P.O. Box 53055    
Los Angeles, CA 90053   

BURNED BY A “BIG ‘N’ TASTY”

Does it make any difference at all what you have for supper tonight? I mean — 350 calories or 1500? A sackful of Krispy Kremes and a main course of LDL-packed pasta primavera, sometimes dubbed “heart attack on a platter” . . . or a green salad, low-fat dressing, with a diet soda and an apple for dessert? Is one going to hurt you more than another?

Amazingly, we have before us as we make out our Thursday menu a diet Bible known as . . . the Bible! That’s right. Both the Old and New Testaments have quite a bit to say about what you should order when you go out to Jack in the Box for lunch today. But here in the four Gospels, as we take a very cautious look at some of the hard-to-understand things Jesus the Diet Doctor is recorded as having said, today we have to really scratch our heads and recheck our calorie counters. Because in both Matthew and Mark, He seems to say to all of us who stand on the scales every morning: “Hey, relax! It doesn’t matter. Eat anything you want, because it honestly doesn’t make any difference.”

Am I paraphrasing? Here’s the exact line, and this is from the New International Version:

“Listen and understand. What goes INTO a man’s mouth does not make him ‘unclean,’ but what comes OUT of his mouth, that is what makes him ‘unclean.’” “It defileth,” says the King James.

Jesus says this to a whole crowd of people at a Weight Watchers rally, but four verses later Peter and the disciples come to Him privately and say — or Peter does: “We don’t get it. What are you talking about?” And Jesus replies:

“Are you still so dull? Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ For out of the mouth come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what make a man ‘unclean.’”

What do you think about that? Now, not one of us could or should argue with Jesus when He teaches that our evil thoughts, our selfishness, adultery, our lies — are all polluting agents. Have you ever felt “dirty” because of your sins? Of course you have, and so have I. It’s why we join King David in asking God to “cleanse” us, to wash us white as snow. But is it also true that all of the sugary things we put into our mouths just slide right through the system, staying for a couple of hours and then saying adios when we take a trip down the hall, second door on the left? Is Jesus scrapping all of the proven principles God gave Israel in the book of Leviticus?

Maybe you heard about it when a lawyer named Samuel Hirsch filed a class-action lawsuit against McDonalds. Eight young people got fat eating Big Macs and having SuperSize fries and milkshakes on a once- or twice-a-day basis. Gregory Rhymes was a 15-year-old high schooler who already topped the scales at close to 400 pounds. And his mom must have been in the crowd the day this Matthew 15 sermon got preached, because she said in her deposition: “Hey, I just always believed McDonalds was healthy for my son.” NBC’s Saturday Night Live did a bitingly sarcastic comedy sketch soon after about people too clueless to figure out that a hundred McDonalds “Big ‘N’ Tasty” sandwiches could cause weight gain, but there’s nothing amusing about the Herald Sun’s ominous conclusion:

“Government statistics suggest around 300,000 deaths a year in the United States can be linked to obesity.”

If you’ve been watching the popular were a fan of the NBC drama, Ed, you might remember a story line in late 2002 involved actor Michael R. Genadry, who plays the part of Mark Vanacore. And he’s a sweet, articulate kid . . . but he’s huge! One web site gently called him “gravitationally challenged,” but the episode, entitled “Makeovers,” had Dr. Burton warning him that he’s a good 250 pounds overweight. Unless something changes, like, RIGHT NOW, he may have a heart attack like his dad. Apparently the actor himself had decided to undergo gastric bypass surgery, so the NBC writing team decided they needed to incorporate a similar story into their 2002-2003 season. But this young man, who simply loves to eat, who is driven to treat himself to endless gourmet confections, is living proof that Jesus must have meant something ELSE when He said: “What you eat goes in . . . then out . . . and doesn’t hurt you. A trip to the little boys’ room solves everything.”

There are two plain realities, I think, that can help us. First of all, here in Matthew 15 and Mark 7, what is Jesus talking about? Is He specifically giving a lecture on diet? Well, all you have to do is go back to the chapter heading of most Bibles. The NIV says it plainly: “Clean and Unclean.” And the Pharisees have just posed this accusing question to Jesus:

“Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”

Now, washing your hands before lunch is a good idea, and you’ve heard about that from non-biblical sources, I’m sure. But the religious leaders here were talking about ceremonial washing, an elaborate, lengthy procedure involving careful, precise washing and scrubbing clear up to the elbows, using as much water as could be held in one-and-a-half eggshells, “holding to the tradition of the Zakenim,” according to one Jewish source. They also said a ritual prayer as they did so:

“Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the universe, who has sanctified us by Thy commandments, and commanded us concerning the washing of hands.”

Again, this was a RITUAL washing, not a sanitary one. That’s the point. The concern was not for germs; it was for following the tradition. In fact, we’re told that if there was no water available, the devout followers could simply go through the motions “dry” and still be undefiled.

So when we come down to the diet part of this discussion, Jesus is plainly telling His accusers that ceremonial uncleanness — whether from not washing your hands in the prescribed way or by eating a food that is ceremonially unclean — was not what was going to hurt your soul. “Food doesn’t enter your heart,” He says in Mark 7:19. “Eating with unwashed hands had no moral effect whatever upon a man” says one Bible commentary. Adultery, anger, dishonesty — THOSE were the things that could poison your heart and soul and mind.

But here’s our second question and concern. Is it still a good idea to wash your hands before you eat? Are there foods which can hurt you? The answer to both questions is an obvious yes. Let’s go back to the Old Testament and consider a question. In Leviticus 11, there’s a long list of animals that are “unclean” foods. Anything that didn’t “chew the cud AND have a split hoof” was forbidden; any sea life that didn’t have fins and scales was also on the non-kosher list. All sorts of varieties of birds were banned. Pork, obviously, was on the “no” list for sure as written up in verse 7. Now the question is this: were these various kinds of meat unclean just from a ceremonial viewpoint, or did God put them in that category ALSO because they were unhealthy? Clear back in Genesis 7, clear before there was a nation of Israel or temple ceremonies, and as Noah was preparing to build his ark, God already called some animals clean and others unclean. Were they just ceremonially so, or can eating pork, for example, actually be harmful to a person’s physical well-being?

Here in Mark 7:19, the Bible writer Mark adds a parenthetical that Jesus WAS intending to erase the CEREMONIAL distinction between clean and non-clean:

“In saying this, Jesus declared all foods ‘clean,’” say the NIV and RSV. The much looser Message paraphrase says: “That took care of dietary quibbling; Jesus was saying that ALL foods are fit to eat.” In the Living Bible: “By saying this He showed that every kind of food is kosher.”

But did God, there in the Garden of Eden, and then when talking to Noah, and again when giving instructions to Moses and His chosen people, Israel, also have in mind the physical health of those He loves and not just their ceremonial purity? Here in the 21st century, it seems plain that He did. It’s on the cover of every major news magazine in America now that certain foods are harmful and that a largely vegetarian diet is the ideal one. In fact, the recent secular bestseller, Live Ten Healthy Years Longer has the numbers to back it up: if a person lives by the biblical blueprint — even though the ceremonial restrictions are now gone — they’re going to be stronger, healthier, more productive . . . and enjoy up to a full decade of extra living.

This is why, in my own Adventist faith community, they gratefully hold on to the “do” and “don’t” list of Leviticus 11. Not because of the ceremonial aspect of the “clean” vs. “unclean.” But because God knows best and our bodies are still His temple. Because, as Paul himself puts it in I Corinthians 10:31:

“Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”