A Wisdom Case for Total Abstinence from Alcohol in Modern Times

[Bert Perry]

And let’s define it properly; it’s eating, at various times or consistently, more than your body needs to operate. The construction worker or distance runner who needs 5000 calories per day (used to be me) is not a glutton. He is eating what he needs. The glutton is the person who eats at one sitting a lot more than he needs (think Thanksgiving or a Super Bowl Party), or who consistently eats more than he needs.

I’m curious what your thoughts are on secular entertainment. Do you ever play a game of Monopoly? Play basketball? Watch a secular movie (say, for example, The Fox and the Hound)? I have wondered how many secular activities Paul participated in, considering verses that make it appear that he never did anything but that which was based on the eternal.

Just trying to understand where you’re coming from; not casting stones here.

That’s a nice dodge, Jason, but it’s worth noting, ahem, that I’ve got no less than seven times in Scripture that the subjects of gluttony and drunkenness are linked. I would hence argue that if you want to address one using these passages, hermeneutically you really ought to address the other. Otherwise, you’re just cherry-picking, most likely on the basis of fundamental soap boxes.

Like, ahem, entertainment. If you demonstrate it’s linked to the subject at hand, I’m game, but until then, maybe….keep to the subject?

Again, if Scripture establishes clearly that an excess of wine is bad—and it does—then what do we make of the fact that in the same verse, it also establishes very clearly that an excess of food is bad? And apart from the fact that preaching on gluttony tends to hit too close to home, tell me why we get a fair amount of emphasis on something not many people are doing, but very little on something that anyone can determine at a glance. Why is that?

I had a massive heart attack 16 months ago. I’ll admit that I was overweight (according to my doctor the term was mildly obese) but my BP, cholesterol. etc. ere within healthy parameters for someone my height and age. I’ve learned a lot about diet in the last year that has changed my life. I’m down around 50 pounds, motivated primarily by the fact that my engine (heart) is now a four-cylinder and it just doesn’t do well in an old big truck body.

I just got back from a check-up with my cardiologist amd I’ll pass on what he said about this subject in simple terms. The typical male caloric intake should be 2000 calories and sodium intake around 2000 mg a day. Non nutritional foods are literally killers (donuts, sodas diet and regular, and desserts.) They’re nice treats but should be rare. (A Krispy Kreme donut is 45 minutes at 3 mph on a treadmill)

Simple truth from the doctor: If your waist at your navel is more than half your height, YOU”RE FAT! and heading for health trouble.

[Bert Perry]

Like, ahem, entertainment. If you demonstrate it’s linked to the subject at hand, I’m game, but until then, maybe….keep to the subject?

Again, if Scripture establishes clearly that an excess of wine is bad—and it does—then what do we make of the fact that in the same verse, it also establishes very clearly that an excess of food is bad? And apart from the fact that preaching on gluttony tends to hit too close to home, tell me why we get a fair amount of emphasis on something not many people are doing, but very little on something that anyone can determine at a glance. Why is that?

I’m just trying to figure out whether or not you take things like gluttony the same way as other things in scripture. In other words, you and others here must have a different overall hermeneutic to be coming to such differences in opinion on scripture. From the way you talk, it seems you believe Aaron Blumer to be intellectually dishonest in his choice to brush aside gluttony and, instead, focus on alcohol. But I don’t think you really believe that, I just think you interpret and apply scripture differently than him and others - which is why I asked questions about other things in the Bible, to try to gauge how you interpret scripture.

How about divorce and remarriage? Do you believe the Bible authorizes divorce and, if so, under what circumstances? Do you believe the Bible authorizes remarriage and, if so, under what circumstances? No, I’m not really looking for an answer to those questions, but we can come to differences in opinion on a huge variety of issues in the Bible and yet still recognize that we are, indeed, born again believers who will share in heaven’s glories. Many, like me, believe alcohol is far more insidious and dangerous than you; I am dumbfounded that any American Christian would say it’s “okay” and even “good” to drink alcohol considering the devastating impact it has on so many aspects of our country. You believe gluttony/overeating is worse. Maybe you’re right; I’m certainly not there with you yet.

