As we begin this morning. The keynote passage for the text
that is on the screen. Really?
Is found in the previous chapter.
There you remember that these were not written with chapter
and verse? They were written as a
continuous letter. So when Peter divinely inspired
by the Holy Spirit wrote. This it was a continuous letter.
So the keynote passage that's found in the previous chapter is
found in First. Peter chapter 1 and verse 23.
Three it really sets the tone, it sets the stage of who Peter
is talking about or talking to. It says having been born again,
not of corruptible seed, but Incorruptible through the word
of God that lives and abides forever.
Let me just say a couple things about being born again.
You know, I realize that it really is a subject or really is
a concept. It's often times misunderstood,
but let me just explain Way to give me about two minutes, I'm
going to explain what it means to be born again.
And it really is very, very simple.
And we go to the words of Jesus, in Matthew chapter 18, it all
begins their. You remember, the disciples came
to Jesus and they said, tell us master, who is the greatest in
the kingdom of heaven and Jesus took a little child and he
placed a little child in their midst and he said, except ye be
converted and become Come as little children ye shall not
enter the Kingdom of Heaven. In John chapter 3, again, the
words of Jesus, the teachings of Jesus, he's talking to Nicodemus
and he tells Nicodemus, he said, you have to be born again.
Nicodemus says, how is that possible?
How can a man when he is old be born again?
Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be
born? And Jesus says, he that is born
of the flesh is flesh and that, which is born of the spirit is
Spirit. Jesus, then says, you have to be
born of water and the spirit. So all we know so far, Matthew
18. Jesus said, if you want to go to
heaven, you have to become as little children, John chapter 3,
if you want to go to heaven, you have to be born again and John
chapter 3 tells us. You're born again.
Can you are born of water and the spirit, we all know that's
baptism, but let me give you a passage in Romans chapter 6
beginning there in verse 3. Paul said know, ye not that so
many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into
his death. Therefore we are buried with him
by baptism into death that like as Christ was raised from the
dead by the glory of the father. Even so we also should walk get
this in. In newness of Life.
Sounds Familiar, doesn't it? Matthew 18, Little Children.
John chapter 3 born again and Romans chapter 6 New Life.
It's the same thing. So we're talking about someone
that has been baptized for the remission of their sins but
going back to our passage, Peter says we are born again, not of
corruptible seed, but incorruptible Incorruptible
seed, in other words in Romans chapter 1 and verse 16.
The Apostle Paul says, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of
Christ for it is the power of God to Salvation for everyone,
who believes for the Jew first. And also, for the Greek, one
more passage along this line, and it's found in Acts chapter 2
and verse 41, then they, that gladly received his word were
baptized and the same day that Were added unto them about
3,000, Souls. All this is very important in
our introduction, and it's going to be extremely important later
on as we progress through. So Peter says were born again,
how not of corruptible seed, but Incorruptible seed, what is
that? That is the gospel of Christ and
the gospel of Christ is the word of God.
All right, so we're talking about a Christian now, now from
that point forward, though, the Christian has Has a
responsibility. You've heard me in days gone by,
you've heard me say, you have heard me say that the Christian
from the Waters of baptism, has a three-fold responding
obligation. You've heard me say that.
You've also heard me preach on two of them, one is a responding
obligation to God, and that's to live a holy life.
We understand that that's first and foremost, by the way, we
have an obligation to serve God and live a holy life.
Number two, we have a responding.
Action to each other in that. We bear one another's, burdens.
We do that. We help each other in the
struggles. We are to do that and responding
obligation to each other. That means I have a responding
obligation to my father responding obligation to you,
but there's one more. We have a responding obligation
to our self and that is to grow in Christ.
These are things that we have to do in our life.
Let's go back to our passage. Let's go back to 1st, Peter,
chapter 2, and we're going to notice the first two.
And by the way, in this, we have some practical things and Peter
gives us the negative side and these going to give us the
positive side. We're going to begin with the
negative side In this passage and he says says this there for
laying aside all malice, first of all the phrase laying aside
literally means once for all time action.
