Pure Food

Over the weekend, I had to nurse a very severe sore throat.  I saw it coming actually but did not do anything to prevent it from worsening.  I am not known to be a great lover of spicy food, preferring to take them in moderation.  My sore throat could have started by me taking a little bit of spicy food here and there (starting off with Mother's Day dinner celebration last Sunday), and adding chilli to my noodles, culminating the week with prata and chicken curry.  On Friday evening, I bought herbal tea to drink and popped a panadol for my headache.  When one has a very severe sore throat, sleeping becomes difficult as the throat tends to get very dry and swallowing becomes very painful.  That was what happened to me on Friday night/Saturday morning where I barely got a good night's rest.  I woke up to gurgle my throat with salt water.   I managed to get some sleep after that.

On Saturday, I was debating whether to see a doctor as I did not feel feverish.  I googled on home remedies for sore throat and discovered that regular gurgling with salt water does help.  So I tried it with warm salt water and avoided food with chilli or hot spices.  I felt much better on Sunday morning; the pain wasn't as intense as the day before.  I continued with my salt water gurgle, suck lozenges, drank water and honey to hydrate and cool my throat.  Now as I write this, my throat is 80% recovered - thank God for the 'anti-septic' nature of salt to bring about such healing.  The morale of the whole story is that there is always a cause and effect to the nature of things that happen.  The apostle Paul instructed his protege Timothy not to drink only water but to use a little wine for his frequent stomach ailments (1 Tim 5:23).  The cause of Timothy's illness was probably due to contaminated water and Timothy, being a godly man, did not want to set a bad example for his parishioners by drinking wine.  Hence the counsel by Paul to drink a little wine.

I was reading a health-related book that says toxic wastes build up in our body when we eat too many impure, processed foods and we don't give our body a chance to rest and get rid of them.  Our body will naturally try to purify and cleanse itself, the way God has made it.  Eating food the way God made it helps in flushing out all the poisons in our body system.  Fruits and vegetables are eliminating and cleansing foods and are alkaline forming.  Starches and proteins are body builders and are acid forming.  We always want a more alkaline body, as too acidic a condition breeds disease.  There must be a proper balance in the different categories of food intake.  Poisons move out of the body when raw or properly cooked fruits and vegetables are eaten.  I always try to have a healthy dosage of fruits and vegetables daily plus plenty of plain water.  As we grow older, we have to cut down on our salt, sugar and carbo intake.  And it does take a lot of discipline to keep our body in check.  May God grant us the wisdom to make wise choices in our daily diet, both for ourselves and our loved ones.