Week 5 Tuesday — Walking with The Word
Tuesday: 1 Peter 2:1-3, 9 — Crave It
Tuesday: 1 Peter 2:1-3, 9 — Crave It
INTRODUCTION
Yesterday the psalmist declared his love for God’s Word with the unbridled joy of someone who has been tasting it for a long time. “Oh how I love your law!” he said — and meant it. Sweeter than honey. Meditation all the day. The overflow of a heart that has been formed by long, faithful, sometimes costly communion with Scripture.
But what if that’s not where you are? What if God’s Word still feels more like obligation than delight — more something you should do than something you long for?
Today Peter speaks directly to that place. He doesn’t shame us for spiritual immaturity. He simply points us toward the one thing that will change it — and tells us to crave it like our life depends on it. Because it does.
SCRIPTURE
¹ So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. ² Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation — ³ if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
⁹ But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
— 1 Peter 2:1-3, 9 (ESV)
REFLECTION
Put It Away
Peter opens this passage with a clearance list: malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, slander. These aren’t just moral failings — they are appetite suppressants. They crowd out the hunger for God’s Word the way junk food crowds out hunger for a real meal. You can’t crave what nourishes you if you are filling yourself with what poisons you.
This is a practical observation, not just a moral one. The psalmist could meditate on God’s Word all day because he had cultivated a life oriented toward it — holding back his feet from every evil way, refusing to turn aside from God’s rules. Monday’s delight didn’t arrive by accident. It was the fruit of cleared ground. Peter is telling us to do the same clearing work — to put away the things that dull our appetite for the Word — so that the craving has room to grow.
Notice that Peter doesn’t say eliminate these things and then come to God’s Word. He says put them away and long for the milk — simultaneously. The clearing and the craving happen together. We don’t wait until we are perfectly pure to develop an appetite for Scripture. We bring our imperfect, cluttered, half-cleared selves to it and let the Word do the rest of the work.
Like Newborn Infants
The image Peter chooses is both humbling and liberating: “Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk.” A newborn doesn’t reason its way to hunger. It doesn’t decide to want milk as a spiritual discipline. It simply craves — loudly, urgently, without embarrassment — because its life depends on what it’s craving.
This is the posture Peter is calling us to. Not the posture of a scholar who has mastered the text. Not the posture of someone who reads Scripture out of religious duty. The posture of a newborn — completely dependent, utterly hungry, unashamed about the need.
The psalmist arrived at “sweeter than honey” through years of faithful return to the Word. But it began here — with a craving. The delight of Mem is the matured form of the hunger Peter is describing. They are the same appetite at different stages of development. What Peter calls milk, the psalmist has come to call honey. The sweetness was there from the beginning. We just have to keep coming back until we can taste it.
If Indeed You Have Tasted
Verse 3 contains a phrase worth sitting with: “if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.” Peter isn’t being uncertain about whether his readers have encountered Christ. He’s connecting the craving to the tasting — reminding them that the longing for more of God’s Word flows naturally from having already experienced His goodness. You don’t crave what you have never tasted. But once you have tasted it — once God’s Word has comforted you in affliction, given you wisdom you didn’t have, kept you from a path you couldn’t see was dangerous — the craving follows.
And here is something the psalmist’s journey makes unmistakably clear: we create our appetites. Not all at once, and not always deliberately — but the things we feed on repeatedly become the things we hunger for. This works in every direction. A steady diet of distraction, noise, and lesser pleasures trains us to crave distraction, noise, and lesser pleasures. But a steady return to God’s Word — even when it feels dry, even when it feels like discipline rather than delight — slowly develops a taste that deepens into craving, and craving that matures into the love the psalmist is describing. The accumulated experience of finding God’s Word faithful, again and again across the years, is exactly what produces “sweeter than honey.” The psalmist didn’t arrive at Mem in a day. He ate his way there.
And then Peter pivots to verse 9 to show us where the craving leads: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” The Word that nourishes us privately is always preparing us for something public. We are not fed just for our own benefit. We are fed so we can proclaim. The delight of Mem and the craving of 1 Peter are both pointing toward the same destination — a life so full of God’s Word that it spills out into the world around us.
“Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation.” — This is the way.
PRAYER PROMPT
Lord, I confess that my appetite for Your Word is not always what it should be. There are things I have been filling myself with — distraction, noise, lesser pleasures — that have been dulling my hunger for what truly nourishes. Help me put those things away. Not in my own strength, but with Your help.
I want to crave Your Word the way a newborn craves milk — urgently, unashamedly, because I know my life depends on it. I have tasted Your goodness. I know it is real. Remind me of what I have already tasted today — the times Your Word gave me life, kept me from harm, comforted me when nothing else could. Let that remembrance rekindle the craving. And as You feed me, prepare me — not just to be nourished, but to proclaim the excellencies of the One who called me out of darkness into Your marvelous light. Amen.
RESPONSE
Put It Away: Peter says clearing the appetite suppressants and craving the Word happen together. Identify one specific thing — a habit, a distraction, a pattern of consumption — that has been dulling your hunger for Scripture. Write it down. Make one concrete decision today about how you will reduce its hold on your time and attention this week.
Like Newborn Infants: A newborn doesn’t work up an appetite — it simply has it. When did you last come to God’s Word with that kind of unguarded need, without agenda or obligation? Set aside ten minutes today to open Scripture with nothing to accomplish — no study plan, no notes. Just come hungry and see what God feeds you. Write down what He gives you.
If Indeed You Have Tasted: Peter connects craving to tasting — you long for more of what you have already experienced as good. Write down one specific moment when God’s Word proved itself real and faithful in your life — a time it comforted, guided, warned, or sustained you. Keep that testimony close this week. Share it with a friend you trust. Someone near you needs to hear that the Lord is good.
Here is a link to all the posts in this devotional series:
https://www.thisistheway.live/t/psalm-119