Fun with Augustine: Lust, Food & Gossip. . . When Our Appetites Get the Best of Us

Hello, friends! It's good to be back after several days away. It's been a whirlwind of a weekend (sorry for not posting yesterday!) with a wedding to do, and today promises to be no different. So before this day gets away from me, here are some Qs&As and the Sunday sermon.


Here's the question and answer from Friday:
What did David do when the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul? (2 Sam 21)
2 Samuel 22:1 David sang to the LORD the words of this song when the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul.

And here's the question and answer from Saturday:
Will God allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear? (1 Cor 10)
1 Corinthians 10:13 13 No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.

And here's the question for today:
Who declares himself king when David becomes old and feeble? Who was supposed to be the next king? (1 Kings 1)


And here's today's sermon:
"Fun with Augustine: Sex, Food, & Gossip. . .
When Our Appetites Get the Best of Us”

PRAYER OF ILLUMINATION
Let us pray: Gracious God, shine the light of your Spirit upon us as we hear these words of Scripture read and proclaimed. Reveal your saving presence in these words, and lead us further down the path of faith. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

SERMON: INTRODUCTION
Last week, I spent several days with some other alums from my Seminary. Once a year, we get a big book list, we read the books (or rather most of the books!), and then we gather to discuss the things we’ve read. This year, we chose to study a theologian from the fourth century named Augustine. And I wanted to share a brief passage from one of the books we read. It’s called City of God. (Book 14, chapter 12)

Augustine—despite the silly passage I just read—is actually a MAJOR figure in the development of Christianity in the West, and he is, to say the least, an interesting guy. He was a rather lusty young man, and he took a mistress at the tender age of 18 and they lived together for 15 years and had one son together. Later on, he left this woman and his child to marry an heiress. He never saw them again.

Augustine sort of drifted from one philosophy to another, though his mom desperately wanted him to be a Christian. Eventually he converted to Christianity in his 30s. From then on, he used all of his energy that had led him astray in his youth, if you get my drift, and put it into his faith. Shortly after becoming ordained, he was made a bishop in the Roman Catholic Church.

So, I thought we’d have a little fun with Augustine this morning, as I indicate in my sermon title. And if you think the sermon title is a little risqué, just wait ‘til you hear the Scripture passage I picked for today!

SCRIPTURE PASSAGE: 1 Corinthians 6:15-20
15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never!
16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, "The two will become one flesh." 17 But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. 18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.

19 Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.

The grass withers and the flower fades but the Word of the Lord endures forever.

#1
Augustine was really interested in bodies AND he was very fond of Paul’s writings. So it seems natural that while we’re in 1 Corinthians, we can listen to what Augustine might have to say about what it means to honor God with our bodies which are the temple of the Holy Spirit.

Augustine would say that we are made up of three parts—that inside our bodies, we have 3 parts: our intellect, our will, and our appetites. Part #1 is our intellect: our heart, mind, and soul; it is our ability to reason. And our reason tells us what is right and what is wrong. Part #2 inside us is our will, which is our ability to do what our intellect tells us to do. And Part #3 is our appetites or our desires—the urges and yearnings we feel.

God created our bodies with each of these parts—intellect, will, and appetite—and he created each part to want what’s best for us. Because we are made in God’s image, we are wired to want goodness, happiness, and peace. In other words, God created us to want God, who IS goodness, happiness, and peace. God is what’s best for us. And our bodies become temples for the Holy Spirit, so we should want what’s best for our bodies. And our intellect, will, and appetite all work together to do what’s best for us.

Let me give you an example: part of taking care of our temples is to eat things that are good for us. Our physical appetite tells our intellect that our bodies are hungry, our intellect thinks about whether it is time to eat or not and what is best for our bodies, and our wills choose to eat a good meal, with lots of fruits and veggies, instead of having ice cream and birthday cake for breakfast. That’s the way it works for you, right? [:0)

#2
I think you’ve noticed there’s a flaw in this system. And it’s called sin. Sin has entered the world and messed up the image of God He put inside us when He first created us. Because of sin, our appetites and our desires sometimes tell us that it’s OK to want a second dessert or to indulge in sexual immorality or to want to gamble on another hand of poker or to want to crack open another beer or to want to pass along a good piece of gossip or whatever it is that you have a strong desire for and a strong appetite for.

Sin tells our appetites that it’s OK to indulge. Sin tells us it’s OK to do things, to desire things, to be hungry for things that are NOT good for our bodies, which are supposed to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. Sin tells us it’s OK to want what’s NOT best for us.

And suddenly our wills are obeying our appetites instead of our intellects. We become impulsive, and we begin to want the things that are not what’s best for us.

Instead of wanting God, we want to BE God—just like Adam and Eve and that darn fruit tree in the Garden of Eden. When we let our appetites get the best of us, we want TO BE the god of our own lives. We begin to want all the wrong things. And this leads to a decided LACK of goodness and happiness and peace. When we want the wrong things, it leads to chaos, like the chaos that existed before Creation.

But God did not create us to live in chaos. God created us to live in Him, so that we might find the goodness and happiness and peace that He created us to want and to desire.

CONCLUSION
God has blessed us with intellects in order to guide our hearts and our decisions. God has created us to want what is best for us, if we can just manage to listen to our intellects rather than our appetites.

God has created us to desire goodness and happiness and peace. God has created us to desire Him.

Augustine's most famous quote is this: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you."[1]

Until our hearts find rest in God, our appetites and our desires for the wrong thing will always win. And even once we find rest in God, our appetites can still get the best of us. But, as 1 Corinthians 6 says, we were bought with a price. We belong to God. And God has given us the ability to resist . . . we are the temple of the Holy Spirit who lives inside of us. God has given us the ability to follow our intellect rather than our appetites. We CAN do it, with God’s help.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

[1] http://www.crossroadsinitiative.com/library_article/621/Our_Heart_is_Restless_St_Augustine.html