Another Slice
- Paul Condello
- Sep 14, 2020
- 1 min read
Your natural desires can be much stronger than your better judgement, and that is at the heart of the conflict.
In the context of having too much sugar, the outcome can be a temporary sick and nauseous feeling.
Slicing off another piece of cake when you know you’ve already had enough sugar is an example of a common problem people often face. In fact, it represents a human conflict that is at the heart of many of the problems humanity faces, both small and large. It is a battle between a bodily hunger and what your better judgement tells you that you shouldn't do.
Your natural desires can be much stronger than your better judgement, and that is at the heart of the conflict. Although you know you’ve already had enough cake and ice cream, your hunger signal can still overwhelm your will to resist having more. That is especially true when you haven’t committed to prioritizing what you know you should do over natural desires that lead to undesired outcomes. In the context of having too much sugar, the outcome can be a temporary sick and nauseous feeling. In other contexts, the outcome can be much worse.
This problem is described in the Bible by a famous Christian from Tarsus as the battle between the flesh and the spirit. An understanding of how to confront and manage this problem, which involves prioritizing what matters most to you, can be found by studying the Bible. What the Bible has to say about this problem and confronting it is of use not only to Christians but to all people in the public square.
The referencing to the battle between the flesh and the spirit is what most of us still are victim of. Actually, it is seen more largely everywhere. We cannot be contempt with what we have and end up damaging our moral, which is opposite of what gives us happiness. Overcoming temptation is not that hard if you know where to stop and find happiness. And with this pandemic going around, we should know better where our priorities should lie.
Temptation, and overcoming it, is a huge part of the human experience. It may feel good to give into temptation, but short- and long-term emotional harm can come with the pleasure you feel in the moment. Just as overindulging in food leads to feeling sick an hour later, as well as health problems over time, giving in to sin can cause long-term emotional damage, as well as the immediate guilt and shame.
With this pandemic going on, we should have already learned what we should now be prioritizing in life.
The extra slice of cake is a very relatable scenario for us to understand. The idea of the battle mentioned in this article is to forgo your own desires and rather let the Spirit lead. Why? According to the Bible, we will bear the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit referring to joy and love. Are joy and love not the emotions that we really need to feel fulfilled, content and happy? I agree that following the advice of the Bible in relation to this topic may prove to be helpful to many people of a religious belief system or not.
I think this blog describes how our motives and actions can be viewed as sinful. We want things in life, but we have to pay for the consequences. Like cake, the more cake you eat, the more calories you eat which means you can gain weight; at what price are you willing to pay to get what you want?