Eat Whatever You Want!

“Just eat whatever you want!”

Let’s see here...hmmm...how may I count the ways (and people) I won’t be hearing this from?!!! Let’s see, at my doctor’s? Nope. How about from a nutritionist? Yeah, right! What about a cross-fit trainer? Do they even eat anything other than green veggies and tofu? LOL - just kidding, of course. You get the point.

I was having lunch the other day with a seventy-nine year old man. Before we had finished eating, he had consumed several pharmaceutical pills along with his meal. I asked what one of them was and he said it was for his cholesterol (surprise! - again, I joke - seems like everyone over the age of fifty is on that pill). We had a good laugh about how while he was taking this pill, he was eating something that arguably was the cause of his high cholesterol. In all fairness to him, at the very end of his five-course lunch he did eat a slice of both celery and carrot.

He mentioned his ninety-year-old buddy that is on even more pills than he is and, with the tone of resentment we often have towards our physicians whenever they limit something we enjoy, he said that his buddy has been really sticking to his prescribed diet. I said, “Man, I’d be eating everything and as much as my little heart desired! The guy is ninety, for crying out loud!” We laughed some more.

When I got home, I told my wife the story and how I was saying that both of these guys ought to be eating whatever they want, given the fact that they have already exceeded the average lifespan in the U.S. She responded very simply, “That’s because you aren’t afraid of dying; whereas, most people are.” She’s totally right. That got me thinking...

One of the greatest things I enjoy every single day is knowing that this life on earth absolutely pales in comparison to what awaits me upon physical death. I have what Peter called a “living hope” (1 Peter 1:3) in things to come, being a future partaker of the “resurrection of the righteous” (Luke 14:14), aka the resurrection of the saints, as Daniel prophesied:

Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt.
Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord — for we walk by faith, not by sight — we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.So, like I said, my wife is right on this one. The reason I’d be pretty much eating whatever, and however much, of what I wanted if I did indeed make it to ninety-years-old is very simple. I’m not afraid to die. However, let me give you a balance statement here. I’m not so selfish as to possess zero reservations about leaving this earth too soon. I’ll echo what Paul wrote.

For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

But if I am to live on in the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose. But I am hard-pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better; yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake.
I couldn’t agree more. As a pastor, a husband, and a father, I know that God has plans for me for as long as I live on this earth in this wretched body. Maybe some of you reading this have already judged me as selfish because of my desire to leave this earth for something better, but please don’t sin against me like that. I have a “joy set before me” (ala Hebrews 12:2) is all, and it’s mixed with a healthy dose of I-can’t-wait-itis!

For the record, if you and I are still around at ninety, you may want to come visit me from time to time because chances are I’ll be partaking in a killer meal (no pun intended)!!! Woo hoo!

Love in Christ,

Ed Collins