1 So putting aside all evil and every kind of deceit and hypocrisy and jealousy and all slander, 2 like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, so that you might grow into salvation.
1 Peter 2:1-2 (my translation)
This verse is sometimes contrasted with Hebrews 5:13 where the recipients of the letter are chided for not being mature, for needing milk rather than solid food. The two verses are talking about rather different things, however, and thus one should take each metaphor on its own terms, even though “milk” is involved in both.
After seeing each separately, however, I think there are some lessons to be learned from bringing the two points together. So I’m going to look at that.
First, the term translated “spiritual” is not usually translated that way, though in this particular verse a wide variety of translations render it as such. I wanted to find a different word, but after looking at it for a while, I couldn’t find a good alternative, and thus bowed to the majority. Perhaps translation committees have made similar searches.
The word translated here as “spiritual” is also used in Romans 12:1, where it is rendered in a variety of other ways, generally centered around the idea of “acceptable” or “appropriate.” I would like to combine the ideas of “thoughtful,” “logically appropriate,” and “spiritual” into one word in order to translate it well for this context, but I don’t know any word that does that.
The point of the verse, however, is clear if you look carefully at the context. The meaning of words is determined by the context. This should be a warning against the process of looking in a Greek lexicon or in Strong’s or another concordance keyed to Greek words, and then trying to force one of the definitions into the verse you’re reading.
In this case, this “spiritual” milk is longed for and taken as nourishment when we put aside all the evil and deceit.
This reminds me of a military aphorism: In war, most things are simple, but never easy.
In our spiritual life, the answer can be rather simple, but it never easy.
Let’s read that into this verse. If we could put away evil, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander, we’d be able to get to that appropriate, acceptable, logical, and spiritual milk. And not only all those things, but pure!
Now go ahead. Get rid of all of those things from your life.
Unless you keep deceit–self-deceit–you’ll realize that may be simple, but definitely not easy. Or even possible.
Yes, if we could just stop deceiving ourselves, we’d be able to get to that pure, nourishing milk. It’s a simple, and hard, as that.
But Peter isn’t leaving us there. How are we going to get there? Peter, pretty good at messing things up himself, isn’t leaving you there. “If you have tasted that Christ is good” (v3), and if you’ve done that, Christ is going to the the cornerstone.
There it is. The one and only way to get to this is through Christ. And this is why we have to go back to the basic and simple. One of my authors wrote that there was one way, and only one way to tell if a doctrine is a Christian doctrine, and that was whether it was centered in Christ.
And that’s where we are right now. People often, with some validity, relate this to the study of scripture. When I identify errors in biblical interpretation, particularly my own, they usually come down to my desire for the text to say something other than what it does. Scripture is not that easy to understand, and the more we look at the big picture, the more difficult it gets. How do all these things fit together?
It’s so easy to take my agenda, my desires, and put the pieces of the puzzle together in such a way that it pleases me. The deceit involves is most often self-deceit. Self-deceit will corrupt everything you try to understand.
And that’s where we have to go back to the foundation, in Peter’s words, the cornerstone. Living cornerstone. The question is whether the interpretation you’re creating fits with that living cornerstone.
Now a short note: I’m speaking hear ultimately about application. A historical understanding of a passage as it would have been heard by those who heard it first is important, and is generally achieved by good historical methodology. But how that applies to my life and the life of the church today requires greater discernment, and this passage provides the basis for this.
Now let’s relate this to Hebrews 5:13, and the need for solid food. I think it’s a good idea to put the two things together. Getting the pure milk of the word, which results from keeping our eyes on The Living Cornerstone, is a critical foundation. It is also a foundation you can’t cover up as you go on to higher things. If you forget the basics, you’re not going anywhere good.
At the same time, we are challenged to grow, to get to the solid food, to build up. One of my concerns with Christian education is that we tend to cycle and recycle the same material over and over again. We don’t behave as though we expect anyone to grow and to go on to more advanced material. We’re stuck on the basics.
Often, we’re stuck on the basics because we aren’t getting the basics. Putting our eyes on Christ is basic, and if we aren’t getting that, more advanced things will tend to get scattered across the landscape. We get into vain arguments when we forget the basics.
So rather than being contradictory to Hebrews 5:13, the concepts of 1 Peter 2:1-2 are foundational to it. They provide the only path there is to more solid food that doesn’t involve falling back into self-deceit.
As you read, or meditate, or talk with your Lord today, keep this question in mind: Am I building on the Cornerstone? Is this a fit living stone to put into my structure?
Let Christ be the center of every thought and act.