It doesn't mean cut back. You know, one of the problems is
people trying to quit something you never tried to quit
something. I have I think everyone's had
something in their life, I'm not necessarily saying it was a
vice, but something in their life.
For example that they were trying to quit or do without and
sometimes people say this, well what I'm going to do is I'm just
going to cut back a little at a time and then as I cut back a
little at a time then eventually I won't be doing it anymore.
Okay. That is like a progression.
A little at a time. You know what the problem is,
while you are cutting back, you have not quit, you have it.
It doesn't make any difference. If you went from participating
in something in great magnitude all the way down to a little
bit. You're still doing it.
You still have that problem. You still haven't quit.
Now, I have to say this to. I do believe in Progressive
growth, so please get this down, you're taking notes, write it
down. There's a difference between
growth and doing without things that we have to lay aside big
difference. You know why?
Because growth is always Progressive We talked about that
Paul said until Christ is formed.
In you, meaning, we grow gradually.
Absolutely, but what about things that were in our life?
Now what he's talking about is once we are born again, once we
are a member of the body of Christ, we have specific things
that we must lay aside once and for all once, for all time
action. Now, remember this?
Sometimes people struggle in their spiritual life and
sometimes we always take a better young people in our kids.
And sometimes they struggle in their life and I don't care how
old you are. You can struggle to But
sometimes people struggle because they will not make a
break from their pest. If you had things of your past
that were not right and you participated poorly in your past
with certain people. You may have to cut those people
out of your life. You may have to cut that aspect
of your life out of the way. Okay, not last month but the
February before in Oklahoma City, I preached a sermon
holding the young people's meeting there with Cullen Smith.
One of my topics was living Godly in an ungodly world and
one of the things that I brought out was this, I said, when it
talks about mortifying, the Deeds of the flesh or putting to
death, the Deeds of the flesh, that means that we have to
mortify, or put to death, the sins of our I passed and we do
that once we are born again when we obey the gospel.
What happens though, is this, if you stop participating in a
sinful act that, you know, is wrong and you stop because, you
know, it's wrong. But inside you ruminate on the
joys and pleasures of that sin, right?
All the Happy Times, all the fun memories, right?
If you do that, you have not mortified it.
You have merely internalized, it and it's only a matter of time
before it leaks out. So what does he say?
Later, decide once, and for all time, and now he's going to get
specific malice What do you think about?
When you think about malice? It actually is defined as
wickedness Badness in quality and evil.
And, you know, really, I don't know anybody in this
congregation that, that fits There's going to be some things
that pertain to you perhaps some things that don't pertain to
you. But notice what he's saying is
this is a hundred percent of all of you is what he's saying.
Once you obey the gospel, you have to lay aside once and for
all time wickedness, Badness and quality and Evil.
It's called Mouse. What else?
The idea of mouse to is to have the disposition to injure.
Someone and that also is with retaliation.
Number two, deceit. Now, what do you think about,
deceit? Obviously, we think about things
like things that are crafting, or Sly, or underhanded.
We get that, right? I got a slip, something else in
there too, though. I got a slip, something else in
because in our society, this is what we say, we say saying a
lie. Okay, to do something.
Underhanded towards someone else is wrong.
As a terrible thing. That's dishonest.
But little white lies are, okay. Have you ever heard the term or
ever heard somebody say everybody lies.
I have everybody lies people sometimes make it a habit, make
it a way of living, make it a way of life in the words of my
dear father-in-law. I love when he's used to say
he'd say. So and so would lie if the truth
bit better. Somebody sometimes just does
that you're going to do once. And for all time action, lay
aside, malice lay aside to seek to be an honest person, get rid
of that. What else live an aboveboard
life? Got to get rid of this one too.
And, you know, over the years, you know, me very well.
Over the years, you've heard me preach on this.
