Filling My Emotions....The Faithful Weigh

I am thankful that God is never tired of listening to me.  I have seen His faithfulness in my life over and over and know that He is always with me.  This healthy-eating journey is no different once I invited Him into this area of my life, that is.  We tend to think that eating is just a part of our lives because we need to do it to survive and it's up to us how we do it!  Well, the truth is, on my own, I "do it" way too much!  Knowing that God designed this amazing body that I am blessed to live in, brings God into the keeping of this body.  I have learned that it's not about how I look in the mirror or how fast I can run a marathon or having every picture of me air-brushed to perfection.  It's more about what I am doing to this temple that He gave me through His grace and mercy at the cross!  I have learned that I need to care for His temple in order to continue to serve Him in the many ways He has given me.  I am not able to do these things when I am not feeling good, unable to walk due to hip and knee issues or allergies that keep me captive in my home.  So, I am on this healthy-eating journey for a lifetime!  The Faithful Weigh is a grace place where I am learning about those areas of my life and my character, that needs to be changed in order to be the best I can be for the glory of God.  One of the exercises we are working on this week in our book study is what drives us to unconscious eating.  Those time when we just aimlessly go to the kitchen and put food in our mouths.  Those emotions that we experience that have FOOD written all over them!  This exercise brings them to the surface as we desire to eat and live a healthier  lifestyle.  My journey began this week by asking God to show me the emotions on our chart that He wanted me to deal with.  I knew that I needed to silence my voice of justification as I read down this list.  I knew that God would not speak to me when my words were already there.  So, in prayerful consideration, I started reading down through these emotions.  The first one that I came to that made me stop and ponder  was "bored".   My words that immediately came to my mind were,  "Ha, I am never bored!  I am a very busy woman with more to do than the time of day!"  Oops!  Forgive me,  Lord,  for  not waiting for YOUR words.  Then I thought….there are times, many times really, that I will just wander to the kitchen for something sweet or salty when I don't want to do the many things on my "to do" list, so I am feeling a little bored because there isn't anything that I immediately feel like doing.  Aha!   Have I ever thought of being bored in this way before?  I don't think so.   The next emotion on the list was "overwhelmed".   Yes, I have been in this place many times.  Mostly because I have taken on too many things to do, either at home our outside the home.  All good things but perhaps too many?  Then the situations and issues in our lives, my kid's lives  and others around me that I tend to take on as my own?  Yes, I have been overwhelmed, a lot!  What do I usually do?  As I thought about my reactions during this emotion, I can clearly see myself wandering to the kitchen and nibbling on anything that is in sight.  I confess that it is probably not something healthy like broccoli or carrots!  The third emotion that God stopped me on was "reward".  Now, is this really an emotion or is it more a reaction to an achievement?  It's both to me!  As I thought about this one, I  learned that I reward myself over every little thing I may have accomplished!  I get home from work and feel I deserve a treat because of all that I got done at the office that day.  I get home from an exhausting day of shopping,  doctor appointments, playing with grandkids, or whatever fun things I may have done and I think I deserve a treat because it was a tiring day!  So, after I take off my shoes and put my coat in the closet, I head for the cupboard or the snack basket in the corner of my counter!  Hmmm….it seems that I am not putting into my temple things that are truly needed but more importantly, I am replacing my true need for God's presence in these times of boredom, feeling  overwhelmed and thinking I need to  reward myself, with food!   Wow!  Talk about feeling overwhelmed!  Be ready when you ask God to show you the errors of your ways.  He is faithful and just to do so!  The next thing I knew I needed to ask God for was the actions I needed to take to fill those moments with Him instead of food.  Earlier  that morning, I was reading in Psalms 32.  It is filled with so many verses that encourages and lifts one up.  Verses 10 & 11 say, "Many are the woes of the wicked, but the Lord's unfailing love surrounds the man who trust in him.  Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous, sing, all you who are upright in heart!"  These words came quickly back to me.  This is what I can do when I aimlessly wander to the kitchen.  I can rejoice and sing His praises!  I love to sing and I know that you cannot sing with your mouth full of  food!  The next thing that came to me, I am still in awe of because I knew it was straight from the Lord.  The first two verses in that next chapter, Psalms 33 say, "Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous;  it is fitting for the upright to praise him.  Praise the Lord with the harp; make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre."   Remember  that I read these verses  before I even started looking at this emotion chart.  When I read the verse about praising the Lord with the harp, I looked across my living room to my beautiful little Pakistanian Celtic harp and said,  "Oh, I so want to get playing that again."   Immediately after I had thought about praising God with singing, I said out loud  "I can play my harp instead of eating!"  God had given me two answer through His Word even before I asked the question, "What can I do?"  Isn't that just  like God?  Meeting our needs so perfectly designed for us when we stop our destructive ways and seek His way?  I am still in awe of His love and care for me in this area of my life.  When I truly think about it, it is a rather big area of my life, as I need to feed my body to sustain it.  Even more, I need to seek and listen to God to sustain me for eternity!  What a journey I am on with Him! I thank Him everyday for the joy, love and grace He so freely gives to me. 

