Amen. Let's take our Bibles. Let's open to 1 Peter chapter 2 for just a minute. 1 Peter chapter 2. I'll tell you what we're doing there in just a moment, but as you're turning there, I love the passage we're going to study today. It's all about maturity. Now, back in the early 2000s, the late 90s, there was a very famous advertising campaign that was running viral. And I asked our staff if they knew what I was talking about. How many of you remember the Gott Milk commercials? How many of you remember these? Yes? About half the room. I asked our young staff if they remembered the Gott Milk commercial. They looked at me like with blank stares. They had no idea what I was talking about. And so I was just sharing with them, you know, there were this series of advertising that was going on in the 90s and the early 2000s, and it all came about because California experienced this decline of milk sales. It went down like by 3%, and so the dairy farmers were losing their mind, and uh they were losing their sales as well, they were losing their money. But uh they decided to run a series of commercials. And the the the milk cells skyrocketed by like 7% uh athletes. Everyone was drinking milk, and and that's just part of what was happening in the 90s and 2000s. There was one commercial where a guy was sitting in a library and he had just made the perfect peanut butter sandwich. How many of you remember this? And uh he he consumes it, he eats it, and it's just peanut butter is all over his mouth, and and and all of a sudden he gets a phone call from the radio, and the radio says, You'll win a cash prize if you can just answer the question, who shot Alexander Hamilton? And he's sitting in the library, it's on the wall, the name, Aaron Burr, right there. He's got the answer, but he can't say it. And he says, Hold on, let me just get some milk, and he has no milk. And he reaches for it, he tries to pronounce it, he can't, and he loses the contest, and he's just disappointed, and then it ends with, got milk, right? Uh there's another one, and there's a series of these, another one where a family's sitting around a breakfast table, and the mom says, Drink your milk, you need strong bones, and the kids go back and forth. We don't want to. Milk's for babies. Yeah, babies. And they say, Our neighbor, Mr. Abernathy, he doesn't drink milk, and he's just fine, and they show this picture of him lifting a wheelbarrow, and right then, as soon as he lifts up, his arms pop off. And uh and they all scream, and and then it ends with them just chugging down milk uh aggressively, right? Now, I love those commercials, I think they're helpful because that's one of the pictures that we get in the New Testament in several books. The concept of milk doing a body good, milk making you strong, and milk, of course, referring to the Word of God. And it speaks to us that you and I need to do the daily things that make us strong, that make us mature. And that's part of the problem we encounter today. Part of the problem is we tend to neglect God's growth formula. We tend to neglect God's clear instruction for how to grow in the Christian life. I got in my son's car the other day, turned on the radio, and I heard this song. It went like this there's dust on our Bibles, brand new iPhones, and we wonder why we feel this way. And I was I was challenged by that, moved by that. Why do we feel this way? Why is it that often in life we feel so messed up? Well, a lot of times it's because we've rejected God's clear path towards growth. And it's not just neglect. Oftentimes we substitute. We we substitute knowledge for growth. And we ignore the things we're supposed to put off. We ignore the things, the challenges. When God brings a challenge into our life, when God brings something to change us, we ignore that and we say we just want more knowledge. And so we we consume mounds of Bible studies and books, but we're not addressing some strongholds in our life that God challenges us with. We don't address the things that God wants us to change. We neglect his plan for growth. We substitute his plan for growth. Worst of all, we live in a society that is absolutely against your maturity. Do you realize that today you live in a world that is dead set on you not taking your next steps with Christ? The world wants to distract you from this. The world wants to keep you from taking steps towards maturity. In fact, this is a world filled with distractions. Now, as I'm gonna say what I'm about to say, with I have two of my kids in sports, alright? So I'm gonna say this with two young people in sports. My son plays basketball, my daughter is playing lacrosse right now, so I just want you to know we're in the midst of this. We had a director's meeting this week, and one of our guys said, I hate baseball. And I said, Well, where's that coming from? What's that about? And and we had this discussion on how sometimes sports even can distract us and pull us away from God's goodness and from growth. And and and we we have we have agreed with this cultural lie that church attendance, serving, and reading is optional. Now, if you can't say amen, say ouch. Ouch. And I say that as a father with kids in sports, and we enjoy it. But we have to strive to keep the first thing the first thing. That's why we also provide an evening service. So if you're watching this online, there's still time. You can come tonight at five o'clock. But what we tend to