Think of a favorite food.   Eating it is an amazing pleasure on many levels.  The look of it already excites you.  The smell fills you with anticipation.  Then the flavor as you bite, chew and swallow.  With some things, like crunchy ones, your hearing is even affected as you chomp away.  And the feeling in your mouth always adds to the experience.   What’s more, you can still taste whatever it is for some time even after gulping it down.   Forget brushing your teeth.  Let’s just enjoy this multi-sensory experience for as long as we can.  No wonder some people overeat when they’re depressed!  Eating just plain makes you feel good!

Now let’s switch gears:

If anyone ever needed something to cheer him up it was the prophet Jeremiah.  This was a man sent to deliver one message of gloom and doom after another.  And he did it without the slightest hint of a judgmental, fire-and-brimstone self-righteousness.  In fact we see him weeping over a people who had utterly lost their way, hating the fact that he never had anything good to say to them.  Moreover, his listeners hated him, repeatedly attacking the messenger because the message upset them – as if the the mail carrier were somehow responsible for their bills.

In the midst of his sorrow, Jeremiah resorted to eating to make himself feel better.  We don’t hear much about his diet, but he loved to devour God’s Word.  Listen to how he described it:

Your words were found, and I ate them,
And Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart;
For I am called by Your name, O Lord God of hosts.”
          – Jeremiah 15:16 (NKJV)

May the Lord increase our appetite for His delicious Word!