Gospel > Gluttony

For the glutton, food is more pleasing, more alluring, more enthralling, more satisfying, and more beautiful than God. The glutton has covenanted with overeating to be their comfort, security, approval. In doing so, the glutton has become his own savior, eating his means of grace as a sacrifice on the altar of pleasure. If this is true, then we need to assess overeating with new eyes. We must say plainly, “I treasure food more than I treasure God.” Gluttony exposes how we really feel about God.


How do we develop a disaffection for gluttony? By faith, look to the cross and see the horror of gluttony in the stripes of Jesus. Charles Spurgeon said it this way, “Look to the cross and hate your sin, for it nailed your well-beloved to the tree.” The glutton needs to see Jesus, who lived a life of self-control and perfect moderation, dying for the glutton. That is what gluttony deserves before God’s tribunal—death. As an idol, gluttony deserves to be cursed and exiled from his holy presence. Though guiltless, Jesus became the glutton on the cross. The pleasure of gluttony loses its luster under the shadow of the cross, where gluttony is revealed as just another broken cistern (Jer. 2:13).


However seeing gluttony as desperately wicked is only half the battle, we also need to  "de-leverage" the cravings gluttony once appealed to by loving something bigger. Here again we look to Jesus. When the glutton deserved separation, they received reconciliation. Why? God has done something utterly astounding and amazing for the glutton at the cross. Because Jesus was rejected by God, the glutton is now accepted in Christ. The wondrous accomplishment of the cross is that glutton is no longer a glutton, but an accepted child of God. In Christ, God gives himself to the soul in deep intimacy and affection, restoring the union and communion once enjoyed in the garden (1 John 1:3; 2 Cor. 13:14). But our new standing isn’t based on our approval, but on the approval of Christ. The wandering soul has been brought home by the relentless love of God, at the cost of Jesus.


From the Resurgence