I was chatting on a radio station recently about TEAR Fund’s One Helping cookbook that has been put together with recipes from some of New Zealand’s best chefs, with all profits from the sale of the book going to help fund TEAR Fund’s partners who are working to combat human trafficking and slavery. The beauty of the cookbook is that it’s designed to be used during the Live Below the Line challenge, so every meal has been created to cost a maximum of 75c per serve.

One of the things I pointed out in the conversation was that our culture is currently built on, and needs us to over-indulge to survive. Our economy continues to turn over based on all of us buying things that we don’t need. It needs us to want more and more and to never be satisfied and content with what we have and to most certainly never be satisfied with things that are simple. Bigger, better, faster – these are words that I think would define the appetite of the culture around us and therefore they are compulsions that shape many of us. 

Food is one place where this plays out. Remember the days when the Big Mac was actually viewed as a big burger? Remember when the up-size was not offered as a matter of course? Remember when a can of drink felt large, rather than a 600ml bottle being the norm? Remember when a snack sized bag of chips/crisps would be reasonable rather than consuming a whole large bag? Remember when refined sugar was not added to EVERYTHING. And do we remember when all of these things were consumed once in a blue moon rather than as a regular part of our diet? I do. For some that’s still the case, but for many, including my recent self, over-indulgence is how we live. Because of that, I venture that we’ve lost the art of appreciation.

Because of this, as part of dealing with my own food addictions, I’m on a mission. At this stage of the game I’m still stumbling from time to time – especially in group food situations, but my mission is to completely simplify my approach to food. I want to go cheap and nutritional (the One Helping cookbook gives great ways to do that). I want to stick to 3 meals per day as a discipline – there are healthy ways to snack, but I need to deal with my own compulsion and emotion around snacking first. I want to be more connected to what I eat, so that means a lot less processed foods and more involvement in the preparation and making of what I eat. I want the foods that I eat to be simple and I want to engage a regular practice of pausing, even if only silently, to give thanks every time I eat or drink something because too often I consume with no thought about the gift of what I am taking in. As part of it all I have also taken up a regular practice of fasting following the Thursday evening meal until the Friday evening meal, consuming only liquid and focusing my meal attention towards prayer. Fasting is not a dieting exercise, it is a spiritual discipline pursued in unison with prayer. Friday is the chosen day because it connects with the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross for all. Sunday is the day to celebrate his resurrection.

The aim is a complete shift in my own inner culture. I don’t want indulgence to be a matter of course in my life. I want to mirror the sentiment of Paul in Philippians 4 – being content in all things, whether I’m full or hungry, living in plenty or in want. I want my approach to food to be one of simplicity so that anything above the ordinary can truly be seen as special and celebratory rather than a continuation of over-indulgence/gluttony. Simplicity encourages and enables thankfulness – seeing all that I have as a gift.

Sitting at the center of this approach is understanding that the highest meal of all is the Eucharist/Holy Communion where what is consumed is simple bread and wine/juice. My approach to all other food should flow from that simple, yet profoundly deep, grace imparting meal.

The whole thing is not easy. When faced with indulgent food right now, I go through a significant internal battle to bring my compulsions into line – but the pilgrimage is worthwhile as it ultimately leads to true freedom rather than a freedom that is actually about enslavement to my own hedonism.

So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. – 1 Corinthians 10:31