CHE Versus The Pleasure Trap

How could Solomon have been so wise and yet so foolish?

This question came to my mind after reading about his amazing wisdom and multitude of women. God had offered the son of David anything he wanted and the new king chose a discerning heart. The Lord was pleased and granted it to the degree that He was able to say, “there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be.”  Then He threw in riches and honor as bonuses.

At the dedication of the Lord’s temple, Solomon prayed with astounding insight, thinking ahead to every possible act of rebellion his people might commit against God and praying in advance for His mercy and restoration. (1 Kings 8:22-61)

YET, immediately Solomon began to collect wives and concubines to a level contrary to his wisdom. They came from nations about which God had told the Israelites,

You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.
– 1 Kings 11:2

“What part of ‘No!’ did you misunderstand?” God might have asked the smartest man on earth. As predicted,

…his wives turned his heart after other gods.
– 1 Kings 11:4

Today people around the world are also wise but act foolishly in things basic to health and well-being. Why? is the looming question. New research, revealed in the book, The Pleasure Trap,* tells us that humans, and all animals, are designed with three motivational drives to help them survive and reproduce. They work in us as desires: to seek pleasure, avoid pain, and conserve energy.

This design worked successfully in a natural environment where our sustenance was a healthy balance between the calories we spent seeking whole natural foods, getting exactly the amount of rest we needed after an active day, and living with one mate in an intimate family unit.

King Solomon and others wealthy enough not to have to spend their days at physical labor began to seek pleasure, not in the pursuit of health and survival, but as an end in itself.

Cocaine is a good example of the problems that came with this new type of pleasure-seeking. Sigmund Freud, (a highly intelligent man) thought the drug was the key to happiness until he saw the deterioration and misery that came with its artificial pleasure. The drug tells the brain, “Something very good is happening; keep doing it!” Chronic drug use, like many “pleasure traps,” cause high-intensity stimulation of our brain’s pleasure receptors and can disrupt normal pleasure neurochemistry. Nothing else feels as good. How could poor Solomon have gone back to just one wife?

Today the whole world has a false and destructive means of pleasure that is causing almost the entire population to reject what is healthy and good. Food, processed to an unnatural state with fat, sugar, salt, and calories is “trapping” the vast majority of people worldwide. The abnormal and artificial concentration of fat, sugar, and calories plus the elimination of fiber fool our body’s innate means of satiation. We are the only species on the planet who overeat. The result is epidemics of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and other non-communicable diseases.

Moreover, the food we’ve created with its artificially-high amounts of fat, refined sugar and calories stimulates our brain’s pleasure centers and makes it insensitive to the pleasure derived from natural food. We’re addicted.

King Solomon knew God did not want him to have seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines, but he couldn’t stop himself. He was in a pleasure trap. We know we should not order double cheeseburgers, a large order of fries, and a gallon of coke, but “supersize” we do!

We use CHE participatory-style health lessons to get people out of this trap, to remember that their physical body is the temple of God, and that we honor it or dishonor it with every bite (in CHE we also use the pictures booklet “3×3 foods” during CHE home visits meaning 3 food groups in each of the 3 daily meals).

Below are some pictures taken yesterday at the grand opening of a restaurant owned by a member of our church. I watched in horror as brothers and sisters with diabetes and hypertension who had told me they were “eating well” dove into burgers, fries and enormous cans of coke.

“Did you see they have a Portobello mushroom burger on whole-grain bread?” Enrique whispered to me. “Look at what they named it!”

My heart soared to see it. “Hamburgesa La Pastora.” I was the “pastora.” They had named the single healthy choice after me! I was the only one who ordered it; I may be the only one who ever orders it, but it’s on their radar and for that, I rejoice!

When you sit to dine with a ruler, note well what is before you, and put a knife to your throat if you are given to gluttony. Do not crave his delicacies, for that food is deceptive.
– Prov. 23:1-3

(A Proverb of King Solomon!)