon this morning. Now why would I even ask a question like that? Well, the answer is this. Because in many people’s Christian lives they remain Christian babies for years and sometimes they never grow up.
There was a time when every person in this room was a baby. I’m talking about being a physical baby now. And I can look at you all and know that you are no longer babies. You grew up and you become a man or a woman, and really, you have no choice in that. Physically growing is a natural thing to do and we will do it whether we want to or not.
In a spiritual sense that is not true. Let’s consider people that are just newly baptized. Now that person can be 10 years old, 25 years old, 50 years old, 75 years old. It doesn’t make any difference what age they are. When you’re baptized, no matter what age you, you are born again, and you become a spiritual baby. At that point you have a choice to make, and that choice is whether or not to grow in your spiritual maturity.
You must decide if that is all the closer you want to get to God. You see growing spiritually is not the same as growing physically. Physically you are going to grow whether you want to or not. Spiritually, it’s a choice. It’s something that we are told to do and for me as a preacher and a teacher it’s something that I’m told to help you to do. That goes for every other Christian in here as well. We are told to help and to care for our Christian brothers and sisters and that involves helping them mature in their spiritual growth.
(Read 1 Peter 2:1-3)
1. RID YOURSELVES OF SIN
Peter in this 1st verse of the 2nd chapter is telling Christians to rid themselves of their sins. We read these words and I believe a lot of us think that he is talking to non-Christians. That may not be so true in this church, but then again it might. Honestly, I don’t know what the first thought that comes to your minds are when Peter tells them to rid themselves “of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.”
I do know that most likely when a non-Christian reads these words that they think that Peter is talking to them. For the most part though I don’t think that Christians believe this and many passages like it applies to them. Most Christians view themselves as good people. Not people that maliciously harm other people. Or people that try to deceive other people. They don’t think of themselves as people who are hypocrites or who envy other people’s things. And they don’t think of themselves as people who would lie to another person. Those are things that we associate with the non-Christians.
But do you know that Peter associates all these things with Christians. Let’s look back at the 1st & 2nd verses of 1 Peter. (read it) You see what he says? He writes these words “to those who reside as aliens… scattered throughout.” Now folks I can pretty much guarantee you that he is not talking about people from another planets that are scatter throughout our world. He is talking to those of us that have a true home in heaven. When we are Christians we only reside on this earth for a while and in our bodies for a while, because our real home is in heaven with God.
So you see Peter is talking to you and to me, because he knows that at times these things still reign in our lives.
I think there is a lot in God’s Word that goes right over our heads because we don’t think that it is us that God is talking to. You may say, that’s right, there is a lot in the Word of God that goes right over my head because I don’t understand a lot of what is said in the Bible.
Do you know that every Christian has that problem? I’ve heard that said by people that are new Christians all the way up to Mr. Reese (professor of New Testament at Central Christian College) and Mr. Pelfrey (professor of Old Testament at Central Christian College). Matter of fact one of the things that Mr. Pelfrey is known for is saying 3 words and that is “I don’t know” and then he often follows that with “and neither does anybody else.” You see in all walks of our Christian maturity there are things that we just don’t get. And when we read them we don’t see that it applies to our life. But at the same time in all walks of our Christian maturity there are things that we can understand. And Peter is saying here that you were born again through the Word of God, therefore put all these aside.
The first thing I want us to realize with this verse is that Peter really is talking to us in God’s word. Until we can rid ourselves of these sins then we will have a hard time growing in our spiritual maturity.
ILLUS. There was a church in a small town and it was a booming church. The people in the church were wonderful Christian people. They loved the Lord and they served the Lord in everyway they could. For the people in the church, living a good Christian life was at the center of their world. The people of the church were reading their Bibles and doing devotions daily. They brought children up to be good Christians as well.
But then there came a time in the life of that church that the Christians began to worry about making a living more than serving God. They began to let their Bible reading and daily devotions slip to the side, because they just didn’t have the time in their days to do it anymore. Soon it came to the point that living a Christian life wasn’t at the center of their world.
