'Burning to Live in Your Presence'

I have been allowed to borrow the book the staff is reading for devotions. While supervising lunch I had been thumbing through it and a few sections caught my attention that I really wanted to reread and chew on. I would like to share some snippets. It comes from "Early Will I Seek You - A 40-day journey in the company of AUGUSTINE - arranged by David Hazard."

"Late have I loved you, O Beauty so ancient and so new. Late have I loved you!
You were within me, while I was outside of myself. I was searching for you in all the outward joys and beauties. And all I found was loneliness.
Then I fell and was broken by those same lovely thing which I sought - things that you yourself made. Yet you were with me, while I was not with you. I was being kept from you by my hunger for the world's lovely things. I did not even recognize that all the things I sought had been created by someone, or they would not exist at all.
Then you called me and cried to me and broke through my deafness! You sent forth your beam, the light of your magnificently beautiful presence. You shone your Self upon me to drive away my blindness. You breathed your fragrance upon me ... and in astonishment I drew my breath ... now I pant for you! I tasted you, and now I hunger and thirst for you.
You touched me - and I burn to live within your peace."
...

"That Your Soul May Live" " 'Listen! Listen to me (the Lord, your God), and eat what is good, and your soul will delight itself in the richest of fare. Give ear and come to me that your soul may live.' Isaiah 55:2,3 "

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"I Approach Food As I Approach Medicine"
"'Everything is permissible for me - but not everything is beneficial. Everything is permissible for me - but I will not be mastered by anything.' 1 Cor. 6:12
'For the fruit of the Spirit is ... self-control.' Gal. 5;22,23
You have taught me that I should approach the taking of food as I approach medicine.
For hunger and thirst are pain of a sort. They break down the body and burn, unless the 'medicine' of nourishment relieves us. And it's by eating and drinking that we repair the daily losses of the body, until such time as you destroy both the stomach and food (1Cor. 6:13). At that time you will kill all fleshly hungers by filling us with your wonderful plenty. Then you will clothe this corruptible body with an everlasting body that cannot be corrupted(1Cor. 15:54). ...
Now, let us be honest, eating and drinking are pleasurable, and good food is healthful for the body. But I may sit down to eat and drink for the sake of health, and then for pleasure go on to eat and drink far more that I need or even what is healthful. Often, it is so difficult to tell the dirrerence, whether my body has a healthy appetite, or whether I am being deceived by my own overwhelming greed, until I am seduced into thinking that I really cannot control my appetite. So then I eat for the reason of gluttony and not in thankfulness to God. ...
I ask you, O Lord, to help me keep a right grip, neither too loose nor too tight, on the reins of my palate."

In one of the many programs I have looked at they taught that God created our bodies with signals and you are encouraged to not eat until you hear your stomache growl or at least KNOW you are receiving a signal from the stomache to eat. Then you only eat till you are full, again, listening for those signals. I agree with this whole heartedly. Especially when your struggle involves food, it is important to retrain ourselves to hear our bodies. And of course, the Holy Spirit also leads us in this.

I have already quoted 1Cor. 6:12, here is the amplified:
" 12 Everything is permissible (allowable and lawful) for me; but not all things are helpful (good for me to do, expedient and profitable when considered with other things). Everything is lawful for me, but I will not become the slave of anything or be brought under its power.
13 Food [is intended] for the stomach and the stomach for food, but God will finally end [the functions of] both and bring them to nothing. The body is not intended for sexual immorality, but [is intended] for the Lord, and the Lord [is intended] for the body [to save, sanctify, and raise it again].

1Cor. 10:23 says, "All things are legitimate [permissible--and we are free to do anything we please], but not all things are helpful (expedient, profitable, and wholesome). All things are legitimate, but not all things are constructive [to character] and edifying [to spiritual life]."

Romans 12:1-2 (King James)
"I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your REASONABLE service. And be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God."