Enough Food...Exodus 16. The Faithful Weigh

The Daily Bread took me to Exodus 16 this morning and God showed me something.  I don't really know if I have heard this somewhere before but it is the first time it resonated in my thinking that this pertains to me and those of us who are on a healthy-eating journey, as we continue to resist change in our eating habits.   It came to me how much we are like the Israelites in the desert.  This account of the Israelites journey is after God had brought them out of Egypt where they suffered in bondage under the rule of Pharaoh. They are in the Desert of Sin.  (The notes say that this name could have been derived from Siani….makes me wonder.)   The Israelites begin to grumble against Moses and Aaron saying that they should have died in Egypt because there they had pots of meat and ate all the food they wanted.  The Lord heard their complaining and provided manna in the morning and quail in the evening for them to eat.  God instructed them to only enough for each person but on the day before the Sabbath to take enough for the next day, too.  Even with God’s specific instructions, some took more during the week and some didn’t take enough before the Sabbath.  So here we are.   God has brought us to this place in our lives that we realized we needed to be brought out of our destructive lifestyle due to our overeating and laziness.  God has given us the desire to invite Him into this part of our lives and change us from the inside out.  We have learned what is healthy for us to eat and the importance of exercise in our daily routines.  We do real good for a while, filled with joy at the work of the Lord in our lives.  We lose a few pounds and are hopeful for the future as we follow this healthy lifestyle.  But then, we start grumbling about the foods that we should not eat or the serving sizes we need to stick to, missing the very types and amounts of food that got us where we were! When we are choosing healthy foods to eat, we take more than we need or think we are doing well by not eating when we should.   We rebel from our exercise routine by finding excuses to sit on the couch or to stay away from the gym.  The Lord speaks to Moses in Ex. 16:28, “…How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions?...”  I felt like I am these Israelites and God is asking this question to me.  How long will you keep holding onto your destructive “Fat Machinery”, this unconscious eating and still call it unconscious?   Oh my goodness….Ron Hutchcraft is on the radio right now…and his statement was about the Israelites!  He said, “The Israelites were brought out of slavery but the slavery wasn’t out of them.”  God is incredible!  It goes right along with what I was thinking!  We have been brought to this place on our healthy-eating journey, but we are still struggling with our old selves!  Isn’t it time to realize what it is to be made new by His grace and allow God to truly change us from the inside out?  We no longer have to wallow in the rebellious desire to want what we can’t have but leave the rubble behind and rebuild this temple God has given to us.  How long will we refuse God’s commands and instructions?  Today, I will go forth in His grace and strength to follow what He has shown me.  Blessings for this day!

Psalms 139...The Faithful Weigh

Happy Weekend!  As our weight-loss support group works our way through the book, "Thin Within" by Judy and Arthur Halliday, we have different activities that help us look into ourselves to become aware of the root of our overeating.  As I continue on this healthy-eating journey, God continues to bring to me some amazing truths that I have known for years but had never applied them to my health.  Today is no exception. The Daily Bread took me to one of my favorite Psalms, chapter 139, this morning.  I loved the prayer at the end of today's reading.  It says, "Lord, help us to see beyond the moments of our lives and to delve deeply into Your marvelous handiwork and perfect design.  Forgive us for our short-sightedness and teach us to see You in every circumstance."  I couldn't help to think that as we do our "Mirror, Mirror Exercise" and the "Fat Machinery" activity, as we look at our reflections or reflect on our behavior that leads to unconscious eating, it is so easy to be "shortsighted" and react to what we see or feel at the moment.  It is a beautiful thought that as I am learning about myself, that I would see Him in all of it! In your moments this weekend, seek to see Jesus and He has promised to be right there with you.  Then you can say what Psalms 139:17 says, "How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!.."  Blessings to you this day.

Valentine's Day Prayer

On this day I have many emotions swirling inside of me. Thankfulness for the love in my life. Hopefulness for the promises of love in my children's lives. Sadness for the loved ones that are not here to share their love with those left behind. Awed by the amazing love my God showers me with every moment of every day. I will hold onto this verse today and always. Isaiah 41:13 says, "For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear, I will help you." May the Lord, our God, hold onto your hand today and comfort and fill your heart with His eternal love! Blessings on this Valentine's Day!