I think the bottom line, though, is that these are all sins of the heart. When we are rightly related to God, walking in the Spirit, we do not sin, we cannot sin. Only when I am walking in the flesh do I sin. If I am rightly related to God while I am eating Thanksgiving dinner, walking in the Spirit, I can be confident that I was not a glutton - even if some human medical expert tells me gravy, mashed potatoes, apple pie a la mode, and a can of Coke are horrible for my health. We could talk all day about what we eat and find that we’d all have to go back to being farmers if we wanted to consume only that which was good for our Temples. My conscience tells me that when I’m walking in the light, in fellowship with God, that it is a blessing from him to enjoy food, even if, sometimes, I consume more than my body needs at that moment in time in caloric intake or if it contains substances that not only lack healthiness but are actually bad for me (back to the buttery mashed potatoes and Coke example). Am I enjoying the food because I am thankful God provided it, or am I driven to consume whatever I want at all times regardless the impact it has to my body? That, I believe, is the fundamental, important question.

But bringing this back to the topic at hand, there is nothing good about alcohol that I can’t get elsewhere. And there is an abundance of bad. Any so-called health benefits from alcoholic beverages can easily be obtained without drinking alcohol. Some like the taste and call it a blessing; I argue wisdom tells me to run away from it because no human knows if he will be the one who will fight with the chemical dependency for the rest of his life because he tried it. This same wisdom tells me to run away from gambling, porneia, tobacco, opioids, and any other of the things that have proven, historically, to be addicting.

[Bert Perry]

Again, if Scripture establishes clearly that an excess of wine is bad—and it does—then what do we make of the fact that in the same verse, it also establishes very clearly that an excess of food is bad? And apart from the fact that preaching on gluttony tends to hit too close to home, tell me why we get a fair amount of emphasis on something not many people are doing, but very little on something that anyone can determine at a glance. Why is that?

At my church, we rarely hear preaching against specific sins, although it does come up in the context of things that happen when we are not walking in the Spirit. When the preaching is almost strictly exegesis, working through books, you come across whatever topic happens to be in the book, of course; but telling someone not to sin is less effective than pointing someone to Christ, which helps them realize why they sin - because, at that point in time, they were failing to walk in the Spirit. The Don’t Do It becomes less the focus - it becomes less about the individual and what he shouldn’t do and, instead, it becomes more about depending on Christ, submitting our will to his, knowing that when we are in the Spirit overcoming temptation to sin is much easier…no, it is infinitely easier.

“Preach what’s in the Word, not what’s on your soapbox. And let’s define it properly; it’s eating, at various times or consistently, more than your body needs to operate.”

Bert, you call for preaching the word, not what’s on your soapbox, and then you give a definition for gluttony that you provided, not one from the Scriptures. Science has measurements they use to define obesity. The Scriptures do condemn gluttony. But who decides at what point the scientific definition of obesity moves someone into the realm of being guilty of the sin of gluttony?

Go back and read your post. You decided what a glutton was, not the Scriptures:

“The glutton is the person who eats at one sitting a lot more than he needs (think Thanksgiving or a Super Bowl Party), or who consistently eats more than he needs.”

Chapter and verse?

I am not excusing the poor stewardship many have in regards to the care of their bodies. There are many ways people knowingly harm themselves.

But you also said this: “You only get those stores of fat by eating more calories over time than you burn; there is no other way.”

Actually there are other ways. There are people with medical conditions and disorders where they eat a very low calorie diet—any lower and they would encounter other medical problems, and yet the weight just keeps climbing. They don’t want to be over-weight, but there is little they can do about it.

Also, joint replacements are not always associated with carrying around excessive weight. I know of several people who had both knees replaced and were otherwise physically fit.

This is a valid topic, and I agree with the premise that preaching should include being good stewards of the physical bodies God has given us…but we should be careful not to paint everyone with the same brush—especially if we are relying on scientific definitions and relating them to the Scriptures in a way not defined by the Scriptures themselves.

Darrell, it is worth noting that I did in fact provide a link to the definitions of “zolel” and “phagos” that indeed does back up what I’m saying. The root words for gluttony do indeed convey a general sense of excess. Again, that tight stomach/nausea after overeating, or gaining fat around the body.

And that’s a big reason why I disagree with one of Aaron’s main claims in his earlier link that a person can get fairly overweight (or even obese) without gluttony. While it can certainly sneak up on you—you can gain 50lbs of fat in 50 years with ten extra calories per day(3500 calories/lb of fat)—your body is indeed mute testimony to your moderation or excess.

Really, if we’re going to follow a chain of hypotheses to go from the very Biblical proscription of drunkenness to a general prescription for abstinence from wine, exactly why would we refuse to follow the statistically documented correlations of overweight/poor diet/lack of exercise to start teaching more on gluttony? Really, when we compare our approaches, we’re inverting the normal hierarchy of evidence, statistical evidence being ignored for hypotheses.

