I get this question, “is overeating a sin?” or some iteration of it, on repeat.

The answer I give always depends on the person asking, why they’re asking and what they’re struggling with. Up until now, the answers I’ve been able to give have only been bits & pieces instead of the whole of my thoughts on the matter. 

This blog post is my attempt to break down the overeating question piece by piece and reassemble it into an entire answer.

Please note, I am not a pastor or theologian. Theology, by definition, is your (or someone else’s) interpretation of scripture. There can be no perfect, complete, and correct theology except God’s own.

But suffice it to say that I believe scripture in its entirety. I’ve read scripture, and studied the topic of food, body image, and grace deeply. I’ve tried to let the Holy Spirit speak to me about these things over years of study, work and writing.

These are my qualifications. They are no more than any person who receives Jesus and reads/interprets the bible with the Holy Spirit’s help can have.

(If you want to fill your mind with scripture check out these Scripture cards.)

So, with these things considered, I’m asking that you keep an open mind as you read and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal life-giving truth about this topic to you. I’m praying that He would lead you toward grace and healing in this area and that the enemy wouldn’t use this article to condemn you or cause you to condemn others.

Okay, without further ado, let’s look at the question: Is overeating a sin?

Before we can answer it, we have to answer some other very important questions.

1. What is overeating?

2. Is overeating the same as gluttony, and what is gluttony?

3. Is gluttony a sin?

4. What do we intend to do with this information? How are we to use it as believers?

What is Overeating?

This is the tricky part. Every individual will have a different definition of overeating based on their upbringing, the influence of diet-culture on their life, and their own personal experiences.

But First, What Overeating is NOT:

Eating until full and satisfied.

Proverbs 13:25 says a righteous man eats until his heart’s content or eats enough to satisfy his appetite. God’s desire is not for us to just eat enough to curb our appetite. He wants us to eat until our heart’s content, until our bellies are satisfied and full.

Eating pleasurable foods and enjoying them.

Ecclesiastes 9:7 says, “So go eat your food and enjoy it; drink your wine and be happy, because that is what God wants you to do.” God wants us to enjoy food, good tasting food without guilt. There is no “sinful” food, He has made all food clean through Christ. Therefore enjoying food, fun food, dense food, all food does not constitute overeating, nor is it a sin.

Eating past comfortable fullness in the context of recovering from an eating disorder/disordered eating.

God’s work is to heal his people. He wants to set you free in Christ from everything that hinders you, eating disorders and disordered eating that wreak havoc on the body, mind and spirit are not his will for your life.

Often eating past comfortable fullness under the direction of a treatment team is necessary in recovery as the body gets used to digesting an appropriate amount of food and restores itself to your healthy weight.

Do not let the enemy or the eating disorder voice convince you that the healing process is making you sinful, or somehow disqualifying you from the grace of God!

Occasionally eating a larger than normal meal as a biological result of restriction throughout the day whether by restricting energy (calories) or types of foods (whole food groups or macronutrients like carbs, fat, protein)

We all eat past fullness from time to time. This is normal. God never calls this a sin. There are times when we have had a busy or stressful day and might have forgotten to fuel well throughout. When we finally get a chance to sit down to a meal, our body drives us to eat more to compensate for the lack of energy we’ve provided.

This can also be a part of learning to eat intuitively for the first time. As we honor our hunger and eat enough food more and more consistently it will happen less and less often.

Also, if we are still believing certain foods are “good” and others are “bad”, we will have a drive to overeat the “bad” foods. This is also normal, but our goal is to make peace and view food as morally neutral, so that these instances of eating past fullness will become fewer and fewer.

If I Had to Define Overeating...

I would say it is consistently eating past fullness at most meals and snacks (outside of eating disorder recovery), tuning out body signals, and eating until uncomfortable, often related to past dieting/restriction, fear of not having enough to eat, fear of not being able to enjoy food again, or a need to drown out hard feelings/thoughts with food.

Now, even with this definition in mind, there is nowhere in the bible where God calls overeating a sin or where he makes a law specifically about how much food one can eat.

There are places where the bible warns against overeating as it may make a person sick (Proverbs 25:16), but nowhere where he calls it an outright sin.

At this point, many people will ask, well what about gluttony, isn’t overeating gluttony and isn’t gluttony a sin?

Is Overeating Gluttony and What is Gluttony?

