Proverbs 25:16

When you find honey, eat only what is sufficient for you,
lest you become stuffed with it and vomit it up.

I don’t remember exactly how old I was. But, I remember the events of this evening very clearly. We had some company over. Which was always a big deal as a kid. I remember getting excited every time someone was coming over. I don’t know why, but I always loved it. I can’t really remember who was there, I just remember there were guests at our house.

I think mom might have made some kind of gross adult food like stir fry, so she made hot dogs for the kids. I had one. Then I had another. Then I had another. And on my way to my third, fourth or fifth hot dog my mom told me, “you’re going to make yourself sick.” That couldn’t possibly be true. How can eating too much food make you sick. But she let me eat it anyway, probably knowing I would get sick. I think she even made me stay in the bathroom or close to it.

And sure enough. She was right. I had too many hot dogs. And my body was not happy with me. So it forced me to do what I wasn’t able to do myself, keep too much of the hot dogs out of me.

Mom proved her point. And I remember her being very unsympathetic to me afterwards. “Mom, I just threw up, don’t you even care?!?” I’m sure she cared, but she had a point to make.

Many of us spend our lives pushing our bodies to take in more and more of the stuff we weren’t supposed to have that much of. And our bodies force us to deal with those things in ways that we don’t always enjoy. For some of us, it’s just being overweight. For others we get diseases and other forms of sickness.

The point isn’t about the sickness. That’s the repercussion. The point is, we need to know how to control the food before it gets into our body and creates problems. When you get the treats, eat only what is sufficient for you. A whole case of Little Debbies is not necessary when one will do. Half a pumpkin pie is not needed when a slice will do.

Notice, it doesn’t say not to eat honey. This isn’t a proverb telling us not to eat treats. It’s telling us to be balanced in our approach to them. To use moderation.

What this means untraining ourselves. For some, we’ve taught ourselves that 14 chocolate chip cookies is a portion. For others, we’ve bought into the lie that we aren’t ever supposed to indulge in sweets. Neither are accurate. Take only what is sufficient.

Three hot dogs is too much.