Sermon Tone Analysis

The last of the Seven Deadly Sins is gluttony.

It’s the one I know you’ve all been waiting for!

It is a sin we obviously don't hear much preaching about these days.

Maybe because too many American preachers are over-weight from too much fried chicken and meetings at Ryan’s.

It is a sin that strikes a little too close to home, and most preachers like preaching on their congregation’s sins and not their own!

Gluttony is one of those sins we assume other people—big people, I mean really obese people—are guilty of.

It’s one of those insidious sins because it’s always easy to find someone heavier then we are and think to ourselves, “See, I’m not that fat” and assume we don’t have a problem with the sin of gluttony.

And let’s be honest—compared to the other six deadly sins we’ve looked at, how sinful is it really if we eat one more piece of pizza then we probably should?

While it may not be a sin you or I commit on a regular basis, it is, never-the-less a sin most of us have committed in the past, and—in the era of 72-ounce big-gulp cups, super-sized burgers and fries and all-you-can-eat buffets—it may be a sin we commit this week.

What is gluttony?

I like one quote I found that said, /A glutton is the person who takes the piece of pastry you wanted./

One Bible dictionary defines a glutton as /one habitually given to greedy and voracious eating./

To be /voracious/ means to be /exceedingly eager/.

To be called a glutton is not a nice thing.

A glutton is a person given to loose and excessive living—food being just part of the excess.

In the NT the word was used to describe a rascal or scoundrel who had an uncontrolled or excessive fondness for the pleasures of the flesh.

And, if we go by that definition, most of us would not be considered gluttons.

We may not be habitual gluttons, but it is a sin that most of us have a problem with more times then we care to admit.

Let me put you to the test by asking you a series of diagnostic questions.

Have you ever heard these words coming from your lips?

* /"Whew I ate too much!"/

If so, then maybe you've committed the sin of gluttony.

* Or how about this phrase: /"If I take one more bite, I'll bust"?/

If so, then maybe you've committed the sin of gluttony.

* Or how about his famous phrase, /"I can't believe I ate the whole thing!"

If you've used that phrase, then maybe you've committed the sin of gluttony.

Why was over-eating considered a deadly sin by our spiritual forefathers?

They believed, and rightly so, that self-indulgence is the enemy of gratitude.

The early church fathers believed that a person's appetites are linked.

Full stomachs and quenched palates take the edge from our hunger and thirst for righteousness.

They saw gluttony as a gate-way sin that led to other sins of the flesh such as lust and sloth.

Ultimately, gluttony is not merely about over-eating; it is about overindulgence in general and our attitudes toward overindulgence.

It is the mad pursuit of the bodily pleasures that never completely satisfy, because our real need is for spiritual satisfaction in Christ.

Frederick Buechner, a Presbyterians minister, theologian and author, says that “ ... a glutton is one who runs to the icebox for a cure to a spiritual malnutrition.”

Gluttony—in whatever form it takes—spoils one's appetite for God.

This is exactly the situation found in the text I read a few moments ago and provides the foundation for my first point ...

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I. GLUTTONY FOCUSES OUR ATTENTION ON THE SUSTENANCE RATHER THAN ON THE PROVISION OF THE LORD

#. the people of Israel have been wandering in the desert for only a few months if not just weeks

#.

every day, God miraculously provided a substance called manna, to sustain them during their march to the Promised Land

#. but very quickly they became tired of manna

#.

I’m sure there are just so many ways you can fix manna

#.

I can just hear some Jewish husband complaining, /“Manna casserole again!?”/

#. the blandness of the manna compared with the spicy food of Egypt prompted a wholesale rebellion against Moses and the Lord

#.

God was angered, but He is also longsuffering

#. the Scriptures tell us that God caused a wind to blow which brought flocks of migrating quail right through the camp of the Israelites

#. all the Hebrews had to do was knock the birds down and pick them up

#. and they did it by the bushel basket full

#.

Numbers 11:32 tells us that every person who caught quail collected no less than 10 homers of quail each

#. if you have a good study Bible it probably has a footnote that tells you that 10 homers is equal to 60 of our bushel baskets!

#. now, Exodus 12:37 tells us that 600,000 men took part in the exodus from Egypt along with women and children

#. do the math: lets assume that just the men caught quail: AND if each man caught 60 bushels worth of quail, that equals 36,000,000 bushels of quail, AND if one bushel basket will hold 50 quail THEN that equals 1,800,000,000 birds!

#. that’s a lot of hot-wings

#. talk about a pig-out party!

#. and that is exactly what the Israelites did—they pigged out

#. instead of giving God the glory for the miracle of providing the people such a bounty, they began a binge of lustful gluttony that focused instead on the meat instead of the Master

#. they failed to give thanks

#. they neglected to recognize God for the miracle

#.

God became angry

#. the bible says that while the meat was still between their teeth, the Lord unleashed His wrath against them and sent a severe plague that killed many of them

#. the place where this happened was named Kibroth-Hattaavah which means graves of craving because there they buried the people who had craved food more than they craved the God who had given them the food

#.

we also have a plague in America due to overeating and over-indulgence

#. it’s called coronary heart disease!

#. 14,000,000 Americans suffer from it

#.

almost 500,000 Americans die from it every year making it the leading cause of death in the United States

#. and while smoking plays a part as well as stress and even heredity, the biggest culprit is the American diet

* ILLUS.

A Jewish Proverb says, /“Gluttons dig their graves with their teeth.”/

#. our early spiritual fore-fathers considered gluttony a sin because it focuses our attention on the sustenance rather than on the provider of the sustenance

#.

I submit to you that to eat anything without giving thanks to God for it or recognizing God as the provider of it, makes us a glutton

!

II.

GLUTTONY IS A DISTORTED EMPHASIS ON FOOD THAT VALUES FEEDING THE BODY MORE THAN THE SOUL

#. the early Christian theologians understood gluttony in different ways than we do

#. the first is the obvious—simply eating too much

#.

but gluttony concerns not only the quantity of food we eat, it also concerns our attitude about food: Our preoccupation with it, our impatience when we do not get it fast enough, and our resentment when we are deprived of it

#.

gluttony can simply be giving eating too much attention

* ILLUS.

Most of you are familiar with the stories that revolve around a bear named Pooh.

Pooh Bear's favorite thing in the world to do is eat – especially honey.

In one conversation, Rabbit asks Winnie the Pooh, /"When you get up in the morning what is the first thing you think of?"/ Pooh Bear ponders the question for a moment and answers, /"The first thing I think of in the morning when I get up is, What am I going to have for breakfast!'"/

#. in the Old Testament we find a man named Esau who had a distorted emphasis on food

* /“Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.

Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished.

He said to Jacob, “Quick, let me have some of that red stew!

I’m famished!”

(That is why he was also called Edom.) Jacob replied, “First sell me your birthright.”

“Look, I am about to die,” Esau said.

“What good is the birthright to me?”

But Jacob said, “Swear to me first.”

So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.

Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew.

He ate and drank, and then got up and left.

So Esau despised his birthright.”/

(Genesis 25:28–34, NIV)

#. he valued a full stomach even more then his birthright which was his spiritual heritage

#. was Esau really about to die from want of food?

#. it is very doubtful

#.

Esau was expressing the very same sentiments we do when we exclaim, /"Honey, when will dinner be ready?

I'm about to starve to death."/

#.

Esau's philosophy is echoed by the attitude of the rich man Jesus preached about in Luke's gospel

#.

Esau’s attitude concerning food and drink reveal three distortions in our attitudes about daily sustenance