do is we tend to substitute for maturity, we tend to give in to the cultural push against our maturity. And we ignore God's clear plans for our maturity. And that's why Christians today are being pummeled out there. Christians today are hurting, they're unstable, they're not mature. So, what I want to do for the next few weeks is I want to pause. We're gonna get to the book of Acts next. But before we do that, I want to give just a mini-series on maturity. I want us to grow in grace. And so today I want us to look in 1 Peter chapter 2, verses 1 to 3. It's a new series I've entitled Grow Up, and that's straight out of the text we're studying today. And today I want us to just look at the growth formula. The passage before us is one long Greek sentence. And really what it contains is a step-by-step plan that if you would take your next steps with the Lord, if you would really strive to mature, you would do the things in this passage. And so let's take our Bibles, let's stand together in honor of God's Word. 1 Peter chapter 2, a one-sized fits-all formula that would produce maturity in each of our lives. It says this. So put away all malice and all deceit and all and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. Today, very, very simple, big idea. Three points, three words, and where all of it is to show you how to move. We need to make this move from how much you know to how much you grow. You see, the Christian life is a growing life. And today I want to give you three words for three verses. This is a growth plan. First of all, I want us to remove the sin that stunts you. I like that word, it stunts you. See, there are stunting sins in your life, and a lot of times what we tend to do is we tend to say, I'm going to take in more and more Bible studies, more and more podcasts, but we neglect the things in our life that are actually stunting our growth. We can't neglect those things. And so what we see in that first verse is five relational sins, and we've got to address those one by one. Second, we we need to return to the scripture that grows you. In fact, that's the word for the milk in this passage, that milk, as we take in a steady diet of the milk of God's word, what happens over time is we grow. And lastly, we need to remember the savior who delights you. Now, what's so interesting is that the word in this passage for uh for savior or delight or savor, it's actually, it's actually very similar to the word for Christ. It's the idea that that you are to savor the Savior. You're to Sor Christ. It's a play on words. And this is a beautiful passage. It it shows us that if you would delight yourself in Christ, if you would address sin in your life, if you would draw near to this book and and all of the expressions of this book, what would happen is there would be growth in your life. And why does this matter? You'd be ready for the next trial. You'd be ready for the next trouble. You'd be prepared for when trouble comes your way. And so may God bless the reading and the preaching of his word. May God bless all of you. You may be seated. I want you to notice this first section. It really addresses abiding sin in each of our lives. You see, there are some sins that we just give a pass to. And it begins with the word so. Do you see it in your Bible? Now, what you need to know about the Greek language is that when you see that word so, you could translate it since or you could translate it therefore. And what it does is it connects this passage to the previous passage. And in the previous passage, look specifically at verse 23. I want you to notice in chapter 1, verse 23, it's basically since you've been born again. Since you are a new creation in Christ, since God's grace has come to you, there's a new reality, there's a new appropriate behavior for you. It's this is who you are. There's a whole new you. Therefore, and then comes the imperative verb, put away. The command is to put away these relational, stunting words. In fact, this word is so interesting for it to put away. It's actually the word for taking off a garment, to take off your clothing. The New Testament loves this word. In fact, in Acts chapter 7, whenever they were stoning Stephen, at the stoning of Stephen, they laid their garments. They took their garments off and they laid them at the feet of a man named Saul. Remember that? Paul will pick up this language throughout the New Testament. In fact, the author of Hebrews will as well. If you look at Hebrews chapter 12, verse 1, it says that we need to, in light of this great cloud of witnesses, we need to lay aside every weight and sin. Now I love this passage because what it shows us is that the Christian life is a wise life. It's decisions that lead to maturity. It's laying aside sin. No duh, of course. But also every weight. There are some things that may not be sins, but they're just not helpful. They're actually hindering your growth. And so every father is to survey the family life and say, what is it that we're doing that is not sin, but we're busy with all the wrong things? We're busy in all the wrong areas. And it's like, what am I keeping the first thing first? Or as it's been said, the main thing is to keep the main thing, the main thing. See, sometimes, sometimes we're we're very aggressive towards sin, but but we're not as aggressive when it comes to these weights that are tying us up and keeping us from growing. The words used all over Paul's