And then the next generation came along in that church, which were further yet from making living a Christian life the center of their world. They became so involved in making money that they slipped further and further from the Lord. Not only did they not do their daily devotions, but most of the time when they weren’t in church they didn’t act like Christian’s. Sometimes, because they were so busy being involved in the things of this world they didn’t even come to church on Sunday morning.
Now there were people that were searching for God in that area. There were people that had heard a little about Jesus and they knew that some preached about Jesus passionately. They could see that Jesus made a difference in their lives, but when they looked at this church all they could think about is how these people acted one way when they went to church and how they acted another way the rest of the week. And the people that were searching for God looked at this and said to themselves, “this God and Jesus must not be real because if they were we would be able to see it in the lives of these people who call themselves Christians.”
You see what happened to the people in the church was that they allowed sin to creep into their lives over the years. They didn’t strive to live a Christian life and they strove for worldly gain. They got so involved in the world that they didn’t see that they were being hypocritical. And they drove people that were seeking for God away by not truly living a Godly life.
Do you know what happened to that church? I’m thinking you have a good idea that it died. But do you know that now that church is has more people in it than ever before and the money is overflowing. Because today that church has a small dance floor and it serves alcohol.
You see these Christian people who had known the word of God for generations became people who were hypocrites, who lied and were deceitful. And they did this because they let the world become more important to them than God was. Over the generations they let the word of God slip to the side and they became a people without God.
Peter tells us to rid ourselves of all malice, and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and all slander because until we do that we will not be able to grow in our spiritual lives and we will always be spiritual babies.
2. CRAVE THE WORD
Now let’s look at verse 2. Peter tells them, “like newborn babies, crave pure
spiritual milk.” I looked up “crave” in the dictionary and this is the meaning it gives. To have an intense desire for. To need urgently. To beg earnestly for; to implore for. I don’t believe you can do any of those things, in this sense without being totally committed to God’s word.
A baby will not live without the milk of its mother. They cry when they want to be feed. I don’t believe that Peter uses the word crave here in a sense like we would think about craving. It’s not like, “man I’m really craving chocolate,” or “a nice big juicy steak sure you be nice now.” He is saying that we need the Word of God like a baby needs its mother milk, to keep it alive and without God’s Word in our life we will not we will not grow and become spiritually stronger.
Peter is saying that you should want the word of God like you want air. Imagine for a minute if you were in an airtight room. You know that after a while you will breathe all the air that is in the room. Now what is going to happen when you breathe that last bit of air that’s in the room? You’re going to want more aren’t you? You will come to the point that you will be begging to get out of the room or for someone to put more air in it. You will beg for it and if you don’t get any, you will die.
We are to crave the Word of God in the same way that we would beg for more air. You see without air we will surely die and without the Word of God being actively involved in our lives we will die a spiritual death.
Are you craving the Word of God? If you are I know that you are doing daily devotions with God. So many people say, “yeah I know that I need to do that, but I just don’t have the time.” Do you know with an attitude like that, they will never have the time? Folks we have time for to sit in our houses and watch hours for TV don’t we. I’m not excluding myself here. I spend time watching TV, but I spend more time doing things on my computer. We make time to watch TV don’t we? We know that on a certain night, at a certain time, a certain show comes on. And we will make a tremendous effort to make time to watch that show.
When was the last time we made a tremendous effort to read the word of God? When was the last time we craved God’s word.
3. GROW UP!
Peter goes on to say to us, “grow up in your salvation.” Why does he say this?
Because we have tasted that the Lord is good. Folks, we are to grow up. I’m not saying that we ALL are spiritual babies and that we need to grow up. That’s not for me to decide. But, Peter gives us some guidelines to see if we are spiritual babies or not. You know whether or not if you have any of those sins in your life. And you know whether or not you crave the Word of God like a baby craves its mother’s milk.
What I am saying though is that no matter where you are in your spiritual walk you can grow more. I don’t believe that a person every gets to the point where he or she can say that they have grown all they can spiritually. I do on the other hand believe that people do get to the point where they THINK they can’t grow anymore.
Once we taste something and we find out that it is good, we automatically want more don’t we.
