40 Day Fast Day Nineteen: Eat, Drink and Be Merry!

Mmmmm bacon!

Mmmm nachos!

I had dreams last night that I forgot I was fasting. My friend Roland from Flying Colors (where I worked right toward the end of college and afterwards) provided me with a big plate of nachos. When I finished with the nachos I started working on a BLT and was about halfway through it when I realized that I WAS FASTING and I ran to the sink and spit my bite of BLT out. But the most important thing is that MY IMAGINATION IS WORKING AGAIN! Not an oyster cracker to be found. Yay! 

Today I listened to Luke 12 and 13. In this section, fasting is compared to feasting, and a familiar motto, “Eat, drink and be merry” is trotted out... and, in context, seen as something evil (because the man who says this is planning on spending all his wealth on himself and is not "rich toward God"). Interestingly, this is probably the best slogan for U.S. culture that I can think of. And somewhere along the way, someone has even added to the slogan to say, "Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die." One point of Jesus' parable appears to be that "Eat, drink and be merry" is an insufficient life philosophy in the light of our too-soon-approaching death. So it's doubly strange that this modified version even exists. 

Anyway, here's the story for those who are interested (from Luke 12)

¹³ Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”
 ¹⁴ Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” ¹⁵ Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” ¹⁶ And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. ¹⁷ He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’   ¹⁸ “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. ¹⁹ And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’   ²⁰ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’   ²¹ “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”