10 Bible Lessons About Food

Food is God’s most basic way of saying, “I love you. I want to provide for you by nurturing you with food that is beautiful and delectable” 

In Food and Faith: A Theology of Eating,  explores what the Bible can teach us about eating well, and shows how God invites us to share in this love by becoming hospitable and nurturing to others.

Food is not a commodity or product made for political gain or private profit. It is a gift like manna, meant to remind us of our dependence on God and upon each other . Receiving food properly we bear witness to a gracious God.

 

Every creature that lives depends upon the sacrifices of countless others that decompose, fertilize, pollinate, and feed the world. We become worthy of God’s offering of the world to us by offering ourselves to it in acts of care and celebration.

Eating is one of the most basic ways we learn to delight in each other and the goodness of creation, author Norman Wirzba says in Food and Faith. Eating together is one of the most important and practical means for overcoming the barriers and ignorance that separate us from each other.

When we eat, we participate in an ecological and agricultural act that joins us to all the members of creation. God cares about whether or not our fields are fertile and our waters clean. God cares about the treatment of animals and about the well being of the land’s workers and eaters

Good food depends on good care of the garden world that feeds us. Humanity’s most fundamental task is to make sure that whatever we do, our actions keep the garden healthy and whole . God is the ultimate Gardener  and Farmer of the world.

Jesus calls us to the Eucharist so that our eating and drinking of his body and blood can transform and then energize us to perform his ministries of healing, reconciling, and nurturing other When we eat well we strengthen the personal, social, and ecological bodies of the world.

 

 More than a pious act, real gratitude commits us to remember and care for other creatures that make their way to our tables and dinner plates. God wants our eating to express thanksgiving for the flavor, aroma, and freshness of the world.

 

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