July 8th, 25: Reawakening Desire: The Path from Spiritual Milk to Meat

Welcome to the Daily Radio Bible! On this July 8th episode, join your host Hunter as we mark day 188 in our journey of reading through the entire Bible this year. Whether you’re a longtime listener or just joining us, you’ll find encouragement in our simple practice: reading the Scriptures together each day, with the hope of being transformed by the God who is love.

In today’s episode, Hunter leads us through Hosea 13 and 14, Psalms 100 and 102, and Hebrews 5 in the New Living Translation. As we encounter warnings and promises in the story of Israel, heartfelt prayers from the Psalms, and teachings about spiritual maturity in Hebrews, Hunter reflects on spiritual dullness and invites us to savor the Word—moving from “milk” to “meat”—so that our desire for God would grow and shape our character in everyday life.

We’ll wrap up with guided prayers, encouragement at this halfway point in the year, and the reminder that, wherever you find yourself on your Bible reading journey, you are loved. Stick around for a nourishing time in God’s Word, honest reflection, and practical encouragement to keep pressing forward!

TODAY'S DEVOTION:

How’s your hearing? That’s the question the writer of Hebrews wants us to consider. Are you dull of hearing? Has your discernment slipped? Maybe you’re finding that you keep making the same mistakes over and over again, lacking the wisdom you need in the moment. The problem might not just be with your decisions, but with what you’re listening to—or perhaps, not listening to. The writer of Hebrews points to a spiritual dullness, a lack of attentiveness to what really matters.

There’s so much more God wants to say to us, so much more life to be found in him—but spiritual dullness keeps us from hearing it. Sometimes, we’re listening to too many things that crowd out God’s voice. Sometimes, we’ve simply lost our appetite for the things that truly nourish us. But there’s good news: God has given us a remedy—a way to restore our spiritual hearing. It’s found in coming back, again and again, to the pure spiritual milk of his word, desiring it, savoring it, letting it nourish our souls.

Peter tells us to crave that spiritual milk so that we can grow up into our salvation. The problem isn’t the milk; it’s our desire for it. When desire wanes, when our ears are dulled by the noise of the world, our hearts grow hard and our lives lack discernment. But we can, by God’s Spirit, learn to savor his word again. And as we do, our taste matures. Desire for the “milk” of God’s word grows into a hunger for the “meat”—the deeper things of God, wisdom for life, discernment and maturity.

Maturity in Christ isn’t about managing sin better or checking more boxes on a pious to-do list. It’s about a deepening desire for God himself—a dynamic relationship of trust, dependence, and joy. As we savor his word each day, Jesus, the living Word, meets us. He feeds us on his grace, his mercy, his love—and we become people who can recognize the difference between right and wrong, who can respond to God in the moment. That’s true maturity. That’s wisdom. That’s life fully alive.

So come to the word daily. Cry out for it. Savor it. Let your desire be rekindled and let it grow. This is the prayer I have for my own soul. It’s the prayer I have for my family—for my wife, my daughters, my son. And it’s the prayer that I have for you. May it be so.