My Healthy-Eating Journey...The Faithful Weigh

I thought it was time I introduce the ministry that God has given to my dearest friend, Laurie and I.  This week marks our 2nd Year Anniversary of a group we called  "The Faithful Weigh", a faith-based weight-loss support group.   Like most of us in the middle-age range, we have been on hundreds of weight-loss programs from cabbage soup to wonder-herb pills.  Although we have lost weight, it usually returned with some added pounds, too.  In a past profession, I found myself as a weight-loss coach for a program through a healthcare office, in which Laurie had joined me in doing.   We were both successful on this particular weight-loss program called Ideal Protein and coached several clients through a weight-loss of over a thousand pounds.  During this time, we learned so much about eating patterns, emotional eating, nutritional values and the false idea that weight-loss is just about the food and exercise you must do to achieve health.  When we both left that position and continued on our healthy eating on our own, we started to feel that God had a ministry for us but we just didn't know what it was.  We had a wonderful group of godly women praying with us that God would show us what He had planned for us to do.  Well, as we know, God is faithful to those who seek His will.  I was working in the church kitchen with a couple of friends, preparing a meal for a church event, and we were chatting about foods, nutrition and how and why we eat what we do.  One of them said to me…"Mary Ann, you should do something with all of this information you have!"  That is all it took to get the wheels turning and God started forming the desire to "do something".   I called Laurie the next morning and said what I  had been thinking since my conversation with these ladies and that we should start a weight-loss coaching group.   She replied to me that she had been in her beautifully finished basement the night before and  thought to herself,  "I should be using this beautiful room for some purpose."   Talk about chills down your spine!!  God has spoken to us His will!  We got together and started brainstorming and planning.  We would form a ministry group and meet in her basement!   I wandered into our church library the next Sunday and my eyes were drawn directly to one book among a whole shelf full.  The title?  "Faithfully Fit" by Claire Cloninger & Laura Barr.  I started reading it and knew, without a doubt, that this was the book God had planned for our group to start with.   It put into words what we were learning...that God was interested in our eating!  I, personally, along with many others that we have ministered to in these 2 years, had not even thought that God cared so much about our eating habits! Why?  Why didn't we figure this out during all of these years of dieting?  We started praying for a name and God gave to us, The Faithful Weigh.  We had an informational meeting in which 20 some ladies showed up to.  We had a couple of possible weight-loss programs to follow but let it be known that they should seek God's counsel on what weight-loss program, if any, that they should follow and that we would support and encourage them on their healthy-eating journey.  That is how we started and for 2 years now, we have been blessed over and over, week after week, by the work God is doing in all of our lives.  Some of our ladies have met their weight-loss goals and moved on in their  journey.  We learn the "tools" through God's Word and the study through godly books, but most of all, from the grace, mercy and encouragement from our wonderful group of ladies who come week after week.    We have a "secret" Facebook group, in which we can invite those in that would like to join us.  We have email mailings that we do with our weekly handouts and encouragement during the week, for those not on Facebook.  We are heading down on the scales but more importantly, closer to God as we continue this journey.   Now that you know about our ministry, I will most likely be posting thoughts and insights now and then on my blog.  My prayer is that God will use whatever He has deemed good in my blog post for His glory and that which is not of Him, will fall along the wayside.  Email me if you would like more information at maa319@frontiernet.net. Blessings!

Random thoughts....God's blessings!

I'm not quite sure where my mind is going this morning.  I feel the welling up of thoughts and words inside my head but they are so random and swirling that I feel like there are way too many to keep in there.  I have many things going on these days.  All of which I am so blessed to be a part of and mostly because God is working on my behalf and I am in awe.  Blessing abounded a couple of nights ago.  I had been through a long, busy day.  Things at my job are settling down with the training.  I went to a women's ministry team meeting and my mind was a whirl of brainstorming for the events coming up.  I was tired after being up since 5 am, mostly because ideas kept coming to my mind so I finally got up to write them down.  I was trying to design a logo for our women's overnight and the computer just wouldn't do what I needed it to do.  I was sitting working on things at home and I opened my emails and there was a sweet friend, telling me that I was a Proverbs 29:7 woman.  The reason for the blessing was that I had recently found that verse and shared it at our meeting to use for our event and to find out that God has shown that same verse to a friend who thought of me.  I felt so unworthy of those beautiful words.  Shortly after that, there was a knock at the door which startled me because my hubby wasn't expected home for awhile and there was another friend who handed me a gas gift card saying that him and his wife think of us often and wanted us to give it to us!  WOW! What did we do to deserve such a blessing?  I went back to my project and tried one more time to move a picture to where it needed to be and it moved!!  It was as if God said, "There, daughter!  I am here!"

Even thinking back on this, I am still in awe of the very presence of my Father, in my home, listening to my frustrations with the things and situations around me...He  was right here with me.   What a lift  to my spirit when I was feeling weary.   The other things that are on my mind is wedding planning, struggling with the lack of progress with healing of my neck and knee.  Dealing with getting my car fixed up before the warranty runs out.  Figuring out money stuff.  Working out a schedule for my days to exercise, write, do bookkeeping and housework.  Lots of things going on right now but the most beautiful thing is that God is right here with me….even when I'm not "paying attention" to His presence...He is still here.  What a beautiful thing that is.  How can you not lift up His Name in praise for caring for such a one as I?  Wow...such randomness that is going on here.  I need to go now...the work day is calling me and the weekend is at hand. :)  To God be the glory and He is worthy of my praise!  Blessings!