ILLUS. I remember when I was young and living at home with my parents and I remember my moms cooking. How I liked almost everything she made. I would especially liked it when we my dad, my brother and I would go out hunting for squirrels. I loved to have squirrel meat for dinner. I also liked rabbits and quail and other wild game that we would get. But do you know that now I can hardly stand to eat those kinds of things. I had a taste of something that I really liked, but after a while of not having that kind of food my taste for it has gone away.
Peter says that these people have only gone far enough in their spiritual walk to have Jesus as their Savior and that is really all the farther they have gone, because they’ve only gotten a taste of the Lord. I find this so much these days. There are so many people that want to have Jesus as their Savior, but after they are baptized, they continue to want to live the way they used to before they took the steps to become a Christian.
On the other hand, there are people who know they need Jesus to be their Savior, but don’t take Him as their Savior because they’re not ready to give up their old way of life. In some ways I respect that. Because they know that living a Christian life means changing the way you live. At the same time that I might respect that, I know that they will go to hell without Christ. I pray for those people to go ahead and take Jesus as their Savior because I know that the Holy Spirit will help them change their lives for God. Without them doing that they don’t have the Holy Spirit in their heart and it makes it all the harder to change.
Once we have tasted salvation we must continue to grow in it, folks that’s called sanctification, continually growing and maturing in our spiritual lives. If we are not growing, then what are we doing? We have either become stagnant in our Christian lives or we are going the other way.
That’s way I am always looking for ways to change and I’m always looking for ministries that people can do in the church. I believe if the church is not continually changing to meet the needs of the people, then that church won’t grow very much, because a church that is not changing, is a church that is stagnant. And a church that is stagnant will only attract stagnant people.
Growing up as Christians is something we continually do, just as growing as a church is something that we continually do.
CONCLUSION. Let’s not give up in our Christian growth. It’s something that we can’t let happen, because if we do then we will not be doing the work of the Lord anymore. The work of the Lord never stops, yet some people get the idea that they come to a point in their life when they don’t have to do it anymore. I’ve never seen a place in the Bible that says when you reach a certain point you can quit serving. Yet we have churches all over this country that have ministries that are not getting done because they can’t find a Christian that is willing to serve. That’s a tremendous shame. We have a lot of ministries in this church that needs to be done and we’re no different than the majority of the other churches, because just like them, we can’t find Christians who are willing to serve.
So many people believe that Christianity is all about them. They believe that once they have their salvation taken care of that they’re done. They can look at another person and know that they are not a Christian and they’ll never tell them about Jesus Christ. I’ve had a person in my family tell me, “I know I’m a Christian and that’s all that matters.” He won’t talk about the Bible or being a Christian, because he has his salvation taken care of and nothing else matters to him. It’s like looking at person that is not a Christian and saying, “I know you are going to hell, and I don’t care.”
How are you in your spiritual walk? Only you and God truly know where you are. Being a Christian is a continual thing. It’s a continual growth process. Are you still a spiritual baby, or are you continually growing? I pray that you are continually growing.
Being a Christian is not only about yourself. It’s about serving God continually throughout your life. If you make it only about yourself, then I can pretty much guarantee that you are still a spiritual baby. Because you don’t grow when you don’t serve. Serving is putting your faith in action and it’s when we put our faith in action that we grow. Do you remember what James says about this? James 2:14-17; “What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”
You see, in being a servant, in putting your faith into action you will be growing. You will get stronger in your spiritual walk, and that will be reflected in your life, but if you don’t put your faith into action that will be reflected in your life as well. You will become weaker and weaker in your spiritual walk and eventually your faith will die.
So the question today is, are you still a baby? If you have been a Christian for several years, I sure hope not. Only you and God know where you are for sure.
Peter tells us 3 things we need to do in order to grow:
1. Rid Yourselves of Sin. Have you done that?
2. Crave the Word. Do you, or can you live without it?
3. Grow Up! Are you growing, or has your spiritual life become stagnate?
INVITATION: If you’re here today and your ready to begin that spiritual walk with God, to start putting your faith in action, then now is a time that you can change your life forever. Jesus is waiting, His invitation is offered. Won’t you make Him your Lord and Savior today?
