7 Deadly Sins Series
July 13, 2008
Gluttony
Have you ever been to Lamberts cafe? If not I highly recommend it, Lamberts is a nice sit down four star restaurant that serves food on this nice elegant plates, waiters are all well dressed in tuxes. It is a wonderful experience. Actually the waiters wear suspenders and bow ties, the meals are served on metal skillets. The drinks come in the largest plastic cup you will ever see, and there are peanuts on the floor. It is the home of the throwd roles and a haven for gluttony. The portions at lamberts are about 3 times the size of what a normal person could consume. In addition to that they continually toss rolls at you, offer you fried okra, potatoes, and various other side items. As if that was not enough however everything is all you can eat. If you order a steak and somehow manage to eat it all they will bring you another one.
A few months ago my wife and I were out of town at a marriage seminar in Branson. One of the nights there was a date night. So we went to Lamberts cafe for dinner. I ordered a steak and some how managed to eat all of it. I had 4 barrel sized glasses of sweet tea and a small mountain of fried okra. The waitress brought out another steak as if to say: I bet you cant eat this. Oh yea, you can eat that steak sure¦but can you eat this steak? I like any reasonable male would looked at this and said, no, I dont need it. I am full. No need to try and challenge me to eat more I am bigger than your games. Actually I dove into that steak like a diver into a pool at the Olympics. I was not about to be scared off by a second steak and I ate almost all of it. Bad move. I ate WAY more than I needed to. As a result my stomach was killing me. By the time we got back to the hotel I thought I was feeling better. So we went to the hot tub to relax. Instead of relaxing though, the hot tub broiled the two steaks I had eaten and left me feeling really nauseous. It was terrible. I could not get up in the morning for the first session of the conference on account of my unbearable stomach pain, and it was all Lamberts fault.
This week we are talking about the sin of Gluttony. Gluttony is defined as excessive eating or drinking. That is also how it is understood by our society. A glutton is someone who eats and/or drinks too much. Gluttony then results in an increase in obesity, a trend that we have seen growing in our American culture over the years. The CDC has some statistics that are actually very shocking: Figures In 1990 show that only just over 10% of Americans were obese. By 1995 it was about 15%, by 2000 it was 20%, and by 2005 it was nearly 25%. The percentage of obesity in America seems to be rising on average by 1% every year. This is not just being overweight 61% of Americans are what the CDC calls overweight. Obese is more than that it is being so overweight that you are unhealthy enough to be putting yourself in danger. 1 in every 4 Americans is obese. So this problem is growing rapidly in our culture. Sloth and gluttony have tag teamed us and very effectively. We love food so we eat more than we should but we are lazy so we dont exercise as much as we should. Its no wonder that this sin of gluttony is so rampant in the United States.
There is this wonderfully entertaining story in the Bible about a man who might be considered a glutton. Turn in your Bibles to Judges 3:12. During the period of the Judges there is a trend. Israel does evil, God punishes them by sending foreign rulers to rule over them, Israel cries out for a deliverer, God provides a deliverer, there is a short time where Israel does right in the eyes of the Lord before they turn around and do evil and start the cycle all over again. This story, the story of Ehud and Eglon is one of the earliest events in the cycle of Judges.
Jdg 3:12 Once again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, and because they did this evil the LORD gave Eglon king of Moab power over Israel. Jdg 3:13 Getting the Ammonites and Amalekites to join him, Eglon came and attacked Israel, and they took possession of the City of Palms. Jdg 3:14 The Israelites were subject to Eglon king of Moab for eighteen years. Jdg 3:15 Again the Israelites cried out to the LORD, and he gave them a deliverer Ehud , a left-handed man, the son of Gera the Benjamite. The Israelites sent him with tribute to Eglon king of Moab. Jdg 3:16 Now Ehud had made a double-edged sword about a foot and a half long, which he strapped to his right thigh under his clothing. Jdg 3:17 He presented the tribute to Eglon king of Moab, who was a very fat man. Jdg 3:18 After Ehud had presented the tribute, he sent on their way the men who had carried it. Jdg 3:19 At the idols near Gilgal he himself turned back and said, I have a secret message for you, O king. The king said, Quiet! And all his attendants left him. Jdg 3:20 Ehud then approached him while he was sitting alone in the upper room of his summer palace and said, I have a message from God for you. As the king rose from his seat, Jdg 3:21 Ehud reached with his left hand, drew the sword from his right thigh and plunged it into the kings belly. Jdg 3:22 Even the handle sank in after the blade, which came out his back. Ehud did not pull the sword out, and the fat closed in over it. Jdg 3:23 Then Ehud went out to the porch; he shut the doors of the upper room behind him and locked them. Jdg 3:24 After he had gone, the servants came and found the doors of the upper room locked. They said, He must be relieving himself in the inner room of the house. Jdg 3:25 They waited to the point of embarrassment, but when he did not open the doors of the room, they took a key and unlocked them. There they saw their lord fallen to the floor, dead.