You've heard me mention hypocrisy and you've heard me
say what hypocrisy is not. Okay, give me a minute.
I got to do it again, but I'm going to give you something else
today. I'm going to give you an example
that I gave in Oklahoma City last month.
I'm gonna give you an example specific example.
If you want to know, if someone is hypocritical or living a
hypocritical life, I'm going to give you a specific example,
okay? But let me talk about what it is
not It is not this, it is not that brother so-and-so or sister
such-and-such is trying to do that which is right.
But they made a mistake, they fell.
They became weak and they sinned.
That is not a hypocrite. You know what people do though?
I hate this. I just hate this.
It is the most overused and abused word in the world.
And what it is is it's used often times as an accusation to
justify their own lack of behavior.
Have you ever heard somebody say?
Oh, I don't want to go to church.
There's Hypocrites over there. Least I can stay out here.
I don't want to go, I don't want to worship with Hypocrites,
overused. I don't know, anyone in fact,
there has not been any one ever that lived?
Besides Jesus, that was perfect. So guess what?
We're all going to sin. And, you know what, I'm so
thankful because the Bible says John says we have an advocate
with the father. Jesus Christ the righteous.
All right, we're going to send so committing a sin is not a
hypocrite. What is it?
As defined? It is one answering for another
according to Yui Vine. That's what it means.
It is a play actor. That's pretending to be
something they never intended to be, that's what that means.
Now here's the example, this is what I used.
So a kid goes away to school, goes away to college.
And during the week. He's doing things that he
shouldn't do. Saturday night rolls around goes
to Big frat party. Okay, does things he shouldn't
do gets bombed out of his mind. Sunday morning, he drives to
church. He walks in bleary-eyed from the
night before I'm brother, greets him at the door and says, Hey
Brother so-and-so. How about taking the third song?
Sure. And he gets up there
bleary-eyed. And he leaves that song and he
sits down. He spends a few hours with his
Christian Brothers and Sisters in Christ.
And then he goes back to his other life in school.
That's a hypocrite. That is someone that's
pretending to be a Christian when they know they really
didn't intend to be that's the difference.
And may I say this to, you've heard me say this statement, but
I've added to it since then, I've added to it.
But I really do believe that who you really are.
Is better determined, by the way that you behave in places where
you are not known. That's number one, that's really
you. Number two, I got to add to it
though, or in places where you are the most comfortable.
That's you. That's me.
That's us. All right.
Now we understand what it is. That's just not do.
That sounds good to me. Let's lay it.
Aside. No more hypocrisy.
No problem. What about this?
What about Envy now? What is Envy me is in Via bad
thing. By definition, it is.
But let me tell you what Envy is not, okay?
Chris is sitting up front. So I'm using him as an example.
He's right there. I like Chris's truck.
I love that truck. Nice truck.
What if I said man? Chris, I sure like to have that
truck That Envy. Nope.
What if I said this man that's a great truck.
I'd sure like to have one one day.
That and me. Nope, nothing wrong with that
either. It's not a matter of, I just
would like what somebody else has one day.
That is not what that means. And sometimes people say that an
envious person is someone that looks forward to having
something. That somebody else has that's
wrong. You got to be content in
whatever state you're in, which is true spiritually.
But from a standpoint of what you might want to have, that's
not a sin that the girl was wanting that you might even say.
A one-day. I really like to have one like
that, like, to afford that one. Again, not a sin.
Here's the sin. I'm displeased with Chris
because he has prosperity and I don't get to have one.
Now, I'm guilty and me. You see what that no-good Chris
got. He got that truck.
I've been working my own self for 20 years.
I can't afford to truck like that and then be.
Yeah, that's Envy. Envy is I'm angry that he has
prospered and I have not, that's Envy.
That's what you got to get out. That's what you got to get rid
of, sole aside malice, deceit hypocrisy, envy and then here's
this one. Oh, this one.
Evil speaking. You know, this word here means
speaking down to or about another Now, I got to tell you.