letters. In fact, if you if you write this one down, it's used over in Colossians chapter 3, verse 8. Put it away. Same word. It's the word for taking off a garment. Put them all away. Anger, wrath, malice, slander. It's used in Ephesians chapter 4, verse 22. Put off the old self, which belongs to the former manner of life. Paul loved using this word. It's to undress, to take off these old clothes, these grave clothes. Take off the grave clothes, put on the grace clothes. In Romans chapter 13, verse 12, cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. That's our word. It is to remove the old life like a set of dirty clothes. Now, this was so important to the New Testament church. In fact, in the first century, it's how they did baptism. In the very early church, one of the ways they would do baptism is they would they would derobe, they would declothe the person being baptized. And they would go into the waters without clothes on. Now, if we did that today, yes, we would make the news. I also think maybe our baptism numbers would go down significantly. We're not doing that. But what they would do, this is significant. When the person came up out of the water in the early church, they would often take white robes and they would put them on the person symbolically. Well, that's very powerful. It's the idea that the old life is gone like a like a dirty robe, and the new life has come. And with the new life, there's a new way of doing things. And so that that's the that's the language we see here in this passage, and it's so important to see it that way. Do you see your old life as out of style? Like, do you see the things you used to do as not matching up with what God has proclaimed your life should be? I think it's so important to think through your life and make that determination. You know, when I go home, I love doing this. I love grabbing my parents' old wedding album off of the shelf. And the only word, as I look at how they dressed back then, the only word that I can think of for mom and dad is the word groovy. I mean, they were cool cats, alright? They were groovy. Dad and all the guys have this big mustache like Tom Selleck, you know what I'm talking about? And and then they had the bell bottoms and they had this shirt. The dudes had a shirt with like ruffles all over it. And here's here's what I promise is true today. You will not find that shirt in the men's section. Uh alright? Why? It's just out of place. It's it's out of style. People don't dress that way unless you're prince, right? People don't dress that way anymore. And that's how we're to look at our old life. I'm supposed to look at the things I used to do, the people I used to hang out with, the thoughts, the activities of the old life, and say, that's out of style. It doesn't match up with the reality of how God has now clothed me. And so all of you need to make that transition. Is the old life out of style? Is there a new life that has come for you? Now notice with me that he's gonna give us five things, and I'm just gonna give them to you as a list. Write these things down. Peter is saying the old life is unbecoming, it doesn't match up. What are the five things? They're all relational. And so take this in. If you are blowing up relationships in your life, if you are, if you are seeing relational turmoil, if you're seeing all sorts of relational fights, you may be focused on the wrong thing. You may be going to all the Bible studies in the world, but what God wants you to do is take some steps towards healing in your relationships. Five relational symptoms and sins that stunt your maturity. Write it down. Number one, malice. What in the world is malice? I don't use that word anymore. That's not really a popular word in the English language. Malice, what is that? Some of your Bibles may say wickedness. The idea for malice is that you really are planning evil or you want evil or you have an unforgiving spirit towards someone. That's going to hinder your growth. Maybe they've wronged you. Maybe you've experienced an event where there's someone, a name right now that comes up in your hearts, and you're saying, I can't stand that person. You can't grow if you have evil in your heart towards someone else. It's going to hinder your growth. Why? Well, because that's your desires and God's desires are now at odds. God desires their good. God desires their responsiveness. God desires their change. God desires their blessing. And yet you do not. And so your desires are dead set against God's desires. You're never going to grow in that situation. It's like the two shopkeepers in the Jewish culture. They hated each other, or they had booths right next to each other. Have you heard this illustration? Well, old Jewish fable. An angel comes to one of them and says, Look, I'm going to give you whatever you ask for. You can wish for something, and I'm going to grant your wish. But whatever I give you, I'm going to give your neighbor double. I'm going to give the guy keeping shop next to you twice as much. So the guy thought about it for a second and said, I'd like to be blind in one eye. See, when you have malice in your heart towards your neighbor, you're dead set against the purpose and plans of God, and you're only hurting yourself. You're actually destroying yourself. You know, I have to make the transition to see that. You and I have to scan the battlefield of our life. And is there someone that I need to forgive this morning? Is there someone that I need to ask God's blessing for? I routinely do this when someone has hurt me. I I always try to pray this prayer, Lord, I pray for them and bless them. And I pray that you would bless them, bless their life, bless their ministry, bless their friendships, bless their relationships. Can you have are you at the point where you pray for your enemies yet? That's something God's called you to do. You'll never be right. You'll never get back on the growth path until you're doing that, putting aside all malice. Number two, write this one down. Deceit. Deceit. We're called to speak the truth in love with each other, to put off lying, to put off the guile or sneakiness. That's the word. It's guile, it's trickery, it's cunning. In fact, the Greek word is fascinating. It's actually the word for a baited hook. It's the idea that you're wanting to bless a fish, you're going to give it a snack, but then in the end you want to eat it. You're tricking it. You're to put that off. You're not to have dishonesty. You'll never grow if you're not truthful. In fact, the lies will continue to pile up inside of you. You'll feel nothing but guilt. You'll feel nothing but sorrow. It will stop you in your attracts from growing. Number three, write this one down. Hypocrisy. In fact, this one's interesting. It's actually plural. Hypocrisies. There's areas of your life where we can be two-faced. In fact, the the word for hypocrisy, this is in the ancient Greek world, one of the things they used to do is they'd have two different masks. And so the play actor would have a first mass that was happy, a second mass that was sad, and often the same actor would play both parts, and they would just lift up the new mask, and they'd lift up the new mask, and they would play two marks. And that's where we get the term you're two-faced. Is there some area of your life where there's hypocrisy? Is there some area of your life where there is a two-facedness, where maybe you're one way on Sunday morning and you're yet another way in your home Monday through Friday? Or another way at work? I had this conversation with a friend just this week. And they said, you know, years ago, we worked for somebody and they were leading a small group at our previous church, and they were godly and they were wonderful, and we went to work for them, and they were underhanded, and they were dishonest, and they were mean-spirited. And it's amazing how we can compartmentalize our lives. You and I, we all do that. And the question is: who are you in the unguarded moments of your life? Who you are at home is who you are. In fact, somebody said it so well. They said, you should be so uh consistent that you could sell the family parrot to the town gossip and be just fine. I like that a lot. You and I need to not have two faces. You and I need to have not a compartmentalization of our life. You and I we've got to strive to have consistency, to put off the hypocrisies of life. Number four, the word envy, again, plural. Why? Because there's lots of places to envy people. Lots of envies that we can have. It's not the same thing as jealousy. It's not the same thing as wanting what other people have. It's it's focused more on the person. It's it's it's I don't want them to have it. It's focused not on an object, but on a person. Uh I think it's Merida who who calls it resentment dressed up as concern. Resentment dressed up as concern. I'm just concerned for them. No, you don't want them to have something. You don't want them to have the blessing. That's why in 1 Corinthians 13 it says love does not envy. Called to put away envy, and Peter's saying that's a hindrance in your life. Is there someone where you want their house, you want their life, you want their fill in the blank? Number five, finally, slander. Slander. Worst for last. Slander in the Old Testament is equal to going out against someone's life. Now we need to understand the word here. The word in the Greek is uh katalalia. Now you can say that a few times if you want. Uh it's kind of like an omomonopeia. Remember that word from your childhood from English class? It's an omnomonopeatic word. Bees buzz, cars crash. The idea here is that this is the wagging of the tongue. It's la la la la la, right? You can hear it in the Greek. It's it's the wagging. This one is one of the most destructive of all. Why is it so destructive? Well, if you've ever been slandered, the hardest part about slander is that someone speaks out against you. They usually speak to the most vulnerable and the weakest person in the church, hoping that they'll believe it, and that person never follows up for clarification. That's why it destroys relationships without a conversation. In Proverbs and in the Psalms, it's equal to murder. It's considered going out against the life of your neighbor. It's a very powerful image. It's one of the sins that God says, I hate. Barclay calls it this. He says it masquerades as godliness. He says this. He says, the sin of those, it's the sin of those who meet in corners and gather in little groups to pass along confidential tidbits and whispered information which destroy reputations and destroy good names. It's often masquerading as a good thing. Well, I'm just burdened. I need to share my heart with someone. I need counsel. I just want to talk about philosophy with you. I'm concerned. Let me share a concern. Let me share a prayer