What's on the menu?

I have decided to give up deer hunting. Not for religious reasons, just for practical ones. For the past two seasons I've not gotten a shot at anything! I did get some nice pictures of deer on my game camera over the past two years. Oh, I enjoyed going to the woods, being out in nature. But I'm glad I don't have to live on the meat I brought home!


In today's reading of the One Year Bible, Noah and his family come out of the ark after a year in watery isolation, and God changes their menu. As we have read so far, man's diet in the garden seems to have been only fruit (Gen. 2:15-17). I thought I had invented a new word for a moment when I described that practice in my mind as fruitarianism.Nope. Somebody beat me to it! Following man's rebellion against God, it is clear that he became a vegetarian, being condemned to till the earth for food (Gen. 3:17-19).


In today's reading God changes the menu again, opening up to man the whole smorgasbord of creation as his diet. Gen. 9:1-4 tells us:

Then God blessed Noah and his sons and told them, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth.  All the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky, all the small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear and terror. I have placed them in your power.  I have given them to you for food, just as I have given you grain and vegetables.  But you must never eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it.

Ham and cheese sandwich is now a possibility!  Meat lover's pizza would not have existed without this passage. Later, God will restrict the diet of his chosen people, the Jews, with certain restrictions in Leviticus, but those will be put back on the table for Christians in Acts 10.  


Funny, but some people want to restrict our diet again. There are those folks who are not happy unless they are calling all of the shots. They are the kind of people who tell you when it is time to drink the Kool-aid! Paul warns Timothy about them in 1 Timothy 4:1-5:

Now the Holy Spirit tells us clearly that in the last times some will turn away from the true faith; they will follow deceptive spirits and teachings that come from demons. These people are hypocrites and liars, and their consciences are dead.  They will say it is wrong to be married and wrong to eat certain foods. But God created those foods to be eaten with thanks by faithful people who know the truth.  Since everything God created is good, we should not reject any of it but receive it with thanks.  For we know it is made acceptable by the word of God and prayer.

Certainly there may be health considerations for what we eat. A diet high in fats may clog your arteries. And some people have allergies to certain kinds of food. But to forbid certain foods on the basis of faith or belief is a teaching that Paul says comes from deceptive spirits and demons and is taught by hypocrites and liars.


Hmmm, wonder what I will have for breakfast today?