Self Indulgence - Self Denial

What do you hunger and work for?

Bible Reading: Numbers 11:1-9

Key Verse: “We remember the fish which we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic” (Numbers 11:5 NASB).

“We remember…” In this section of Scripture, we find God's chosen people in a state we often find ourselves in today -- remembering what it used to be like before God became central to our daily life. Here, the people are tired of eating the manna God has provided for them. They have already taken God's provision for granted. They have already tired of the very blessing that has kept them alive in the wilderness. They are remembering the variety of food they used to eat in Egypt and comparing it with the manna God has provided. They are longing for more, they are longing for the variety they once had and for some meat. They are looking back to their enslavement under the Egyptians instead of looking forward to the Promised Land of milk and honey. 

How often do you and I recall how things used to be before we gave our life to God in Christ? Have you ever remembered how it used to be and wish that it could be that way again? Have you hungered for the `meat' you used to eat, thinking it was so much better than the `manna' God has provided you with today? Is your appetite for the things of God or the things of the flesh? “A worker's appetite works for him, for his hunger urges him on” (Proverbs 16:26). 

Instead of looking back, like the Egyptians were, and letting their appetites for the things of the flesh rule their daily life, let us look forward to the Promised Land of milk and honey - wherein God will wipe away every tear and no one shall want for anything. (Rev 7:17)

Let us, like the apostle Paul, learn “the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want” (Philippians 4:12 NIV).

Bible Reading: Proverbs 23: 29-35

Key Verse: “They struck me, but I did not become ill; they beat me, but I did not know it. When shall I awake? [Yet again] I will seek another drink” (Proverbs 23:35 NASB).

“Yet again I will seek another drink.” As a recovered alcoholic, I understand this section of Scripture with crystal clarity. The section starts out asking who has woe, sorrows, contentions, complaining and wounds without cause. Looking back, I can see the formulation of such a mindset. I can see how I began to think and feel as thought life was “unfair” and how often I felt “injured without cause.” In fact, when I was sixteen years of age, I felt so overwhelmed by the 'unfairness of life', that I tried to gain a personal audience with God and let Him know just how I felt. Fortunately for me, God did not receive me nor allow me to “check out” of the life He had given me. So I turned to alcohol and drugs, and railed all the more about how rotten my life was. I became the person described in this section of Scripture. 

Everything described in these verses came true. The alcohol and drugs bite me like a serpent and stung me like a viper. My eyes saw strange things and my mind became full of perversity. I was `a walking dead man'. I eventually got to the point that I could no longer feel nor remember what I had done. For all intents and purposes, I was in a perpetual “black out” - I was among the living, but I merely existed from day to day. I sought only “another drink,” another `high' to get me through another day.

I'm sure other `recovered' alcoholics and drug addicts can relate as well. However, one does not necessarily need be an alcoholic or drug addict to relate to this section of Scripture. There are many other “addictive agents,” such as power, prestige, wealth, physical fitness, relationships and sex, just to name a few. (See the book, SERENITY - A Companion for Twelve Step Recovery, by Dr. Robert Hemfelt and Dr. Richard Fowler, published by Thomas Nelson Publishers) 

Regardless of what you use to satiate your fleshly appetite, you will continue to despair as long as you reject the One in whose `image' you were made. There is nothing on earth that can fill the emptiness in your life and in your heart. There is only the One who gave you that sense of longing that can truly and completely satisfy the perpetual longing in your life. That One is “Our Father in heaven…”

Bible Reading: Ecclesiastes 6

Key Verse: “All a man's labor is for his mouth and yet the appetite is not satisfied" (Ecclesiastes 6:7, NASB).

What do you hunger for? Food for the belly or the food that gives eternal life, the Word of God?

Which do you work for the most? The needs and desires of your flesh, or your spirit?

Have you ever paused to consider eternity and your place in it? (See Ecclesiastes 3:11)

God has made it clear that those who practice immorality will not enter into His kingdom after leaving this world. (See 1 Corinthians 6:9-10; Galatians 5:19-21; Ephesians 5:3-6; Colossians 3:5-6; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-6; Jude 3-20; Revelation 2:14-16; 2:20-23)

God has made it clear that those outside His kingdom will cry and curse themselves for not accepting His free invitation to dine with Him at His table. (See Isaiah 66:22-24; Matthew 8:10-12; 13:40-42, 47-50; 22:1-14; 24:45-51; 25:28-30; Luke 13:28; Colossians 3:25; Revelation 21:8, 27; 22:15)

God has made it clear that those who turn from living for themselves to living for Him will be richly rewarded. (See Isaiah 51:7-8; Matthew 5:11; 13:44-45; 19:29; 25:14-23; 25:31-40; Luke 6:35; Colossians 3:23-24; Hebrews 6:9-12; James 2:5; 1 Peter 3:9; Revelation 7:11-17 21:6-7; 22:14)

He will wipe away every tear. No longer will there be need or want and the harshness and sorrow of this world will be forgotten, for He is the Great Provider.  (See Isaiah 25:6-8; 35:10; 51:11; 65:17; Revelation 7:17; 21:1-4; 22:1-5)

So, again I ask, “What do you hunger and work for?”