request. And Peter comes and he says, all of that is out of style. It breaks the unity. It sows discord in the body of Christ. It stirs up the body. That's why Titus 3 says that the elders are to rebuke a person once, then twice, then have nothing to do with someone who's stirring up disunity. It's the same word, by the way, that was that was used of the New Testament church in their persecution. In fact, we see it in 1 Peter 2, 1 Peter 3. The idea is that the church was being lied about, the church was being sinned against with slander. And yet we do this to each other, and it's a hindrance to our growth. Now I want you to notice this. Notice the repetition in our passage of both plurals and the word all. You see that? Notice it says you're to put away all malice, all deceit, hypocrisies, envies, and all slander. And the idea is not even a little bit of this. You're to not let any of this rain in your life. You're to put it away with extreme prejudice. You're to be done with it. That's the old life. Now, when I was studying this week, I found something very fascinating. Duke University did a study on why people fail their diets. Now, this is an interesting study. This is a helpful study. Why is it that it doesn't work out for people? And Duke concluded that based on mounds of research, it wasn't that one person was stronger, it was what is that they were smarter. The people who were successful in their diets, what did they do? They said the problem's not willpower, it's environmental. What they did is they went through the house and they got things out of the house. They took the trash can and they started throwing stuff in. And they said, if it's in the environment, what happens is you're going to tend to give in to the temptation. It's a powerful study. In fact, I was reading it, I was like, yeah, that's exactly what I had to do in my life. I was, when I got to Central, I was uh 65 pounds heavier, and someone said, That's the guy who ate Matt Shackelford. Uh it was it was a bad situation. And I I remember Ashley and I, we would go to the pantry and we just started throwing stuff away processed foods, sugar, anything we could to get it out of our lives. Probably could do that again. It has a way of sneaking into the house. Don't you agree? Stuff just like, how did this get here? I'm glad it's here. But I don't know how it got here. It just magically appeared. My kids bring home candy from children's ministry. Next thing you know, they find me in the corner, just eating it. You know what I mean? It's just like, how did this get here? And why am I eating it? No, you you've got to you've got to get rid of the temptation. You've got to get it out of your life. And so God's call to you is to experience radical amputation. Something causes you to sin, go scorched earth on it, get it out of your life. Something causes you to fall. If something's hindering your growth, you've got to go scorched earth. You've got to get it out of your life. Put it out. Put it off. And so this week, your assignment is to empty the pantry. As you survey these five relational sins, here's what I want you to do. Look down at your Bible, and I want you to just make a dot or make a circle or make a note. Which one of these five? Pick one or two. Which one of these relational sins do you need to put off this week? Which one's most active in your life? Don't continue to wear the things that are out of style. Why? Because it is going to stunt every bit of growth that God is trying to do in your life. And so put off. And put off. And put off. Number two, if you're taking notes, we need to return to the scripture. You see, it's the scripture that grows us. Do you see the alternative? You see, first it's the put off, now we have the put on. Now we have the take in. You see, there are some people who just naturally gravitate towards drama and conflict and fighting. They want to be in the midst of all of the relational trouble. Those people are consumed with the wrong thing. You need to be consumed with what grows you. Notice verse 2. The godliest person's consumed with this. This is what they're doing with their life. Like newborn infants, long for pure, the pure spiritual milk. Now, what is the milk? This is an easy proof. When Paul or the author of Hebrews or Peter speak about milk, it's always in reference somehow to the Word of God. It's the Word of God. In fact, flip back with me. Look in chapter 1 of Peter, chapter 1. 1 Peter 1, verse 23 says, Since you've been born again, how? Not a perishable seed, but imperishable. Through the living and abiding word of God. And then it goes into verse 25. The word of the Lord, what? It remains forever. The good news that was preached to you. The whole context leading up to chapter 2 is the word of God, the salvation of God's people, and the effects that the preaching of the Bible, the preaching that God's word had on them. So the Corinthians, Paul will pick up this image of milk and he'll say, Look, milk is good for children, but by now you should be full grown. You're still stuck on milk. I want to feed you steak, but you're on milk. And that's how Paul will use that word there. The author of Hebrews, we'll see next week, also uses this term for milk. It's the idea that the Word of God nourishes us. And like newborn infants, we're to do one thing: long for it. That's what you have to do. You're to long for it. You're to crave it. You're to desire it. So much of life