Destination Discipline

I like cold turkey. Unless, by cold turkey, you mean quitting a bad habit. I think they call it “quitting cold turkey” because when you give up that thing that you love, you feel like a turkey that has been plucked of all its feathers and left to stand outside in the cold. There is no way to sugar-coat it, learning how to apply discipline to ones mind or body is not comfortable.

And that is where most people give up–before they have even started. They consider the pain and turn back to the thing that is killing them. Now, maybe they don’t want to believe it is killing them. Maybe they consider that food/drug/porn addiction isn’t really a problem. Maybe they consider they can keep it inside a tidy little box where nobody knows about it but them. But on the inside–they hate that thing and the cage they keep it in, and really wish they knew how to drop it over the edge of a bridge.

The reason so many of us struggle to conquer those things that have captured us is that we are afraid to name it. The word “sin” makes people uncomfortable. I was, for many years, unwilling to acknowledge overindulgence as sin because I loved it so much. My life was well-ordered around my proclivity to overeat, over watch television, and live a generally undisciplined life. Still, in God’s Holy law–the ten commandments–his very first “rule” is, “I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me.” The truth was, I pulled God out when I needed something, but for the most part, when stressed, angry, sad, happy, or any other intense emotion, I worshipped at the altar of food.

Sin is insidious and resides in all human hearts. In my opinion, the only way to conquer sin is by the redeeming grace of Jesus Christ. To know Christ we must surrender our sinful hearts to Him and as Him to cleanse us of all unrighteousness. Salvation is His free gift to us–a gift that gives us communion and fellowship with God. But that free gift came at the cost of His life and therefore He does not take lightly to our living a life surrendered to sin instead.

“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?” – Romans 6:1-2

So the very first thing we must do is surrender our wills to Jesus and ask Him to cleanse us of all unrighteousness. Then, we must all allow Him to do it.

The prayer of faith is a beautiful thing. The more I ask God to show and heal me of sin, the more He does so. The gift of repentance is wholly freeing. I give to God my shame, regret, and humiliations, and He gives me His peace. This is how I walk as a Christian. I can deny my human passions by relying on His promises to strengthen me while I allow him to conquer that thing which had conquered me.

This is not pie in the sky. This is not a wishful hope. This is a real, practical, way to live joyfully and free.

“For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:20-23

I started out this blog entry by talking about the thing we love making us feel like a cold turkey. I would at this point like to remind everyone that God will never leave us standing outside of the warmth of His love. Even in the worst circumstances, we can trust that He is with us and for us.

How do I know this?

Because when I surrendered my will to God and allowed Him to teach me discipline, we began walking towards hope. So yes, you can do this! You can surrender your will and invite Him to change your life. Will it be super comfy? Like your couch and a plate of cookies with your favorite television program? No. Following Jesus looks like torture. It’s like carrying a cross down a path that leads to death. By death–I mean the death of the you, you once were and walking toward life–the life you never dreamed could be possible.

Next time….Prepare to Suffer Well!

I remember the glory days of my blissful ignorance. I consumed what I wanted, lounged in bed, and never considered there might be consequences to my choices. When people talked about losing weight they used words like, “I’m going on a diet.” To me that meant excruciating pain followed by temporary results which made the pain part wholly unnecessary.

I remember a kind woman at a previous employer who was the fitness coordinator for the company. She ran the gym (located in the basement) and taught me how to make healthy meals, count calories and do exercises that would burn fat. Angela was amazing. But everything we did was to no avail. The harder I worked physically, the more I stumbled with food. If I did a hard work-out, I followed it with Taco Bell (because I was hungry!). I dutifully journaled my calories in the book she gave me, but I did not lose weight. I was confused. After a period of a month, I quit. I mean really. Why bother?

The problem was, I did not truly take inventory of my lifestyle and what I wanted to accomplish. I wanted to be more aesthetically pleasing but I had no real long-term plan.

Working out as an overweight individual is awful. One gets out of breath within 30 seconds and everything hurts. The mental aguish is overwhelming and the temptation to stop is potent. The brave few who are able to push through the pain are heroes in my estimation. The problem is, those who are perpetually sedentary have difficulty shifting their mindset to an active persona permanently.

Have you ever thought about the reason for your existence? Have you taken inventory of your life and considered what you want to accomplish in the few short years you are alive? Do you think about your future and how your lifestyle impacts those around you? Do you think about the eternal consequences for how you live today?

At Thanksgiving dinner I asked my nieces what they are learning in school. They uniformly said, “Nothing.” One must understand my nieces are smart. They always get straight A’s. Still, they insist school is boring and they aren’t really learning anything. I couldn’t help but think, “Shucks then, what’s the point?”

When I was in school, I really struggled to get C’s and D’s. I didn’t learn much of anything either. I left dinner wondering how my life would be different today if I had a better brain. What if I had tried harder in school? What if my learning disabilities hadn’t frustrated me to the point of giving up? What if I hadn’t thought (and believed) I was stupid?

I didn’t know I was born for a reason and that my life had meaning. When I discovered just how valuable my life was, I started telling everyone–even strangers on the street–just how precious and dearly loved they are. I didn’t want anyone to not know something so transformative.

Are you willing to learn?

The conversation with my nieces reminded me that regardless of ones grades, ones capacity to learn is unlimited. An education isn’t procured only by completing a certain number of courses over a period of years. I don’t have a college education in nutrition or physical fitness but I was able to lose 140 pounds. I knew then one cannot continue to make the same choices and expect a different result. I had been trying that for years! Still, I was willing to learn about those things and–like my hero, Abraham Lincoln–pick up a book and apply what I learned to my life.

I used to exist to sit on the couch and eat cookies. I used to watch television and live vicariously through the dramedies and comedies of the prettier-than-me people. I used to cry in private because my clothes were too tight. Again. I was not willing to do a thorough examination of my life. It was God who gently nudged me when I prayed for help. My prayer was simple, “God I want to lose weight but I don’t know how.” He said, “Margaret, you need to learn discipline.”

Finally, I was ready. Are you?

Next time, “Can you do this? Yes, you can!”

I walked into the store and blithely noticed the holiday décor. A large package caught my eye (as it was designed to do) and I stopped. I stared in horror at the monstrosity. The selection of gigantic candy baffled the senses. A ring pop that was the size of a softball. Yard stick sized Twizzlers. Hershey kisses that could be basketballs. Had I entered some terrible processed-food-hocking hell?

I would only later think about the marketeers who conjured up such processed peculiarities. The hedonistic henchmen who—like gold prospectors did in the early 1800’s—desire to mine every cent from the consumer’s pocket by way of their stomach.

Now maybe you are reading this and thinking, “So what? Who cares if they make giant candy? It’s not like they are hurting anybody. Margaret, you are jerk! I love golf ball sized jelly beans! Shut your orating orifice.”

All right. I hear you. Let me back up a bit and explain why I hate giant candy. It may not be the reason you think.

When I was a little girl, my mother had a dear friend named Pat. Every Christmas she would visit my mother and bring me and my sister a large candy cane stick. I remember the first time I saw it. It was amazing! It was like a candy cane only bigger and it lasted a lot longer. I remember cutting my tongue while sucking on it and enjoying every second. Thirty something years have passed but every time I come across one of those candy cane sticks, I think of Pat. Memories swell like a cloud of beautiful butterflies and I am incited to buy one. I want to feel like I did when I was young and carefree—back before adulthood knocked me in the head with a horseshoe.

This is what we call nostalgia. Nostalgia is a wonderful feeling I am prone to embrace like a mug of (sugar free!) hot chocolate on a cold night. Unfortunately, greedy corporations have learned to prey on this feeling. They use our feelings to entice us to unclench our fists and let the coins roll from our palm to theirs. This is manipulation and I think it is wrong.

The holidays can be particularly difficult for our friends and neighbors because of nostalgia. If someone has lost a loved one or has particularly painful memories, a song, a smell, or yes, even a glimpse of candy can start a fire they cannot easily extinguish. Some run to alcohol or drugs to numb the pain. Others use food like a tonic-time machine to evoke memories the past. The manipulations are endless.

The sugar addict in me finds it difficult to gaze on candy (especially Recess Peanut butter cups and M&M’s). And while I have practice at walking away, there are times I still pray, “God help me not to buy and eat that thing that to me is sin.”

The Bible specifically condemns idolatry and sensuality. First, I know I have a problem with food as an idol. Second, my favorite place to eat dessert is generally in bed (with a good book).  And while many do not equate eating with sensuality, the passion with which many gluttons approach putting food into their mouths is, well, grossly exaggerated to the point of sensuality.

“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” – Galatian 5:16-24

The bible doesn’t condemn idolatry and sensuality because it wants to keep me from having any fun (as many people think it does). The bible is mainly interested in setting captive people free. That is why Jesus came to earth—to set me free from my sin. He had strong words for people prone to lust in his “sermon on the mount”. “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.” (Matthew 5:29-30)

There is something worse than obesity: hell. Yes, it is a real place.

This is why I hate greedy corporations that manipulate my emotions so that I will become addicted to their products. They want to separate me from the love of Christ. When I lived in slavery to food and topped the scales over 300 pounds, I felt like I had no hope of ever breaking free of the need to live for food. When my blessed Savior gently told me I needed to learn discipline, I discovered that saying “no” to my craving for physical pleasure brought me into closer relationship with God. The difficulty with which I learned how to stop consuming processed foods and sugar caused me to rely upon the promises of God by way of his words in the bible. Only then did I experience the sweetest sensation known to mankind; the pure love of God.

We are at the very beginning of the holiday season. The (marketing) vultures are circling. The ravening lions (Hershey, Nabisco, etc.) are sharpening their teeth. The geniuses who use “A Christmas Story” as a weapon are set to stoke our emotions—along with our appetites—and nothing short of the Bumpass Hounds will stop us from consuming our Thanksgiving turkeys to the detriment of our waistlines. Who will save us from annihilation?

Jesus.

The Apostle Paul once wrote, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Today, if you are struggling with the holiday of horrific proportions, take heart! The captive can be set free by calling on the name of Jesus. One does not need to indulge to reminisce. One can celebrate with love instead of food (or alcohol or nicotine or marijuana or meth). Nostalgia may invoke memories from indulgences of years past, but it can also be the impetus for creating new and beautiful memories of the captive who tastes the sweetness of true freedom.

“Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!” Psalm 34:8