Day 20 / Big Appetite

There were four brothers: Homer, Boyd, Billy Ray, and Roy Dale. Big, big Southern boys with huge appetites. They used to love to go to the all-you-can-eat catfish buffet in Bald Knob, Arkansas, and eat 'till they had their fill. That restaurant isn’t there anymore. I wonder if that weekly fearsome-foursome had anything to do with the owners shutting it down! Or maybe they ran out of fish in Bald Knob Lake!

Appetite is a funny thing. We use that word for more than just food. We might hear something like, "That boy just had an appetite for danger" or, "That girl has an appetite for anything expensive." Appetite is another word for hunger. It's more than desire. Hunger has more urgency to it. When we say we are hungry for something, it is almost like saying, "I gotta have it."

The apostle Paul notes that appetite isn’t bad, but there are at least three questions that are essential when considering how to respond to our hunger pains:

1. What am I hungry for? Sometimes we think we are hungry for one thing when we really desire or need something else. We can find ourselves acting out and hungry for attention. If we peel back a layer or two we might find that we are actually hungry for respect, but we have been eating the junk food of attention and it, at least temporarily, satisfies us.
   
   
2. If I fill myself on something, will it actually cause me to not have enough room for what I really need? Sometimes when we have had a huge meal, someone will offer us something else, and it really looks good! But we pat our stomachs, and we a grimaced look on our face we say, "I’m stuffed! I don’t have room for another bite." When we cram our lives with spiritual, emotional, mental, and relational junk food, we may not have enough time or energy left to do what we know would really bless someone else and make a difference.
   
   
3. Has my appetite become more powerful than my mind or my spirit? In 1 Corinthians 6:12-13, the apostle Paul notes that the Corinthians were using their appetites as an excuse for sinning. They are covering up their sin by saying, "All things are permissible." They are using the phrase, "Stomach for the food and food for the stomach." Paul’s response is that actually the body is for the Lord, and is not to become a slave to every passing desire or appetite.

What is it that you crave, envy, covet, or desire so much that you would consider sinning against God in order to have it or experience it? What "hunger" do you give in to the most that is not healthy for you? How can you curb your appetite(s) so that you will not engage in things that are not of God and not good for you?

- Don McLaughlin