And regarding the notion that there are other ways to put on extra weight than extra calories; that’s nonsense, Darrell. Pure, unadulterated nonsense. Fat gain is a simple equation of calories in vs. calories out. There are ways (see link) that you can persuade your body it’s satisfied (that’s the root of just about any diet, really), but let’s not pretend that we can get past thermodynamics.

The passages in question are:

• Dt 21.20
• Pr 23.20
• Pr 23.21
• Pr 28.7
• Mt 11.19
• Lk 7.34

Bert says seven, I only see six references. In all but one, Pr 28.7, the term is used in conjunction with drunkenness, “the glutton and the drunkard”, etc.

Whatever gluttony means in the Bible, it is clearly connected to drunkenness. It is an excess in the same way. It may even be the same excess.

I think that people tend to overeat. I agree its not healthy, not good stewardship, etc. But is it gluttony according to the Bible? Is it overindulgence in the same way drunkenness is overindulgence? What is that way?

The problem is that we have to eat, we don’t have to drink alcohol. When there is abundance, we can habituate ourselves to eating too much, and that will show itself. But to say that is gluttony is a stretch in my mind.

I think I should write a little more on the nonsense idea that one can gain fat without excess calories. While there are some medical conditions (e.g. thyroid diseases) that can greatly change the metabolism, that does not change the fact that if you’re putting on fat, you are eating too many calories, period. One might argue that a lipoma—fatty tumor generally beneath the skin—is an example, but again, if you’re not taking in more calories than you’re burning, that lipoma can only grow by taking fat from elsewhere in the body, upon which it becomes obvious and you hire a surgeon to fix that issue.

The only quasi-exception to this pattern is when a tumor or water retention adds to the non-fatty tissues of the body, and I’ve made it explicit that I am talking about fat. But even there, when you gain weight, that’s a sign that something is different.

As a rule, when people argue “oh, there are all these other ways to gain weight than overeating”,that’s usually a dodge to get around the fact that they’re fairly overweight. Very often, it’s visible at a glance, and at other times, the old 1970s “gut check” can work wonders; take off your shirt, pinch your skin to the side of your navel, and tell me how thick that fold is. Can you pinch an inch? If you can, you’ve got some weight to lose.

Darrel, you have brought up some really good points on gluttony. The points you raise are the reasons that I would like to read a well thought out article on the subject that is supported by scripture. You wrote earlier:

Not everyone who appears to be overweight is guilty of the sin of gluttony. I know some who have medical problems that result in excessive weight gain. I also know of some who literally can eat huge portions of food and desserts and never put on any weight. Its not as easy to decipher as getting someone’s body mass index number and then declaring them being in ‘sin’ if the number is too high.

I could not help but notice that someone hit “dislike” for that post (I copied and pasted the whole thing). I wish I had a scripture to show why what Darrel said would not be liked. If I am missing something, I want to learn. My wife was the one who posted earlier about having so much water weight. She dropped a lot of weight in just a couple of weeks once the medical professional found out that she had both food sensitivities and nutritional deficiencies. These conditions were causing inflammation (Inflammation is not fat). She was actually swelling due to a health condition, not due to her eating too much. She quit eating the foods she was reacting to (many of them were what we would typically consider healthy- she had to stop eating legumes for a while). Once those foods were gone and she started taking supplements for what was lacking in her diet, the inflammation (water not fat) quickly vanished.

The context of what you said was about how to get the ample stores of fat that are a sign of gluttony:

“As such, ample stores of fat are as much a sign of gluttony as bloating and nausea. You only get those stores of fat by eating more calories over time than you burn; there is no other way.”

My point was that there are people who eat minimal calories and yet still put on excess weight. You seem to be ready and willing to label these people as gluttons. It has nothing to do with thermodynamics, but rather with a body chemistry that aggressively stores calories as fat—in a way that is not normal for most folks.

Furthermore you did move from ‘a general sense of excess’ to ‘The glutton is the person who eats at one sitting a lot more than he needs (think Thanksgiving or a Super Bowl Party), or who consistently eats more than he needs’ which is more than what the Scriptures say.

What about the person whose metabolism burns off everything at an incredible rate? Would you label that person a glutton? I know someone like this who is not overweight, can eat incredible amounts of food, including 5 dunkin donuts in one sitting (I would be in pain by the 3rd), and yet he is a normal weight (and ‘hated’ by friends for his ability). Is this man a glutton according to a Scriptural definition? How about by your definition?

JD, I made clear, repeatedly, that I was talking about gaining fat, not water.

