Got Milk? - Pt 1

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 tasted that the Lord is good. (1 Peter 2:1-3 ESV).

The slogan "Got Milk?" was licensed to the National Milk Processor Education Program (MilkPEP) in 1995 to use on their celebrity print ads, which, since then, have included celebrities from the fields of sports, media and entertainment posing in print advertisements sporting a "milk mustache" and employing the slogan, "Where's your mustache?" According to the Got Milk? website, the campaign has over 90% awareness in the United States and the tagline has been licensed to dairy boards across the nation since 1995. Got Milk? is a powerful property and has been licensed on a range of consumer goods. And, milk is good for you. It is no wonder that the apostle uses this image when he encourages his readers to “grow up into salvation” (v. 3). So, as we continue to read through Peter’s first letter, I want us to look at our reading today and make some important observations concerning our growth. One of the great threats to our growth toward salvation (v. 2) is what I would call spiritual fatalism. This is the belief that you are stuck with the way you are now. It is that constant buzzing voice that says, "this is all I will ever experience of God—the level of spiritual intensity that I now have is all I can have; others may have strong desires after God and may have deep experiences of personal pleasure in God, but I will never have those because, well, just because. I am not like that. That's not me." This spiritual fatalism is a feeling that genetic forces, family forces, or the forces of my past experiences and present circumstances are just too strong to allow me to ever change and become more zealous for God (cf. Titus 2:14). Spiritual fatalism is tragic in the church. It leaves people stuck. It takes away hopes and dreams of change and growth. It squashes the excitement of living, which is growth. It's like saying to a gawky child who feels like their body is all out of proportion: “Well that's the way you are, and you will always be that way.” When the fact is they are meant to grow and change. That would be tragic to convince them of this kind of physical fatalism. So it is with the spirit. Only spiritual fatalism is much worse. Because greater things are at stake, and because we never do get to a point where we've arrived at the final stature like we do in our physical bodies. It robs us of our passion for life. It negates the abundance in life Jesus has intended for us. The answer is “pure spiritual milk”! We’ll explore how to get that more. Today, commit yourself to drinking it when you find it!