“Eat Our Own Dog Food”

This is a saying that supposedly has its roots in the dog food industry and perhaps in corporate industry as well (see Wikipedia submissions). Last Sunday’s message was entitled “Where the Hypocrites Roam” and was an attempt to help us as God’s people to confront the accusations that we are hypocritical (we are). I used the phrase “eat our own dog food” as an illustration pointing to the fact that persons who strive to follow Christ need to eat our own dog food … practice what we teach/preach/read … you get the point. In doing so, I ate several bites (throughout the three services), what looked like canned dog food. In reality, it was Hormel Corned Beef Hash which looks like and smells like canned dog food … I would even suggest that cold and straight out of the can that it tastes like dog food as well.  Anyway, when such a dramatic illustration is used there is always the danger that folks will experience the “wow” effect, getting so caught up in the image that they will miss the point that the illustration is trying to make.

Ah ha… another form of hypocrisy; getting stuck on the show instead of the message. The same is true in our lives as well. Sometimes we get so caught up in our image, our wow effect, or whatever that we actually miss-communicate the actual message that we intended to convey. We in essence aren’t eating our own dog food.

So here it is. Eating our own dog food or practicing what we teach doesn’t always taste good… in fact it is sometimes down-right disgusting. However, there is nothing like being true to our Savior and ourselves as we journey down the path of faith. It is probably high time for me to take a bite out of my own dog food … to clean the inside of the cup instead of worrying so much about the outside (Matthew 23:25-28).

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~ by edsedge on January 26, 2010.