Message from Jim Callahan, High School Teacher

“So put away all malice and all deceit 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 tasked that the lord is good.” 1 Peter 2:1-3 ESV


We all start the Christ life as babies in Christ. There is nothing bad or shameful about this. It is a spiritual reality that we all experience. We also are to remain as babies or children throughout our Christian lives in regard to humility (Matt. 18:1-4) and evil (1Cor 14:20). However, it is not the will of God that we remain as babies in every sense forever; we are to “grow up into salvation” (1Pt 2:2). Paul tells the Corinthian Christians “Brothers, do not be Children in your thinking (1Cor 14:20). How does Peter direct us to grow in this passage? The answer here is by the elimination of malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander in our lives. What is very interesting here is that Peter does not say that when you grow up you will be able to eliminate these things, but rather that the elimination of these things is a prerequisite to growth through the proper use of “pure spiritual milk.” May God by His grace enable us to eliminate these things in our lives.