This is one of the coolest stories in Scripture. King Eglon was so big that the 18 inch blade of Ehuds sword was completely swallowed up by fat¦.that is a really fun. This is something you see in a bad horror movie.
As with sloth, greed, pride, envy¦well as with probably all the other deadly sins gluttony has been misrepresented and is misunderstood. Gluttony is not simply an over indulgence in food though many people view it as such. Take for example the words of nineteenth-century Russian Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov:
Wise temperance of the stomach is a door to all the virtues. Restrain the stomach, and you will enter Paradise. But if you please and pamper your stomach, you will hurl yourself over the precipice of bodily impurity, into the fire of wrath and fury, you will coarsen and darken your mind, and in this way you will ruin your powers of attention and self-control, your sobriety and vigilance.
According to Brianivanoski---lets just call him Iggy. According to Iggy if you can control your stomach you can enter eternal life, if not you will literally eat your way into hell. Seriously, who knew our relationship with God was so simple and eternal life was so easy. I dont know why weight loss drugs dont use this in advertising. Not only will you feel great about yourself. Not only will you lose weight. You will get into heaven! I am sure there is more to what Ignatius is saying here but this just goes to show us how misunderstood gluttony is.
One more example and then I will move on. I found this website on the 7 deadly sins that defines the sins, explains why you commit those sins, and tells you what your punishment will be. Under gluttony, those who are condemned for not keeping their eating in check will be force fed snakes, rats, and toads for eternity. Sounds great doesnt it.
The misconceptions about gluttony are truly remarkable. Especially when you consider the fact that the Bible does not condemn gluttony or even obesity. Our fat king Eglon is not a wicked man because he is obese. He is wicked because he attacked the people of God. Neither he nor anyone else in Scripture is ever condemned for being fat or for how much they ate. The simple fact is: gluttony is not really a sin, at least not in the way you think. The idea that gluttony is a sin seems to come from the dualistic heresy that says the body is all bad and the spirit is all good so neglect your body. These monks who practiced this would avoid all pleasures in life believing that a simple, dull life was the key to holiness. The really funny thing to me is that Jesus was called a glutton and a drunkard because He did not fast and He was always around the dinner table. I mean anyone who can turn water into wine has got to have a problem with drinking right?
Now before you just scratch this off the list of 7 deadly sins we should note something. When God created the earth and He put Adam and Eve in the garden He gave them one command. Not to eat from this one tree. The original command and the original sin had to do with eating. Its interesting that God did not use touch, sight, sound, or smell, but that His command was not to EAT of this one particular tree. It is also worth noting that Jesus first temptation was to turn rocks into bread so He could eat.
While gluttony is not condemned in Scripture as the act of overeating there is a principle that we can learn from this. There is something to this idea of gluttony. Take away all the food and what you have is that gluttony is a sin of over indulgence. It comes from feed your appetite too much. In Scripture there are a lot of temptations that have to do with our appetites. In this sense the sin of gluttony is actually very similar to the sin of greed. Greed is the desire for more. Gluttony is indulging in more than you need. So greed and gluttony tend to go hand in hand.
The truth is gluttony is a sin. It is not a sin of eating too much. It is a sin of letting your appetite run out of control. When your appetite for the things of this world runs your life then there is no place for God to be Lord of it. Galatians 5:22 says:
Gal 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, Gal 5:23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Gal 5:24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Gal 5:25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
Notice the last item on the list of the fruits of the Spirit. It is self control. If you look at the acts of the sinful nature listed in verses 19-21 you see a group of sins many of which are the result of a loss of self control. Gluttony is dangerous because your over indulgence is a loss of self control and can lead to all sorts of wickedness.
