What the Bible says about Artificial Stimulation
(From Forerunner Commentary)
To govern these people was a tremendous burden for Moses because they were not free of their slave mentality. They still thought like slaves. They kept rebelling to the extent that they yearned to go back to the bondage that they had yearned to come out of just a short time before.
Interestingly, the problem on the surface had to do with their diet, but it was not the real problem. As God presents it, the conflict was over what to them was a plain and bland diet as compared to the rich and stimulating diet to which they were accustomed in Egypt. They wanted to be stimulated, but they did not realize—because they were still thinking like slaves—that their tastes were entirely perverted, even their tastes in food. In despising the Lord, they were actually accusing Him—the One who made them—of not knowing what they needed to face the rigors of life in the wilderness.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Freedom and Unleavened BreadRelated Topics: Artificial Stimulation | Perverted Taste | Sensual Stimulation | Slave Mentality | Stimulation, Craving | Taste, Perverted
Amos 6:4-6 mentions feasting, indulging in artificial stimulation, listening to unusual music, and taking excessive and vain measures in personal hygiene. The single idea behind these illustrations is that the excesses of powerful Israelites were possible because of their oppression of the weak and poor.
By contrast, verses 9-10 show ten common Israelites huddled together in one house in fear of the war-induced plagues. People will die so rapidly that the survivors, looking out for themselves, will not take the time to bury the bodies of their own families but burn them in huge funeral pyres. These survivors will eventually recognize that God has dissociated Himself from them, and they will consider it an evil thing even to mention His name! How very bitter! And how very far from God!
The people, whether rich and indulgent or poor and deprived, were self-concerned. Throughout chapter six, Amos balances complacency and disaster, boasting and fear, showing that they result from rejecting God and idolizing self. Inevitably, God will send judgment upon Israel.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Prepare to Meet Your God! (The Book of Amos) (Part One)Related Topics: Addictions | Artificial Stimulation | Complacency | Complacency, Moral | Creature Comforts | Drink | Epicureanism | Excess | Feasting | Food | God's Judgment | Hedonism | Hedonistic Lifestyles | Indolence | Israel's Worldliness | Luxury | Moral Complacency | Music | Oppression of Poor | Overindulgence | Self Centeredness | Self Idolization | Worldliness