comes back to pray and read your Bible. Like, isn't it amazing? You hear that when you're just a kid. You hear that when you're growing up or in youth group. Pray, read your Bible. So much of life just comes back to those simple principles. He says, do this like a baby. Now, I made a huge mistake this past week. I um told my kids, if they, my young kids, my my littles, that if they will start putting themselves to bed, uh, if they do it seven days in a row, which gives us a good portion of our night back, uh, I'll get them something from the store. We'll go and shop and get a toy. And they did it. Seven days in a row, my littles put themselves to sleep. And so we went to the store and we bought uh a very realistic baby doll for my daughter, Lydia. And um this was a terrible purchase. I just want to confess that to you. This baby doll is, well, it's very realistic. It came with a bottle, it came with a pacifier, and it came with a baby monitor. This thing cries all the time. Drives me crazy. It may come up missing. I'm just gonna tell you. Um, but I mean, this baby doll, we were at uh Pete and Jill's house the other night, and and my daughter went out to play, and and and they laid uh they laid the baby doll uh in my lap, and this thing would not be quiet. I mean, it just kept going. And so here I am, 42 years old, and and here I am trying to feed this baby a bottle to silence the baby. And yet I could not get it quiet. It just kept going, and it was going from the baby and the monitor, and it was just crying, crying, crying. It wanted one thing, and I could not silence its cries. Eventually, I had to like take out the battery, turn out the back, and just try to get this thing silent. And eventually, one of my kids helped me uh get it quiet, but but that's the thing about babies. Babies want one thing in life. They want milk. They want milk, and and they're not satisfied until they get that one thing. What this passage is saying is be like a baby in that sense. Be hungry. Like as you look at your life, does your life reflect that? Like you're a hunger for God's word? Like Sunday morning, the glory of Sunday morning is here. I'm ready to hear the word of God. Maybe I even read the passage a few minutes before. Maybe I even prepare the night before as I'm laying out my clothes and getting ready to come to church, that I'm preparing my heart to receive the word of God. That this is the high point of my week. You see, I tell young preachers this all the time. Don't neglect the consideration of the cumulative effect of your preaching over time. I can't hit every single subject of every person in this room. That's why that's why we do expositional preaching. Our norm is to work through books of the Bible, passages at a time, and eventually we hit a lot of different topics. We let the passage determine the topic. But over time, what happens is when I'm giving you that diet week in and week out, what happens is you grow up. I mean, I had this realization just the other day. I was walking through my hallway and I was looking at pictures of my kids from just like last year. Got them hanging up there in the hallway. And man, they've changed. Caleb and Sayla came down for for dinner the other night. Sayla is as tall as her mom. Caleb is nearly as tall as me. And I'm looking at them and I'm just like, how did this happen? I mean, another year has passed, and look how tall they are. Look how much they've grown. Let me tell you how it happened. Are you ready? They kept eating my food. They just kept coming back to the table. Dinner time, and they show up again. Dinner time, breakfast time, lunchtime, and they just keep coming. And they are so expensive. Do you understand that? And it's like they just keep coming and they're eating more. And they're eating more, and they're growing more. Friends, how is it that you grow? How is it that you spiritually you just keep coming back for the word of God? You keep coming to dinner. That's why the Puritans called Sunday the market day for the soul. It's the market day. This is the day when you gather groceries for the week. If you do one thing, come to church and sit under the word of God. If you do two things, read your Bible every day, sit under the Word of God. If you do three things, read your Bible every day, come to church, be in a small group to talk about the Word of God. That's how you grow. That's the growth formula. It's to have your life saturated by the scriptures, and the result is that you grow up. That's the series title. That you would grow up what? Into salvation. That you would lay hold of this salvation that is so glorious. See, the problem of our day, friends, is that we listen to all sorts of material. We listen to all sorts of podcasts, we listen to Joe Rogan, we listen to Theo Vaughn as a culture, we listen to all these different voices, but but how many voices are we taking in that match up to the Word of God? How many voices are we taking in that grow us spiritually? Dusty Bibles, brand new iPhones. I wonder why we feel this way. No wonder why we feel this way. We've got to return to the scriptures. Lastly, and I want you to see this as really the heartbeat behind the whole passage. Our third point, we need to remember the Savior who delights you. We need to remove sin. That's for sure. It stunts you. If you have relational sins, it stunts you. We need to return to the scripture. That's gonna grow you. That's going to be