We live in a culture that is all about getting as much as you can. We feed and feed our appetites. We satisfy not only our needs but also our wants and desires. We are fueled by our appetites. The thing is every time we feed it we make it stronger. We make it harder to satisfy. Those of you who have a hard time with anger my guess is that you did not always have a problem with it. It started out with just one. One time you let your anger loose and it felt good. So the next time it took a little less for you to feed that anger. Before you know it you are loosing your temper of things that never would have made you mad in the past.
You see that is the brilliance of sin. It does not come at you fully developed and show you all the pain and problems it will cause you. It comes to you like a little infant. It looks cute and harmless. You almost take pity on it as you invite it into your life. Once it gets in it starts to grow. It grows just fast enough that by the time you notice it is too powerful for you to do anything about it. Sin is an addictive force that works much like a drug. It starts off simple and quickly becomes something that runs your life.
If you look at Luke 16:19 we see a story of Lazarus and a rich man. I find this to be one of the most disturbing passages in all of Scripture. Let me read it for you:
Lk 16:19 There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. Lk 16:20 At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores Lk 16:21 and longing to eat what fell from the rich mans table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. Lk 16:22 The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abrahams side. The rich man also died and was buried. Lk 16:23 In hell, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. Lk 16:24 So he called to him, Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire. Lk 16:25 But Abraham replied, Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony.
You know what the scariest thing about this text is? We are not told of any sin in the rich mans life. He may have been a sinner but the only thing that we know he did was live a lavish comfortable life and neglect to care for the poor man Lazarus. He had more than he needed and he did not help his brother in need. He is cast into hell, and the only reason we are given in the text is that he did not take care of Lazarus. This text scares me. Perhaps this rich mans only sin was indulging in his riches while people around him suffered and that was enough for him to be cast to hell.
We so often do things to satisfy our desires. We live for our feelings and meeting our needs. We give when we can, serve when it is convenient, worship when we feel like it, and help others only after taking care of ourselves. I wonder if when we serve it is really for the kingdom of God or just another way of satisfying our appetites. When you serve do you serve because you want to glorify God or because that is something we enjoy doing?
I will be honest with you. As a minister and someone who has grown up in the church I have seen a lot of people burn out. They served for a long time and then they just couldnt take it anymore. Some of that is the fault of the church. We often overburden people asking too much of them. However there is this idea that people burn out because they are serving in an area that they are not gifted or passionate about. I disagree with this notion. Perhaps the reason people burn out and get tired of serving is not because they are serving in the wrong places but because they are serving for the wrong reasons.
Sometimes people serve as a means of satisfying their appetites. Since becoming a Christian their appetites have changed so now they have a new appetite to fill a spiritual appetite. So they serve in order to satisfy this desire to indulge this appetite. They burn out because their service is not satisfying their appetite as much as it used to. In so doing they are serving themselves not God. Now there is nothing wrong with serving in an area you are gifted in or passionate about, in fact God gives us our gifts and passions, the problem comes when your service stops being about God and starts being about the thing you enjoy doing.
Take worship for example. Lets say one of the guys on the worship team really loves music. So they get involved with the worship team. They get to be a part of music which they love and thus satisfy their appetite for it. But then they start to feel burnt out because they dont like having to wake up early for practice, or dont want to show up for practices in the middle of the week. Are they burning out because they are doing too much, or are they burning out because they have forgotten what this service is about? I think the major reason people get burnt out from service, not the only reason, but the major reason is that their service is more about their satisfying their own appetites than it is about serving the kingdom of God. When our service in the church becomes about how we feel and not who God is, our service itself can become an act of gluttony.
The danger of gluttony is that the things of this world that we indulge in are deadly. They distract us from the kingdom of God. The only thing we know about the rich man is that he had a lot of stuff. In his indulgence in the pleasures of this life he neglected his spiritual responsibilities. Perhaps the only reason this man was condemned was because in all his wealth he did not help those in need. If that is the case gluttony should scare us.
This life is about the glory of God. Not about our indulging in the things of this world. You see the sin of gluttony is that it puts our focus on the things of this life. Gluttony derives pleasure for this world rather than from the things of God. We can over indulge in many different things, but I think the major aspect of the sin of gluttony comes from our under indulge in the Kingdom of God.
