The Wading Pool

“One who is full loathes honey, but to one who is hungry everything bitter is sweet.” (Proverbs 27:7 ESV)

I love Mexican food.  Love it.  Did I say I love it?  Yeah, I LOVE it.  I think I could seriously eat it 5 out of 7 days a week.  And I’d eat Tex-Mex on those days.  Last night, my father-in-law and I took my youngest to one of our local favorites. If you’re ever with us when the chips and salsa come, f.y.i., keep your hands out of the way.  It can get ugly.  When we’re hungry, we can go through several baskets/bowls, just the two of us, but there always comes a point when we stop.  Always.  Why?  We’re satisfied.  We’ve had enough.  The thought of any more at that point would just about make me sick, as much as I like it.

The proverb above was in my reading for today, and it really struck me.  So simple, yet so true!  When we are satisfied, we loathe anything more to eat.  It doesn’t matter if it’s deep fried in chocolate sauce!  When you’ve had enough, you’ve had enough!

Yet, to the hungry, even bitter things seems sweet. The Word says “every bitter thing is sweet.”  Think about that.  Not “looks” sweet, but “is” sweet.  They fool us.  They trick us, so deeply that we actually believe they are what we desire.  Ever had that happen with food, or a drink?  You’re so thirsty that you drink something you’d never drink otherwise?  I have.  And you don’t notice it.

Not until later.

You know where I’m going.

Is this not the case with sin?  “A satisfied soul loathes the honeycomb.”  If my soul is satisfied, and it can ONLY be satisfied with Jesus, I will loathe anything that seeks to entice me to find my satisfaction elsewhere.  If I am hungry, longing for something to fill the desire within me (that can ONLY be filled with Jesus), I will be fooled into thinking that (insert desire/sin here)  will fill me up.

It’s a lie.  There is nothing out there that can meet the desire inside of you that God has designed to cause you to seek Him. Nothing.  Seek to fill it with anything else (money, sex, drugs, drink, work, sports, music, art, stuff, etc., etc, etc.,) and look at the end of the day: still empty.  Why?  Why do so many attain the highest of man’s goals, and still feel empty?  Because they are seeking to satisfy an eternal longing that earthly things will NEVER satisfy.

Better to be like King David, who wrote:

O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;

my soul thirsts for you;

my flesh faints for you,

as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,

beholding your power and glory.

Because your steadfast love is better than life,

my lips will praise you.

So I will bless you as long as I live;

in your name I will lift up my hands.