Proverbs 27:7
One who is full loathes honey,
But to one who is hungry, everything bitter is sweet.
The wisdom from God will, ordinarily, lead us to what is sometimes called “the balanced life.” Neither of the conditions described above are favorable: stuffed to the gills with no appetite even for the good stuff OR so ravenous as to desire even the bad stuff. By highlighting these two extremes, we have been indirectly pointed to the middle way: being well fed but not stuffed senseless.
Doesn’t another proverb discuss “gluttonous eaters of meat” who are always having to fight off sleepiness? Just the other day I noticed Lahoud watching me eat a roast beef sandwich: I think this proverb was running through his mind! (He had a little sympathetic sneer as I wolfed the sandwich down.)
“Let your restrained reasonableness be known to all men.” Some Christians aren’t satisfied if they can’t be living at the borders of normality, hovering around extremes. Everything must be exciting in the life of Christ, right?
Don’t be weird. Live quietly. Dwell in the land and do good. Live for fully pleasing your Lord, and not yourselves.
And try ordering the small or medium.
Paul wants us to imagine two church members in the midst of squabbling with one another who look up and see themselves before the Bema (Judgment). Now that puts things into perspective, doesn’t it?
Our in-fighting is a serious thing. Our settled, nasty opinion of church members will have repercussions into the Day. Leave behind the foolishness. And listen to this:
“The unity of Christians across traditional barriers is a sign to the principalities and powers that a greater rule than theirs has now begun…Maintaining that unity, then, is not just a matter of preventing squabbles and bad feeling in the church. IT is part of essential Christian witness to the one Lord. If the church divides along lines related to ethnic or tribal loyalty, it is still living in the world of Caesar.” (Wright, 739)
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