like steroids to your walk with the Lord. But lastly, we've got to remember the Savior who delights you. My favorite thing when I take my kids for ice cream is to go to the counter and to get the little spoon. Who knows what that little spoon is for? It's just some samples. Could I try that one? And that one, and that one, and that one, and that one, and that one. Amen. And the whole point is you find one where it's perfect and you want more. That's the concept. He's going to say this line. It says, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. Now, this is a conditional clause, but it's not like in a negative. This is not doubt that they have believed. In fact, in chapter 1, he makes it clear. He believes they have been born again. This isn't like goading them into growth. This is believing that growth is the natural response of the one who has believed the gospel. In fact, that word if, again, translated could be sense. Since you have tasted. Since indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. It's logical. That if you've tasted of the goodness of God, you're going to want more and more and more. In fact, in James chapter 3, we see the result of sinful cravings. You're going to end up in all sorts of relational fights, and you're going to end up in all sorts of problems if you have sinful cravings. But if you have godly cravings, holy cravings, it's going to bring new life to you. It's going to have a cumulative effect of bringing life to others. Just this week, my son, he just finished his cooking class with Kyle and he made pancakes. He walked into my office with a stack of pancakes. And I'm telling you, folks, listen. He walked in and he started just describing these glorious pancakes. He said, Dad, you are going to love this. I said, Okay, tell me more. He said, These pancakes are crispy along the outside. So it's got just this light crunch, but on the inside, it's fluffy and thick. These are the best pancakes. You are going to love the pancakes. And for the next like five minutes, we both hovered over this plate and devoured it like a couple of animals. But what's the point? He was quite convincing. He had tasted, and his taste, his excitement, led to my excitement. And it's your Christian life is like that. You will never be excited to share your faith. You'll never be excited to do ministry until you are routinely taking in the goodness of God. It motivates every part of your life. It motivates every conversation that you have. It motivates every temperament, every display of excitement. And it makes you compelling. If you've tasted that he's good. And so the question is: have you tasted the goodness of God? This passage builds on Psalm 34, verse 8. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Psalm 119 is going to hammer this home. In fact, if you if you ever wonder, is there a chapter that talks about all the benefits of the Word of God and how glorious it is, how tasteful it is. Psalm 119 hammers this concept. Verse 16, it says, I will delight in your statues. Verse 24, your testimonies are my delight, my counselors. Verse 35, lead me in the path of your commandments, for I delight in it. Verse 47, I find my delight in your commandments, which I love. Verse 97, Oh, I love your law. Verse 103, how sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey. Verse 148, my eyes, get this, my eyes awake before the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promise. What this is saying is, your word, it's better than sleep. It's worth getting out of bed for before the sun comes up. It's that good. And we're to let the memory of the delight of Jesus push us to resolve relational conflict, put it away, to draw near to the Bible, to saturate our lives with biblical instruction. That means showing up in this place. That means routinely putting ourselves under the Word of God, routinely hearing God's word in our hearts. It transforms us. I heard this week a story of Lee Strobel's interview with one of the most famous evangelical evangelists of all time. You see, there's there's two evangelists here. Do you see the one on the right? You may recognize him. He's a very well-known man. His name's Billy Graham. This is young Billy Graham. This was in a time where they had TV shows like on NBC, and some of the major broadcasting networks were actually proclaiming the gospel to the masses. Unbelievable how far we've come. The guy on the left is a guy named Charles Chuck Templeton. And the story is stunning as you think about the path of these two men. Templeton was more successful at the time. Better evangelists. Templeton was powerful and sought after. One of the national speakers. Templeton's life didn't end well, though. Years ago he left the faith. After having preached to some, he left it. Stopped believing. Charles Templeton, as he renounced his faith, he went a step further and he wrote a book called Saying Farewell to God. One of the saddest books that you'll ever read. Lee Strobel approached him for an interview, and Lee Strobel was doing his research on Christianity, and Lee Strobel was in the process of becoming a Christian, and he did this interview with Charles Templeton. The interview ended with Templeton asking the question: who is Jesus? Good question. Unsure what that question would bring about, Templeton's body language shifted. I mean, he had this antagonistic tone towards God, and he doesn't believe in God anymore. And I