Chi Alpha @ Stanford

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Gluttony
Sixth message in the series The Seven Deadly Sins
Length: 20:32
Size: 8 MB
Format MP3
Speaker: Glen Davis - 3/2/2005

Here’s this week’s handout:

Gluttony: A Sin-opsis
The Sin Cluster: Drunkenness, Self-Indulgence, Dissipation, Carousing
The Virtues They Distort: Enjoyment, Celebration
Biblical Stories About:

• Esau: traded his inheritance for a good meal (Gen 25:30-34)
• Lot: committed incest while drunk (Gen 19:30-38)
• Exodus: craving for delicacies led the Israelites to despise God’s gifts (Num 11:4-10, 31-34)
• Eli’s Sons: disrespected God’s offerings (1 Samuel 2:12-17)
• Prodigal Son: wasted his inheritance on extravagant living (Luke 15:11-32)

According to the Bible, gluttony:

• isn’t the same thing as enjoying food (Pr 13:25; Ps 104:14-15; Deu 14:26; Isa 25:6; 1 Tim 4:3)
• is a matter of the heart (Matthew 15:16-18)
• can lead to debauchery (Hab 2:15)
• can lead to poverty (Proverbs 23:20-21)
• embarrasses those you love (Proverbs 28:7)
• can be a form of idolatry (Philippians 3:19)

Additional Notes:
In the message I mention that there are five classic types of gluttony and I listed four. Here’s the full list: gluttony is eating too soon, too expensively, too much, too eagerly, or too daintily.

Also, a quote I considered reading in the message but decided not to:

Now that gluttony has become an affront to prevailing standards of beauty and health rather than an offense against God, the wages of sin have changed and now involve a version of hell on earth: the pity, contempt, and distaste of one’s fellow mortals. What makes the glutton’s penance all the more public and cruel is that gluttony is the only sin whose effects (in the absence of that rare and fortunate metabolism that permits the fruits of sin to remain hidden) are visible, written on the body. ~ Francine Prose, Gluttony page 5.

Also, something I wrote in my notes that didn’t come out as clearly as I would have hoped:

The mere fact of comfort foods is revealing. They comfort, they give succor, they help us to cope with disappointment.

In fact, eating can become a substitute for relationships, for love, for success, for almost anything.

We all know that to be true.

So why are we so shocked that gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins?