Overcoming the Acceptable Christian Sin of Gluttony #41
Welcome to the Overcoming the Acceptable Christian Sin of Gluttony podcast, a companion podcast to the Acceptable Christian Sin of Gluttony message series. My name is Daniel Whyte III president of Gospel Light Society International. The purpose of this podcast is to share with you, from a biblical perspective, the means by which we can combat and overcome the sin of gluttony and its outcome of obesity.
Our passage from the Word of God today is Proverbs 23:21 which reads: “For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags.”
Now, let’s look at gluttony and its effects in the news: According to Fox Business, Working from home has its perks, but potential weight gain isn’t one of them. As more workplaces allow employees to work remotely with the ongoing new coronavirus outbreak, a combination of job stress, the uncertainty surrounding public health and having easy access to the refrigerator could prompt some to eat more than they would at the office. It’s called “stress eating” for a reason. A number of studies show that emotional or physical distress increases the amount of food we eat, particularly meals higher in fat, sugar or both. Jaclyn London, a registered dietitian and head of nutrition and wellness at Weight Watchers, said, “Anytime you’re feeling particularly stressed out — whether it’s at work or at home — and you’re feeling aimless, we go to what’s comfortable.” London said, not having to commute to work and the ability to wake up later can also throw off your meal times. “It’s the disruption in the schedule. Make sure your environment is set up so you have all of that produce, nutrient-dense food so when you’re going to snack you automatically have things available to you that are healthier options.” Stress eating can impact people in a few different ways. In the short term, stress can prevent appetite, but when it’s ongoing, a hormone called cortisol gets released into our bodies that could increase hunger.
In this podcast, we are going through the book, The RAVE Diet and Lifestyle: The Natural Foods Diet With Meals that Heal, by Mike Anderson. This section is titled: No Animal Foods, Part 3:
Another reason why animal protein causes cancer has to do with digestive enzymes – or a shortage of them as a result of eating animal foods. Cancer cells have a protective protein coating around them which makes them invisible to the immune system. The pancreas produces two enzymes that help digest animal protein. In addition to digesting animal protein, only these enzymes can dissolve the protein coating around cancer cells. Once the protein coating is dissolved by the enzymes, the cancer cells become visible and the immune system can do its job of destroying them.
Animal protein requires a lot of enzymes to digest it and eating a diet high in animal protein can cause a shortage of pancreatic enzymes. When this happens, cancer cells will keep their protective protein coating and remain invisible to the immune system – and start multiplying. The more animal protein you eat, in other words, the more you impair your body’s natural defenses against cancer.
In contrast, pancreatic enzymes are not necessary to digest vegetable protein – so you can eat as much vegetable protein as you want and the supply of pancreatic enzymes available to unmask cancer cells will be remain plentiful.
Therapies based on pancreatic enzyme supplementation have been successful in treating cancer, but it’s much easier – and cheaper – to simply eliminate animal products from your diet.
These findings fit together with Dr. Campbell’s findings: Animal protein promotes cancer and vegetable protein does not. In fact, vegetable protein does just the opposite: It fights cancer. These findings also agree with thousands of studies linking animal-based diets with cancer. What’s amazing is that it has taken all these studies to confirm what was obvious to observers in the 1890s.
Cancer is very rare in areas of the world where people eat low-fat, plant-based diets. There is 120 times less incidence of prostate cancer, for example, in China compared to the United States. As the Chinese change to the Western diet, however, their risk increases proportionally with their higher intake of animal foods. This was demonstrated in a study in China where they found a man’s chance for developing prostate cancer increased with the increased consumption of animal products. Migration studies have also shown that as people leave their low-fat, plant-based diets behind and adopt the “standard American diet and lifestyle,” their risk of cancer increases with each year of residence in their new country.
With respect to some cancers, there is a little known problem with eating meat and dairy: 89 percent of the herds in the US are infected with the leukemia virus, which cause leukemia and lymphomas in cows. This isn’t just an American problem as 84% of herds in Argentina and 70% in Canada also have the bovine leukemia virus, as well as high percentages in other meat-eating countries throughout the world. Some countries, such as Finland, have thoroughly eliminated the virus from their cattle, after some 30 years of effort. In the study cited above, regarding American cattle, researchers found that 74 percent of the people they tested had been infected by this bovine virus, due to their meat- and dairy-based diets.
In addition to infecting white blood cells, these bovine viruses also attack other cells in the body, such as cells of the breast and the lymph nodes. One study found the virus in the breast tissues of 10 of 23 human breast cancer patients.
We will continue looking at this topic in our next podcast.
— PRAYER —
Now, in this series, as we focus on overcoming the sin of gluttony, and managing our bodies as God intended, we must not lose sight of the most important part of our existence — our spiritual life. Even those of you who are fit, who eat right, and who exercise regularly must still address the condition of your soul. You may keep your body in perfect condition till the day you die, but you will still die — we all will, and the only thing that will matter is the condition of your soul. Is your soul in shape? Is your soul in right standing with God?
The only way to make sure of that is to trust Jesus Christ as your Savior from sin and the consequences of sin. He alone can save your soul, put you in right standing with God, and ensure that you do not perish in Hell. Now, if you do not know Jesus Christ as your Savior, believe in your heart that Jesus died for your sins, was buried, and rose from the dead by the power of God for you so that you can live eternally with Him. Pray and ask Him to come into your heart today, and He will.
Romans 10:9 & 13 says, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved… For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Until next time, may God bless you and keep you is my prayer.
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