Counterfeit Sweets

So in church on Sunday, the talks were about the Word of Wisdom. Between going in and out of the chapel with a noisy baby, one of the speakers caught my attention. He asked the question (and I think he was quoting someone he knew with this whole idea):

Why don’t vegetables taste better if they’re good for you??

Now, I’ve long held my own opinions on this topic—it’s a question I have woefully considered most of my life. I even proudly came up with the motto “Nothing good was ever easy” to motivate myself because of such unfortunate twists of fate. But the speaker’s response was not what I was expecting!

He said… they do!

His claim was that they do taste good—or at least they did until the adversary’s counterfeit version came around.

When I heard that, I must admit I thought it was rather silly, and I would have been the first to argue that vegetables just don’t cut it. And how could chocolate muffins have been invented by anyone but the kindest person in the world? But throughout the week I’ve been thinking about this idea a little more.

Before processed foods and partially hydrogenated oil and ice cream sundaes, there were fruits and vegetables. Fruits are sweet, undeniably. Pineapple, strawberries, watermelon, oranges. Mmmm. Vegetables make you feel good when you eat them. They add flavor, they satisfy the needs of your body. There are even some vegetables that I am starting to appreciate as I get older (shhh! don’t tell anyone I said that…). But if you are surrounded by donuts and orange soda, it's hard to recognize any of that. It's hard not to be distracted.

I wonder if I would have loved vegetables had I been born in a day and age without Reese’s Pieces??

Yes, I think there is some merit in the idea that Satan is trying to distract us from what our body really needs. More sugar, more fat, more salt, more flavor! He wants us to pay attention to instant gratification when it comes to food, just like when it comes to anything else. And he doesn’t want us to observe the way our bodies feel after we come home from a burger joint and all that fried food is making our stomachs do flips. He doesn’t want us to notice just how many handfuls of snacky items we are shoving into our mouths while staring at a screen.

Josh and I have been trying to listen to our bodies better. We want to eat what our body feels like eating instead of what our taste buds are shouting. I don’t do very well, but I’m going to keep at it. And maybe someday, someday! my taste buds will beg me for a little more zucchini.