The '7' Deadly Sins
Gluttony:  Misplaced Hunger
Preacher: Marcia C. Wilkinson

March 25, 2007

Matthew 11:16-19

Baking bread is fun and one of the most therapeutic and creative exercises -- a journey of wonders from the earth to the oven.  It is a simple and wonderful transformation: From seeds to wheat to flour, adding yeast warmth and hands to knead and shape,  gives way to the most satisfying and delectable food.

Sharing bread at table brings another transformation.  When people gather as companions in fellowship, life experiences are shared.  Bread is a natural catalyst that sustains and grows not only the body, but can be a holy food for mind and spirit.  The people of Israel knew the importance of bread.  When God intervened in Abraham’s and Sarah’s lives and blessed them with a son in old age, they celebrated God’s miraculous gift with a feast.  When God led Israel away from Egypt into freedom, they traveled through the wilderness depending on God‘s miracle manna each day.  From then on, Israel celebrated, remembered, and gave thanks at Passover.  In every way God had saved them as a people.

When feasting is filled with gratitude to our Creator, it is good and right.  Our Holy Communion, Eucharist is rooted in this celebration of thanksgiving and gratitude remembering that night before Jesus died, when the ordinary meal became extraordinary and bread and wine took on a whole new dimension.  “Those who eat of this bread will live forever.”  Jesus broke bread, blessed it, gave it to his beloved friends, and said take and eat, signifying the gift of his body broken for them, for us.  All of you, my followers do this together.

Jesus was saying that night of the Passover celebration that he had come to be the bread of life for us. We do live by physical bread, but not that alone.  We live by every word that comes from the mouth of God.  Eucharist is our sacred reminder that we are dependent upon God and his Son for physical and spiritual life.

This connection brings us to our topic for today.  We need physical bread and we need spiritual bread.  Gluttony, one of the deadly sins turns that which is good and right, healthy and holy into abuse.  Gluttony is excessive consumption because we forget who we belong to and for what we were created.  We forget to see the miracle of God’s daily creation and recreation and that our lives are completely dependent on God’s goodness.  We pay lip service to God while madly pursuing bodily pleasures that never completely satisfy.  In Paul’s Letter to the Philippians he tells us that when the belly becomes our god and we pay homage to our appetite, we end up giving praise for our conspicuous consumption rather than to the true God who is the giver of all good things (3:18).  The feeding of insatiable appetites leads to waste, and a deeper hunger that will never be satisfied by more.  And, the roaring lion inside will continue to keep us focused on ourselves.

Gluttony is any excessive consumption that attempts to satisfy a void in us.  Whether it is food, drink, drugs, shopping, gambling, computers, gadgets, collecting a variety of things, overuse of natural resources- excessiveness is a spiritual killer.   Boredom from having everything in life, or a lack of strong relationships, or feelings of failure will often point to emptiness.  Our need makes us hungry to continuously feed ourselves until gluttony eventually dominates and controls us.

When instant gratification dominates our behavior, it is our conspicuous consumption that is rewarded.  The cycle continues. Then, balance of the body mind and spirit is lost.  Life is out of whack!  And, God is not our central focus or the one whom we depend, nor the recipient of our gratitude.  At this point we have forgotten who we are meant to be and to whom we belong.

Saint Francis of Assisi referred to his body as Brother Ass because he believed that just as the ass/donkey serves and works for the master, so the human body must be servant to the mind and spirit.  The body was not to be ignored or scorned like some ascetics might believe.  The body deserves attention and a degree of reverence, but being healthy demands a healthy spiritual discipline.

Jesus made an interesting point in Matthew 11:16-19 when he gave two examples:  when John the Baptist came from the desert neither eating nor drinking he was accused of having a demon.  Then when Jesus ate and drank with sinners and outsiders, he was called a glutton and drunkard.  In both stories eating and drinking were connected to the demon, and the unhealthy company of outsiders.  Whether one eats with sinners or abstains from food and drink is not the issue, but the healthy fruit that is born of our lives is.

In Dante’s Purgatory, the unhappy and unsatisfied gluttonous were subjected to torment.  They long for delicious fruit, laden trees, and cool springs of water which they see but never reach.  The purpose of this penalty is to purge the souls of sin of gluttony and to train them in the virtue of temperance.  As they experience this forced deprivation in the presence of God they would learn to control their appetites and refocus their love which has been misdirected to the sensual, back to its proper object, which is God.

But those in Christ do not have to go to ‘purgatory’ to be refocused.  Finding serenity in God means enjoying things in moderation because we are people of reason and wills that are meant to live in a healthy confidence trusting that God is doing a new thing in us.  If excessive consumerism of all kinds of things is not the answer, what will bring joy and fulfillment?  If we belong to Christ, and worship God as creator, and depend on the Spirit of God to fill and sustain us, how then shall we live?     

Pray!  God’s grace is more powerful than the lure of temptation.  Our individual resources are not adequate for the war that goes on inside us; nor can our strength ward off the 7 deadly sins.  Minding the Gap means that we must keep the vision of God making all things new in us a reality as we give ourselves to God’s will .  Our practices, our attitudes, can be surrendered to Christ daily.
If we like the idea of splurging, and not always being moderate in all things, (and who doesn’t like to splurge), then indulge in God’s creation, getting in touch with sights and sounds around us.  Drink in and delight in the beauty of what is ours to enjoy. Be thankful!  Participate in other activities to stimulate the mind and soul in place of excessive consuming pleasures of the body.  Be reminded that the world does not live as we do with such resources. Reach out to others to share. See the world’s hunger, people who hunger for their physical and spiritual needs.  Give out of gratitude to the Lord’s gifts to us.  Bake bread and share with friends.  And provide living bread because the answer for life is not in us, but in the living in and with Christ.