I have a milk allergy, and no, it is not merely my imagination. I was raised to drink good, wholesome milk. In fact, when I was young, being a rural girl, we got our milk from local farmers. I can still see it in the fridge in a large, glass jar, with a screw-on lid. That good nutrition caused me to grow up strong and well. But, about 15 years ago, I began to have a lot of intestinal discomfort and, through the process of elimination (pun intended), realized that it was due to my consumption of overprocessed, hormone-laced dairy products.
Spiritually, some of us have a milk allergy! Just this morning, I ran across the daily devotional from Dr. Michael Youssef's Leading the Way ministries. The title was "The Subtle Sin of Compromise".
<crickets....>
I immediately had a spiritual allergic reaction. I didn't want to read that! Why not? Because straightaway the Holy Spirit brought to my mind an area in which I have been compromising my walk. So, I made myself read it and meditate on it anyway.
Has that ever happened to you?
Has the pastor, for instance, ever gotten up to preach and you immediately "tuned out" because you did not like the topic? Did you break out in "spiritual hives" becuase he hit a little too close to home?
Sometimes, I know I'm not going to get many hits on a particular daily blog post, simply because of the title! Holiness, for instance, does not "sell". We really don't like to be confronted with our own sins, do we?
Persistently confronting our sins, confessing them and repenting of them is essential to our growth as Christians. We must not shy away from that ongoing sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. If we do, we won't mature and will instead become spiritual "Baby Huey"s!
Today's passage is 1 Peter 2:1-3. Here it is, from the NKJV:
2 Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, 2 as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, 3 if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious.
Has the Lord been gracious to you? He has been incredibly gracious to me, because He has given me His salvation! If I want to "grow up" spiritually, then, I must desire that pure spiritual milk which is foremost found in God's Word, the Bible. In order to do that, I must push past my "hounding sins", those sins that "dog" me, day-in and day-out, (some sample ones are mentioned in verse 1) and immerse myself in God's pure, spiritual milk daily. The more you apply this spiritual discipline to your life, the more you will come to crave that delicious "milk"!
Lord God, please give us a voracious hunger and thirst for the morsels of nourishment from your Word, even if sometimes they taste like celery (which you know, Lord, I don't care for!) Please "grow us up" in our faith, so that we can represent You accurately to those who do not yet know You as Savior. In Jesus' name, amen.
Sources:
https://www.ltw.org/web/guest/read/my-devotional/-/blogs/the-subtle-sin-of-compromi-1
https://archive.org/details/Baby_Huey_Quack-A-Doodle-Doo_1950
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