Nourishing food will cause transformation only when it is given to something living and organic. If you try to give nourishment to something lifeless and inorganic, that thing would become corrupt and unclean. It is impossible for something lifeless to receive help from nourishing food. Obviously it is useless to try to feed a dead person. No doubt, the guileless milk in the word can feed us and nourish us. However, it can only feed and nourish those who are living and organic. Without life, there would not be anything in us to cooperate with this nourishment.
Peter begins 2:2 with the words “As newborn babes.” The word “newborn” indicates a living organism. A newborn babe is living and organic. As such newborn babes, we need to drink the guileless milk of the word. Then the milk will afford us living, organic nourishment. Spontaneously the life within us will work together with the nourishment of the milk so that we may grow. However, if we did not have a living, organic element in us through regeneration, the nourishment in the milk of the word would not have any effect, for there would not be any cooperation on our part.
In 1:23 Peter says that we have been regenerated. In 2:2 he urges us to be as newborn babes longing for milk. Both regeneration in 1:23 and the newborn babes in 2:2 point to the same matter—regeneration with the divine life. This regeneration is the base for our growth in life and for the purification of our inner being. We all have within us the divine life that we received in regeneration as the basis of all spiritual growth. In order to grow and be purified, we must have this base. Therefore, as newborn babes, we should long for the guileless milk of the word so that by it we may grow unto transformation.
In verse 3 Peter continues, “If you have tasted that the Lord is good.” The Lord can be tasted, and His taste is pleasant and good. If we have tasted Him, we shall long for the nourishing milk in His word. The Greek word rendered “good” in this verse also means pleasant, kind.
Peter was certain that the ones to whom he was writing had been regenerated. But he was not sure that they had tasted the Lord. For this reason he says, “If you have tasted that the Lord is good.” It was certain that the believers were newborn babes, but as verse 3 indicates, some of them may not have tasted that the Lord is good. Today millions of believers have truly been regenerated, but a great many have never tasted that the Lord is good.
Let us use an example to show how someone may be regenerated and yet not have tasted that the Lord is good. A middle-aged lady had been saved for two years. She had been redeemed and regenerated. After visiting our meetings a few times, one day she stood up to give a testimony. She said that her husband had lost his job, and they were unable to pay the rent. Furthermore, their son was sick. She went on to say that she prayed to the Lord about the situation. She praised the Lord that He gave her husband a better job, provided a better place for them to live, and even healed their son. She declared, “Hallelujah, the Lord Jesus is living and able!”
Let us consider this testimony carefully and ask if it is the testimony of a person who has tasted the Lord. I would say strongly that this is not the testimony of one who has tasted that the Lord is good. Years ago I would have felt differently about this, and I would have said that this woman surely has tasted that the Lord is good. Actually, in her testimony she said, “How good the Lord is to me! He is real, living, and good. We prayed, and He gave us a better job and a better house, and He healed our son. Hallelujah! The Lord is good.” But although she spoke of the Lord’s goodness, this is not the testimony of tasting that the Lord is good.
What, then, would be a genuine testimony of tasting the Lord? Suppose the same sister testified something like this: “My husband has lost his job, we have lost our dwelling place, and our son is ill. The more we pray, the more trouble we seem to have. But, brothers and sisters, I can testify that the more difficult our situation is, the happier I am inwardly. Oh, how I enjoy the Lord! I have experienced a little of what Paul experienced when he asked the Lord to take away the thorn and the Lord refused, saying that His grace was sufficient for Paul. The Lord caused Paul to enjoy His grace. He put him into a particular environment so that he would have to enjoy grace. He did not take away the thorn. On the one hand, Paul suffered the thorn. But on the other hand, he was experiencing the Lord’s sustaining grace. In our case, it has been several months, and still the Lord has not done anything for us outwardly. But I can testify that I have been enjoying Him as my grace. When my mother learned of our situation, she said, ‘What is this? Where is your Jesus? Is He real and living? Why wouldn’t He do anything for you? You should go to Buddha instead.’ But no matter what she says to me, I keep on enjoying the Lord’s grace.” This is a testimony of tasting the Lord.
The tasting of the Lord is not in outward miracles. Rather, it is in the inward nourishment of life. No matter what kind of environment we may be in or what kind of circumstances we may have, we are sustained by the Lord. We can say with Paul, “I can do all things in Him who empowers me” (Phil. 4:13). We can stand the test of both riches and poverty, of both pleasant circumstances and difficult, because we do not care for the outward situation but for the inward nourishment. This inward nourishment is the genuine tasting of the Lord. In these verses Peter indicates that if we have tasted that the Lord is good, we shall surely long for the milk in the word.