The bible mentions gluttony a total of 4 times, once in Deuteronomy 21:20, and 3 times in Proverbs, the wisdom books (Proverbs 23:20-21, Proverbs 23:2, Proverbs 28:7)

Not as much as you might think, right? Considering the emphasis on gluttony by past church leaders (note: not by God) as one of “seven deadly sins” – the foundation for this term (or lack thereof) is the topic for a whole separate post.

The Hebrew word translated glutton or gluttony literally means: to be worthless, vile, to make light of, to be lavish with, to squander.

Read that again carefully. There is no mention of food in that definition at all.

Gluttony is instead an attitude or act of lavish squandering, vile behavior, idolatry and worthless actions.  It is a heart posture, not an amount of food eaten.

It’s usually paired with drunkenness to describe an individual who has no concern for the things of God but is consumed with idolatry, pleasure, self, etc.

We have to stop reading between the lines here, or rather we have to shut the enemy’s mouth with truth when He tries to twist scripture to condemn us for something so necessary as eating! Eating and enjoying food is God’s design! Being satisfied by great food—which is God’s gift to his children!

Overeating is not the same as gluttony. Sure, we could consistently consume food in excess to drown out feelings or to compensate for harms done to us. We could also make food and our body an idol through restriction and dieting.  Romans 14:23 says that anything not proceeding from faith is sin. But guess what? God doesn’t want us condemned in these situations, he wants us to come to him with our pain, to let him heal our wounds.

Maybe a more important question than whether overeating is gluttony or whether gluttony is a sin is what we do with our answer here?

What Do WE Do with the Answer to the Gluttony Question

Even after reading the above, if we decide that overeating is a sin (I don’t believe it is) and that it is the same as gluttony (also not my belief), how are we to use that information?

Does it give us the right to judge others?

No. The bible tells us that God alone is the judge. We are instead to love, encourage, and forgive one another as Christ has forgiven us.

Does it mean we can tell someone is overeating or committing gluttony by looking at them?

Absolutely not. Each of us are created uniquely. God designed us to exist in varying body sizes and shapes. There is NO perfect weight or appearance. Those individuals who exist in a larger body and maybe even in a body that is above their genetically predisposed weight are God’s children, dearly beloved, chosen.

Weight differences may be a result of genetics, or weight gain could be due to repeated cycles of dieting in an attempt to achieve a body that is more palatable to culture. Excessive weight gain can happen in childhood as a result of food deserts (poverty and lack of access to nourishing foods), family lifestyle, or physical or emotional abuse.

We cannot determine someone overeats or is “gluttonous” by their body size.

When we are tempted to judge a person, or whole people groups, let’s remember they are humans just like us with goodness and sinfulness in them, in need of a savior. They are God’s beloved children, children whom Christ died for, so that they would no longer have to live under any labels but HIS.

Does it add fuel to the enemy’s lies, to the fear, shame, and self-condemnation we feel for eating past fullness or eating pleasurable foods?

We as believers are told there is no fear in love, because perfect love casts out all fear. Fear has to do with punishment. If we are focused on our own sin and fearful of the punishment we will receive, it is evidence we have not been perfected by love.

Love says there is no more condemnation in Christ Jesus, He has taken all of our punishment on the cross, He has forgiven every sin, past, present and future. We no longer have a need to keep track of every one of our sins, no need to make atonement for each misstep. Christ has set us free from all of this, our only need is to look to him for help and forgiveness, to thank Him that every sin whether conscious or unconscious has been paid for!

If finding the answer to the overeating or gluttony question results in any of the above, than maybe we’re better off asking another question…

Is Christ Enough? 

Is he enough to cover all of my sin or do I still need to live as a slave to the law, making sure to follow every single item? Do I still need to worry about every tiny detail, do I still need to make atonement for myself? Or am I really free to follow Him by His Spirit’s leading to guide me? Am I really free to trust him with the details of my life?

Is Christ Enough? And is He good? Has He redeemed me? Has He put His Holy Spirit in me?

If your answer to these is yes, and you believe them, then it will be okay to let go of the food control and worry, it’s okay to trust the good body God’s given you, it’s okay to trust HIM, to let down your guard, to surrender to His will for your life, which is perfect and good.

His will is that you would be free from sin worries, that you would experience joy in the gifts he’s given you (including food) and that you would define yourself by HIS work, not by your own. 

If this post resonates with you and you want to learn more about how to step into a more joyful grace fueled relationship with health, be sure to check out our 12 week course Joyful Health designed to help you step out of the diet shame cycle and instead learn to eat well and move free by grace.

Until next time, stay nourished, body, soul and spirit.