"Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.'"
Here is something I wrote on this passage in January 2020:
And, thus, the Weber grill was invented!
When Adam and Eve were created, the diet prescribed by the Creator was a vegetarian one. Following their expulsion from the garden due to their sin of partaking in something the Lord commanded them not to, and following the judgment of God by killing off all mankind generations later, save Noah and his family, the Lord now gave mankind a carnivorous diet, "Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything."
Some people today prefer to stick with a vegetarian diet. For those with health issues, this is certainly understandable. However, there are those who have a notion that refraining from eating meat somehow brings them closer to the divine, provides for a personal environment where spiritual growth can flourish.
The Seventh Day Adventist Church is one such group. While the church does not require vegetarianism within its ranks, it is certainly promoted. The notion is that a vegetarian diet is more healthful, and that since our bodies are given us from God, we have a responsibility to care for them. I suspect their view is along the lines of: since our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, we should not defile them with an unhealthy lifestyle. Coffee, tea and a number of things are also on the "no-no" list, as well as other "unhealthful" things.
Jesus was not a vegetarian and he put a hole right through the notion that what we put in our mouths can improve us spiritually or can defile us before God. He taught, "'Are you so dull?' he [Jesus] asked. 'Don't you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? For it doesn't go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.' (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.) He went on: 'What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person's heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.'" Mark 7:18-23.
I recall having a discussion with a Seventh Day Adventist elder on this issue years ago. He strongly claimed that vegetarianism was important for spiritual growth. He even said it would be a sin for him to eat meat. Afterall, vegetarian was the diet God determined for Adam and Eve when they communed with God in the pristine environment of the garden.
I guess it was lost on him that vegetarianism was the very diet Adam and Eve enjoyed when they chose to rebel against God and caused the entire human race to fall, that it was the very diet for all mankind when they corrupted themselves to the point that God destroyed them all, save Noah and his family.
Vegetarianism, as a health issue, is one thing. But this notion that vegetarianism can have spiritual benefits is only one more arrow in the quiver of the "do-gooder" as he seeks to enhance his relationship with God through his own works. It is a fool's errand. God looks for faith, not diet!
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