The word In this passage is also found in 2nd Corinthians, 12 and
20 and it's translated as backbiting.
It Paul said, for I fear, lest when I come, I shall not find
you, such as I wish and that I shall be found by you.
Such as you do not wish, lest you be there, be contentions and
jealousies outbursts of Wrath selfish, Ambitions, back
bitings, whisperings can seats and two moles.
So the word for back bitings is the Greek word that's found in
this text, and it's only found in these two places.
It means speaking down to another person.
And you know what really is scary about that.
We've all done it. Speaking words to tear down.
I want to understand something with you today.
We are in a spiritual battle everyday.
If you're a Christian, you are in a spiritual battle every day.
You are an individual Soldier fighting in this battle.
Collectively together in the body of Christ.
We are the Army and we're fighting a war and a battle.
You know what the war is? We're fighting a battle against
the devil every day. Who wants our souls?
And you know what else? We're fighting a battle against.
The world who opposes us. Now, I'm going to tell you what,
we got the devil against us and often times, we have the world
against us. Let's not be guilty of Friendly.
Fire me. Tell you something out,
Friendly, Fire. One of the saddest things to
ever hear is when a soldier, an American Soldier goes into
battle and loses his life. It's bad enough when they lose
their life, but when they lose their life because of Friendly
Fire, that's so much worse. number of years ago, you
remember Pat, Tillman Pat Tillman was a Outstanding
football player. He had a multi-million dollar
contract to the University of well first he went to the
Arizona State University, then he went on to the Arizona
Cardinals and FL Right after 9/11, he decided I'm going to
give up my football career and I'm going to enlist.
I'm going to go into the military.
I'm going to fight for my country.
He said, And he was fully willing to die for his country.
Shortly after he was in the military.
I don't know how long it was when he was in war, shortly
thereafter. We all found out that he died.
He was killed. That he died in battle.
We all thought, But then the report came out later that he
died. From Friendly Fire.
One of his own accidentally took his life.
All I'm saying is this, we're in a battle every day, we fight
against the devil, we're fighting against the world.
Let's not do that to each other. Let's build each other up a
strengthen one. Another, let's be diligent in
doing that. So he says ladies decide once
and for all time these things that's the negative side.
Now let's talk about the positive stuff.
Here's some positive things that we can do.
First Peter, chapter 2 and verse number 2.
First of all, he says, as newborn babes in other words,
what this means is this is talking about at your earliest
infancy. It is new or recent.
So it means right from the start, right?
When you obey the gospel as newborn babes, you have a
responsibility from coming from the Waters of baptism at your
earliest infancy to do certain things.
What does God? Expect from a young Christian,
the same thing he expects from an old Christian and the same
thing he expects from a new Christian, it happens to be old
and years, here it is as newborn babes, we have to desire, a
burning desire and have a desire for the word of God. you know,
when a baby is born, I think this is emphatic in the sentence
here, when a baby is born and brought into this world The
first thing that they do is they bring the infant to its mother.
because you come in this world hungry, And that's what he's
saying. You enter into this world from a
spiritual perspective, you're doing so hungry you're doing so
with a burning desire, for the word of God, it's an intense
driving desire to know more about the word of God than you
know. Now the suggestion in our
passage is very clear that until we make a clean break with the
sins in our life, we are not going to have the desire for the
word of God that we need to. Have we will be full of the
world and not full of the word. I'm going to tell you if you
have sinful things in your life, if I have sinful things in my
life, you know, when I'm wanting to do those simple things in my
life, the last thing I want to hear is a sermon If I'm making a
choice to have sinful Pleasures in my life, that day.
The last thing I'm thinking about is picking up the word of
God and reading it, don't you see the idea is what's implied.
His you got to get rid of a sinful things.
Immediately right now, I did say that growth is Progressive, but
you have to get rid of the sinful things immediately and
just as a baby comes into this world.
