Hungry for God’s Word

“Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation.” (1 Peter 2:2)

Being hungry for God’s Word and finding delight in God’s Word must characterize the daily life of the Christian. This is because God’s Word is not only essential for the Christian’s endurance in this fallen world, but also the Christian’s growth in His walk with the Lord. But if we are to be honest, we Christians usually exhibit the opposite of this hunger for God’s Word and delight in God’s Word. Too often, we starve ourselves of God’s Word in our day-to-day lives and focus more on our earthly preoccupations. We are just too caught up in our jobs, our families, our errands. We deceive ourselves into thinking that we just don’t have the time for it and that there are other things we need to prioritize right now. We brush off God’s reminders to have a regular intake of His Word. Sooner or later, we forget our desperate and urgent need for God’s Word. We go about thinking we are doing okay without it. And then we begin to question why we don’t seem to be growing in our spiritual walk. But is that really a question of why we aren’t maturing in the faith or a consequence of our negligence of an important spiritual discipline designed for our spiritual growth?

The apostle Peter was very clear when he exhorted the believers of his time about growing in the faith: like newborn infants, long for the spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation (1 Peter 2:2). This is a very short verse with a very simple instruction. And yet, despite its simplicity, it is something we struggle to do, or more specifically, something we struggle to do consistently.

What was Peter trying to tell us in this precious verse? Just as a newborn baby desires for and feeds on milk so that by it, the baby might grow physically, so too should we believers desire for and feed on God’s Word, so that by it we might grow spiritually. Just as we are dependent on physical food for physical health and nourishment, we are dependent on spiritual food for spiritual health and nourishment. And our spiritual food is none other than the Word of God.

One of the temptations we face as Christians is feeding and filling ourselves with things other than our spiritual food. Especially in this day and age, it is so easy to consume the “junk food” that this world readily makes available. What is saddening is that at times, the intake of this “junk food” has overpowered or even replaced the intake of our spiritual food. And even worse, it results to a decreased consumption or even no consumption at all of our spiritual food.

Dear believer, reflect on this honestly and quietly before the Lord. How has your attitude been towards God’s Word? Do you have that genuine hunger for God’s Word and true delight in God’s Word? And has God’s Word been fueling your journey of faith? Or are you struggling with an insufficient consumption of God’s Word or perhaps even a prolonged absence of God’s Word in your life? And has that resulted to what seems like a stagnancy or even backward motion in your spiritual walk? Whatever your answers may be to these questions, the commandment for us is one and the same: we must be consistently and generously fed by God’s Word. It is the only way we can be spiritually nourished and grown.

The beauty of being saturated by God’s Word is that it also grows our understanding of God’s Word, our love for God’s Word, and our trust in God’s Word. With hearts that are so prone to forgetting and wandering, we always need constant reminding and prodding from the Lord, and the very instrument He uses to do that is His Word. You see, God’s Word did not only have the power to save us, but it also has the power to continually transform us - that’s why it’s so important in our whole Christian life and that’s why we simply cannot do without it.

As we start a new year, may we pray for a renewed hunger for God’s Word. May we seek to know God more by seeing more of how He revealed His character, His works, and His promises in His Word.