Lent Midweek March 14, 2018
2018 Study of Gluttony (This file is a short study sent out in advance of the Lent midweek sermon.)
Lent Midweek
Proverbs 23:19-21; Philippians 3:17-21; John 6:47-51
March 14, 2018
“Jesus vs. Gluttony”
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Let us be very clear as we talk about gluttony. It’s not about how good your body looks. God loves us in all shapes and sizes. The love that God has for you and me doesn’t depend on our waistline, our body mass index, the size of our muscles, or if we can run a half marathon. There are no cookie cutter people. We’re all different sizes and need different amounts of food.
But God loves you and me because of Jesus Christ. Everything we do wrong Jesus did right. And that includes any talk of gluttony. You will never handle food perfectly. You will never eat exactly the right foods in exactly the right amounts with exactly the right amount of thanks and enjoyment. We’re all gluttons. And Jesus died for gluttons. And this same Jesus said there’s only one food that you most need to be concerned with—and that’s bread. He is the Bread of Life. He is your eternal food. If you have Him, then the rest is all icing on the cake (to mix metaphors).
So gluttony can’t just be about how good our bodies look, because that has nothing to do with Jesus. The problem of gluttony is when food becomes an idol. When it becomes a substitute for Jesus. A god for us that we look to for help. So gluttony is much deeper than just saying, “I ate too much.” That is only one part of gluttony. To make the case here that gluttony isn’t just about eating too much or how good your body looks, I’ll quickly take you through five other symptoms of gluttony that the early monks detected besides just eating too much.
First, there’s the symptom of eating at any other time besides meal time. In other words, snacking between meals. The monks would eat one meal a day at 3pm. You see that anyone of any size can have this demon of eating all day long. It has nothing to do with weight or size. And if it becomes a repeated habit where we’re eating all times of day then it can quickly start to run our lives.
Second is anticipating eating with eager longing. In other words, we’re always checking our clock wondering when we can eat again. Notice again that this vice can affect anyone from the most fit to the least fit.
Third is eating expensively. The fourth is related and is being discontent with your food and always wanting something newer and better. Always seeking after delicacies. Both of these have nothing to do with weight. They are sins of the soul—not being grateful for the food God gives us and arrogantly thinking we deserve something better.
Last is paying too much attention to food in general or caring too much about food. This symptom of gluttony is when we run our entire lives around food—what we’re eating, when we’re eating, and how we’re eating.
Let me use a case in point to illustrate all of this. If you say, “When is gluttony a problem?”, someone would answer, “At Thanksgiving, for instance.” Right? Isn’t that a picture of gluttony? A huge Thanksgiving feast where we eat far too much?
But I would say that’s wrong. We definitely might eat too much at a Thanksgiving feast. Okay, fine. That’s gluttonous. BUT it just so happens that at Thanksgiving most families actually get things right a whole lot more than at other meals. For instance, we almost always stop to pray before a Thanksgiving meal. We give thanks to God for the food and for many other blessings that God gives. Also, at Thanksgiving meals we often take the time to thanks others for the food they brought and we compliment them on it. “Mom, your sweet potatoes are so delicious.” Furthermore, we almost always sit down at a table to eat a Thanksgiving meal which means we take our time and enjoy the food God has given and we talk to each other. Finally, for a Thanksgiving meal many people will “fast” beforehand so that they better appreciate the feast for what it is.
Do you see what I mean? Thanksgiving feasts are definitely not our most gluttonous times. We actually pray, give thanks, sit down, enjoy our food, talk to one other, compliment each other, and even fast beforehand. Contrast that to the usual dinner meal in many American homes. We don’t pray, we don’t sit at the table, we shovel our food into our mouths in a hurry to get wherever we’re going next, we complain about the food and say how tired we are of it, we don’t eat it all because we just had a big snack two hours ago, and we barely stop eating before we’re asking what’s for dessert. Now that, you see, is gluttony.
Food is a great blessing from God and we should enjoy it. But we should be in control of food. Self-control. Or in the classic list of virtues it’s called temperance. That is a gift of the Holy Spirit. When we are redeemed by Jesus Christ, our bodies and souls, food doesn’t make us who we are. Jesus makes us who we are. So we have full control over food. We simply use and enjoy food for our health. And for the health of others. All the while knowing that Jesus is our ultimate food. He is our living bread and living water that gives and sustains eternal life.
To put this a little differently, loving food can disrupt our love for God and our love for our neighbor. First, it can be hard to love God if we’re overly obsessed with food. We’re never thankful for the food that He gives us. We’re never content with the way He made us, always complaining that we’re not a different size or shape. And we have no time to stop and contemplate His mercies because all we can think of is nutrition.
Secondly, gluttony, the love of food, can keep us from loving our neighbor. How loving is it when we complain about our food? The very food that someone worked hard to make and serve for us? How loving is it when we greedily take too much food without a care of anyone else? How loving is it when we’re never willing to eat with others because we’re too particular about every single thing we put into our mouths?
Praise God for Jesus. He fasted. He fasted for 40 days. And He did that for you. He put food in its proper place. He fed thousands when He needed to. One time when Jesus was sitting by the well in Samaria His disciples kept pestering Him to eat. “Rabbi, eat!” they said. But He said to them, ‘I have food to eat that you do not know about.” They said, “Huh? Who gave Him food?” But Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to accomplish His work.”
So Jesus’ food was to do God’s will. In other words, His food was to save you. That’s what He lived for. To save you. He didn’t live for the next meal. He didn’t live for the next burger or the next blizzard or the next pie or the next glass of wine. He lived for you. His food was to save you from your sins. And then to give Himself to you as food that gives eternal life.
If you would like to have more self-control over food, there is much hope. Jesus is your hope. Self-control is a gift of God. He gives it to us through our Baptism, through His Word, through forgiveness, and through the Supper. It starts with repentance. Turning to God for grace and mercy and receiving from Him the Holy Spirit.
Food is a blessing. But it’s no substitute for Jesus. True fullness and satisfaction and contentment only come from one food—the Bread of Life. This is the food that endures to eternal life.
In Jesus’ name. Amen.