If you want to be successful, have a burning desire for the
word of God. An intense hunger for the word
of God. You know, in Luke chapter 15.
You know, we we've taught we know this story.
And I'm not going to get into the story of The Prodigal.
I want you to fast forward to the story when he's with the
pigs, okay? A terrible job for a Jewish boy,
I want you to fast forward the entire story and let's focus on
the where he was with the pigs. The Bible says that he would
have eaten the husks. That were fed to the pigs.
You know what the husks do I read?
The husks kill the appetite. And number two, it perverts the
taste. Now, he said I would have eaten
that. But they wouldn't even give me
that. Stay with me on this.
We're talking about feeding on something spiritually.
That's good for you as opposed to something that is bad for
you. A husk destroys the appetite.
It also perverts. The Taste.
What I'm getting at is this, if you fill your mind with garbage,
okay, I don't care who you are. If you fill your mind with
garbage, it's going to destroy your appetite for the word of
God. And it's going to pervert.
The Taste and confuse you. I'm going to give you Bible for
that. I'm just come up with them and
give you a Bible. Notice with me a couple things
about that. What about the first Timothy
chapter? 1 verse 4, the King James calls
it myths and endless genealogies.
The new King James has rights rights it like this.
Listen, neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies,
which minister questions rather than Godly edifying which is in
faith. In other words, instead of Godly
edifying to the word of God don't feed on that garbage.
I'm going to tell you something right now.
People sometimes get confused. Because they divert their
attention from that, which is wholesome, and that which is
right, and that which is good and that which comes from God.
And they do all of their investigating in other avenues,
with other books, with other authors with other others.
And they're so confused. They're so confused.
And you know what they start doing?
They start saying this. Well I just can't see how a
loving God would do this or I just can't see that.
It really does matter. You know why?
Because they heard somebody say that.
How important is it when you come from?
The Waters of baptism, have a burning desire for the word of
God. I'm going to give you some more
Paul is saying that we must avoid the things that corrupt
our clear minds and assault and attack biblical truth in first.
Timothy 6 and 20, listen to this Timothy guard.
What was committed to your trust.
Avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of
what is falsely called knowledge.
In other words stay away from them you know the phrase their
Vain babblings is from the King. James actually means something
outside, the sacred Temple. It is contradictions of what is
falsely called, knowledge. So a practical way that I might
say that, don't let your mind be corrupted, don't do that.
Don't let your mind be corrupted.
Don't focus on those kind of things.
I'll say this too. There's going to come a time in
your life. when you obey the gospel and perhaps you were
raised in the church, And maybe your entire life you were
brought to the church. And you worshipped in the Church
of Christ, all your life. And you were brought up that way
and you were baptized for the remission of your sins and and
all of that. And I do believe that there does
come a time in a person's life when they have to own their
faith. In other words, their faith has
to become their own. That's true, no problem.
No problem yet. And then there comes time when
there are questions that people have and sometimes people start
questioning things again so far. No problem, how do we know that?
Because Paul prays those in Berea, why they heard even the
great Apostle Paul preached, and they didn't take his word for
it. They searched the Scriptures
Daily to see if those things were so So the question we know
from the Bible is not wrong. Here's the problem.
What's the source of the answer? If you have a question okay have
it pick up the Bible and find the answer?
Don't pick up some books, somewhere that some man wrote?
Don't ask your friends at no less about the Bible than you
do. Don't do that.
Seriously, pick up the word of God.
If you don't understand something, go to someone that
can help teach you the word of God.
But keep your mind free and rid your mind of all the garbage
that exist in the world today. So notice what it is.
Let's talk a little bit more about the word of God.
So it says, as newborn, babes are earliest infancy, have a
burning desire for the word of God.
The new King James says, pure and the old King James says
sincere, and the word sincere is from the word.
That means, guileless or unadulterated, it is the word.
That's often times in its Origins referred to as without
wax, okay. Now.
Couple painters in here. Remember what we used to say, I
was a painting contractor for 24 years.