Regarding the notion that a medical condition can result in adding fat without excess calories, that is once again absolutely false. The reason is the first law of thermodynamics, as well as the laws of conservation of matter and conservation of energy. Each gram of carbohydrate, protein, fat, or alcohol is either used to make energy (with water/carbon dioxide/etc. excreted, etc..), form muscle and connective tissue (proteins), not digested/excreted, or stored as fat. So if you’re gaining fat, you have a surplus of nutrients coming in. Always.

For the two examples, that means that the person who gains fat despite “eating like a bird” in our view is still eating too much for their metabolism and activity level. You might get that checked out (e.g. hypothyroid conditions), but dietetically, it means the person is getting too much food. Conversely, it means that the person who eats “like a horse” but doesn’t gain weight isn’t being a glutton because they’re simply eating an amount of food that corresponds to their metabolism and activity level. Again, you might get it checked out—weight loss is an early sign of many cancers—but eating like Michael Phelps is not gluttony if you’re training like him, too.

Put strictly speaking for JD—my mom was a dietician and I learned a bit—that might also mean that you’re going to want to look closely at how quickly your food gets into your blood, as large amounts of sugar wreak havoc with your insulin response. That large Coke at McDonald’s may get you through the day, but it’ll do nasty things for your blood sugar and fat in your blood. Check out www.eatright.org (Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics) for a lot more info on this.

Regarding the point that there isn’t anything in wine that you can’t get elsewhere, well, that’s almost true. You can buy resveratrol tablets or eat a lot of dark grapes, and you can get blood thinners and diuretics that work in a similar way to alcohol, to be sure. But let’s go with it. Sure, there’s no need or particular advantage to wine with the exception that people can enjoy it in moderation.

But that noted, if you go to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (again, eatright.org), you’ll learn that there is absolutely no food that you absolutely need. So let’s play the game of “you don’t need this” with other foods. Let’s cut out that Coke, that butter, all those eggs, and forget about that steak. No chocolate, no coffee….all of a sudden, what we’ve done is to keep everything you need in your diet, and it’s quite frankly a diet that you will absolutely HATE.

Thankfully, the Scripture does not use this approach with any food, including wine. And that’s my point. If Scripture does not condemn the person whose wine-vats are full by God’s blessing for using those wine-vats in moderation, neither should we.

[Bert Perry]

Thankfully, the Scripture does not use this approach with any food, including wine. And that’s my point. If Scripture does not condemn the person whose wine-vats are full by God’s blessing for using those wine-vats in moderation, neither should we.

But the Bible does not warn against specific foods, just against “gluttony” (pick the translation/interpretation of the word of choice - doesn’t matter here). There are warnings against alcohol specifically, but I don’t know of any warnings concerning eggs, butter, or steak (unless it was offered to idols ;)). Not the same conversation.

“Regarding the notion that a medical condition can result in adding fat without excess calories, that is once again absolutely false.”

You put someone with a low thyroid in an impossible situation Bert. You accuse them of taking in too many calories, but if they get any fewer, they would battle incredible fatigue and other problems. Someone close to me developed thyroid disease as a teenager, and the condition worsened throughout adulthood until the point it became a dangerous thyroid cancer that had to be surgically removed. But a decade before the cancer, a doctor decided to take her off thyroid treatment altogether to see what it would do. She did not change her diet, which was balanced and healthy, and yet the pounds started adding on. Going on a diet to eat less to try and stop the weight gain led to a much greater degree of fatigue and failure to thrive. The only option was to get back on the synthroid and the weight came off—again with no change in diet or exercise.

So in a way, your statement itself was absolutely false, because for this person, eating a healthy diet, taking in just enough calories to fend of extreme fatigue was still resulting in the addition of fat. Do you see my point? Eating any less would cause a significant health crisis, but the calories kept getting wrongly stored as excess fat. She didn’t want to gain weight and only ate enough to stave off the weakness due to the lack of proteins and calories being put to work to keep the body functioning. Her broken body was wrongly storing it up as fat instead of using it the way it should be used.

The bottom line is we are in decaying bodies marred by sin. Our bodies can be broken by a host of problems, and for some people the best of intensions when it comes to calorie intake still does not resolve their problems with weight gain.

And for the record, the person I described above along with myself are both a healthy weight. I was ‘blessed’ to have inherited a very wide skeletal frame from a very wide German great-grandmother. So I typically weigh a little more than what my height says I should weigh on the government provided charts. But no one would look at me and think me obese or anything.

So I am not arguing on this thread from perspective where I am trying to play a ‘get out of obese free’ card. But I do have some overweight friends, and I hurt for them in their struggle with their health. I don’t know about each of their conditions although I know at least two of them have a severe and life-threatening battle with auto-immune disease—a complicating factor with their weight gain.