think Strobel was absolutely stunned when he heard the answer. Who is Jesus? Templeton paused and said, Jesus? Jesus is the greatest man there's ever been. The greatest human being who's ever lived. Strobel was taken aback. He said, It sounds like you really care about Jesus. It sounds like you even love him. Templeton uttered the most unexpected words that one can imagine. And his voice kind of cracked. He said, I miss him. I miss him. Stroble said that tears flooded his eyes, and he turned his head downward and he raised his left hand to shield his face. His shoulders kind of fell as he wept. This passage reminds us of the delight of Jesus Christ. In some way, Templeton tasted of the delight of Jesus, and we don't know the end of his story. We don't know if at the end of his life he came back and became a believer. No one knows. You don't know, I don't know. But some of you in this room have gone from God. You have said your own version of farewell to God. You have said your own version of farewell and goodbye. I'll live my life the way I want to live. Here's what I want to compel you with. Jesus is delightful. Jesus is delight to the soul. And Jesus is calling you back. Have you been running? Have you been far from God? Have you been neglecting his voice in your life? Take this as that moment. Jesus is calling you home. Jesus is saying, it's time to come home. Taste and see that he's good. Remember that summer camp that you went to where you first tasted the goodness of God. And maybe you left for a time and You've been wandering. And God's voice is saying, Son, it's time to come home. Daughter, it's time to return. Your heads bowed with your eyes closed as the team comes out. What's your action plan as you leave this place today? What is it that God wants to do in you? I can think of several. For some of you, maybe you feel the conviction that there is a relational sin to repent of. Maybe there's a name that's coming to mind right now that God's saying, look, I want their good. I want their blessing. I want them to experience true life in Christ. And you have desires set against my desires. Maybe you need to just say these words in your heart right now. God, I forgive them. I'm letting it go. In fact, love covers a multitude of sins. Lord, I'm choosing in this moment to let love cover the offense. Some of you may need to lay your gift at the altar and go and make it right, even today. But you'll never grow with God. You'll never grow in grace. And guys, here's the thing about grace. Here's what's so powerful about grace. You don't have to deny those things in your life. You don't just say, oh, that's not me. It's not really that bad in my life. Here's the thing about God's grace. You need to feel this. Grace allows you to come out of hiding. Guys, we're a grace church. We emphasize the grace of God because grace frees us to not deny what we're seeing in our life, but to take God's side against our sin. And so do you see a relational sin that God's calling you to repent of? Maybe it's katalalia, maybe it's the wagging of the tongue, maybe it's maybe it's slander. Where you tend to speak against everyone and everything, and you need to repent of that. Maybe for others of you, you'll never start growing, and today you realize that unless you start taking in the Word of God. Maybe there's a commitment to make. Maybe you need to make a new commitment to start sitting under the Word of God more regularly. If you go to church twice a month, you start coming four times, three times a month. If you have a Bible study once a week, maybe this week you could try for five days. Maybe this week. You get into a small group. Reach out to Pastor Greg and say, you know what? There's a small group that I need to be in. Help me find it. I need to be under the Word of God. I'll never grow unless I'm being challenged by God's word daily. Maybe for others of you, you just need to remember the goodness of God, how good he is, that he forgives sin. He casts your sin as far as the east is from the west. Remember his goodness and come back to him. That's going to change every part of your life. And today, if you're not a believer, this passage is a delightful invitation. This passage reminds us that Jesus is the greatest treasure. Jesus is the greatest pleasure in all of life. This passage reminds us that there is satisfaction in no other name, there's salvation in no other name. There is no other name given to men by which we must be saved. That Jesus is the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father except through Him. And if you came to Him today, He would delight your soul. Why not repent, turn from your sin, and trust in Christ. Father, thank you for this passage. Thank you for a growth formula. A true plan to help us take our next steps with you. Lord, I pray all across this room decisions are being made. I pray that this wouldn't be just another sermon. But Father, it would be and it would represent nourishment to our bodies. It would represent nourishment to our souls. Father, that we would grow up into the salvation that you've given us. You've given us salvation. Now, Lord, may our lives represent the fullness of that salvation. May we look like the thing you're making us into. So, Lord, I pray this over us all. I pray this over myself. Mature us in Christ today. We love you. We pray you. We pray these things to you. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.