We always said this a painter's putty and paint make a
carpenter. What he ain't or a carpenter
Works in strives to do his best in the painter.
Comes in Cox the wrist. Right.
You know what this word means hear this phrase without wax.
It was referred to a sculpture or a carpenter.
And when the carpenter would build something and it would
have imperfections and flaws in it, they'd had wax when a
sculptor would sculpt something out and it would have an
imperfection or a flowing it, you know, they do it, put it in
a little wax. But if the man actually
performed great work and turned out a mess, your piece and it
didn't have flaws in it. You know what they called it.
They called it without wax. That is the word sincere.
It is without wax. That's what the word of God is.
Against all the garbage in the world.
The word of God is pure. It's without wax.
You don't need anything else. It is straightforward.
Christian's can feed upon it. Notice verse 3, verse 3 now.
And what this is this is a summation of what he just said.
In other words going to give a reason why do you do it.
Why do you cast aside all those simple things.
Why do you have a burning desire for the word of God?
God, because in this verse, it says, if indeed, and if indeed
literally means since So he's sewing it up.
He says, since you have tasted what that the Lord is gracious,
you've perceived the flavor, you've enjoyed the Lord is
gracious, Hebrews, 6 and 5, same idea and have tasted the good
word of God and the powers of the age to come.
The Lord is gracious. The word gracious means kind and
benevolent. Here's the point.
Why do it since you received at the Lord is gracious and you've
tasted the beauty of that cast aside, the sinful things in your
life and have a burning desire for the word of God to grow.
That's what that means. That's what that means in
conclusion, and I'm finished. We've learned the following.
In 1st Peter 2 and verse 1, through 3.
We lay aside. Malice deceit hypocrisy Envy
evil speaking and we're going to be as newborn babes are, and
we're gonna have a burning desire for the Pure or sincere
milk of the word. Why?
That we may grow, that we may grow one final passage in my
conclusion, get this. I have an entire sermon, by the
way, on this passes. I'm going to show you.
So I'm not going to preach the whole sermon now, but I'm just
going to show you something here.
Okay, I love practical stuff. In First Peter 1 beginning in
verse 13 13, you want to be successful in living the
Christian Life. You got to understand, I'm in a
battle him in a fight, okay? So what I'm going to do, I'm
going to gird their loins of my mind.
I'm going to get my mind, right, I'm going to get prepared for
Action, that's what I'm going to do.
That's what I'm going to do. I'm not going to let these
peripheral issues derail me. I'm going to get my mind, right?
I'm going to be focused on that. What else am I going to do?
I'm going to be sober, simply meaning this, I'm going to be
serious minded about my Christianity.
That's all that. It's what else am I going to do?
I'm going to get my mind fixed. I'm going to get my mind fixed
on when Jesus is going to come back and I'll make decisions
based on how is this going to affect?
When the Lord comes back? In my relationship with him as
obedient children, I'm not going to conform myself to the former
lust, as in my ignorance. I'm not gonna do that.
I'm not going to fall back. But I'm going to live a holy
life. I'm going to live a Godly life.
In all my conduct. And may I say this?
Just because we know, we're not perfect, and we know we're going
to stumble and sin. Doesn't mean that we cannot make
the affirmation that I am not going to be anything other than
a faithful Christian for the rest of my life.
You mess up. All right, get back.
Get right straighten up. That's okay.
Let's go get back in there. But you have to make the
determine resolve in your mind. I'm not going to be anything but
a faithful Christian for the rest of my life.
If you're thinking in the back of your mind well we'll see how
it goes. Yeah.
We'll see how it goes. It's kind of like getting
married you stand there with that person.
You're making the choice. I'm going to be with you for the
rest of my life. It's a choice.
It's a choice in advance, make that in your life.
And serve God all the days of your life.
I'm finished this morning. Thank you so much for your kind
listening. We thank you for listening to
our podcast, put on by the Church of Christ at 22:15 plans.
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