My flesh machinery has really been riled up these past few days, with food loudly and persistently calling my name, like, all the time! Awaiting zero has been harder than usual.
We are taught in Thin Within that overeating – eating when we aren’t hungry – can cover raw, uncomfortable emotions, thus numbing us and keeping us from dealing with emotions that really need to be dealt with, not buried alive or smothered.
Doing things that I know I should be doing often helps me ignore the loud calling of my name by food.
My food is to do the will of Him who sent me, and to accomplish His work.” (John 4:34)
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I’m fully aware this is Jesus talking, and that I’m not Jesus! Or diety! But I believe that this principle – that doing the will of God is food to us – is true for us, too, and Jesus lived it out first to show us how to do it.
But still… right now all I want to do is eat! EAT EAT EAT!!!! UUUUGH!!!! (This is as embarrassing to admit as it is frustrating to feel!)
But the Lord reminds me… I am not without help! He Himself helps us:
Apart from Me you can do nothing…
But He has also inspired His people to create resources that help us more clearly see – and accurately apply – these truths. And He has given us many wonderful resources in Thin Within, especially via Judy and Arthur Halliday, and Heidi Bylsma! I am currently going through Rebuilding God’s Temple, and in the Week 10, Day 4 lesson, we are asked to take note of specific emotions that are stirred up in us while awaiting zero, and then also journal about them. So that’s what I’m going to do right here – share with you my process… for better or worse…
1. Identify the emotion that’s surfacing while awaiting zero:
That’s easy! ANXIETY!
2. Journal about it:
I know scripture clearly tells us to not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, to let our requests be made known to God…
And I totally get that and agree with that! Well, I totally agree with that, but I’m not so sure I totally get it, or I wouldn’t still be dealing with this stuff, right? But nonetheless, I am anxious.
The wonderful thing is that God knows us, He knows we will be anxious, and He has made provision for this emotion in these verses:
Pour out your hearts to the Lord for He can help.” … “Make your needs known to Him.” … “Come and talk with Me, oh my people…”
So I will take Him up on his offer and start pouring… making my needs known to Him… and coming to and talking with Him…
Here are my current anxiety-causers: (They really boil down to two.)
One is that I have a busy few days coming up, and I am anxious about how I’m going to get everything done. How do I best prioritize, not get side-tracked, and use my time the most wisely?
The other is that we will be having company staying at our home for several days. I have a melancholic personality and I enjoy – and actually need – time to myself. Having company will entail interruption to my usual quiet days – quiet because we are empty-nesters and my husband is retired. So this will be challenging to my flesh, especially since hospitality does not come easily or naturally for me – probably because I am basically selfish, and hospitality is basically all about unselfishness. It will be rewarding, too, I enjoy people once they are here, but I am still anxious about this.
So identifying the emotion and journaling about it got everything out in the open, and definitely helped, but now I need to take it to the next level and “finish it up”; I need to…
3. Pray it all the way through.
Okay, Lord, here I am…
Lord, You know all about the anxiety that is having a hayday in me right now. And I’m sure this is part of what’s drawing me so strongly to want to eat right now, to try to mask it or smother it or avoid dealing with it, or D. ALL THE ABOVE.
Of course I know full well that none of those will work, but that doesn’t mean I won’t fall for it, again.
Lord, I want to be honoring to you in how I eat, and I know I have not been, and for that I ask your forgiveness.
I come to You with the weightiness of my emotions, my selfishness, my confusion, my frustrations, my anger, and my insecurities…
…in this case, about hosting and entertaining guests. And I give it ALL to You, Lord…
You know what You want to happen with our guests, and I ask You to lead me that way and give me Your heart, Your love for them.
Help me think less about myself and more about them and their needs, and to make them feel welcome, and to show them Your love.
I also ask You to help me use my time wisely and get done those things that You want done, and let the rest go!
I cast all of these cares on You, Lord! I can’t fix them or get rid of them anyway, so I bring them to – and leave them with – You.
And I trust You with them, and to get me over any hurdles, and through any tough times that come up today and once our company is here. Please give me the words, the heart, the direction, and the wisdom I need in each moment.
Thank you, Lord, for everything You are doing and are going to do! Aaaaaaamen!
I’ve never known that, when you do wrong, it breeds more wrong-doing. After all of the progress I’ve had, I overate early this morning and completely fell off the rails.
Just one misstep, and I was back wanting to do wrong today. I want to eat everything in sight.
Now this is where the choice comes in. What are my choices? I have two:
One is to turn off of the TV and reset myself by getting into the Word as much as I can all day. Today will turn out to be a great day if I do that.
My other choice is to eat all day, receiving condemnation from the enemy. He’ll be accusing me and telling me that nothing has changed. He’ll taunt me saying “It’s no use doing Thin Within! I told you, you haven’t changed! It really doesn’t matter. Mind renewal is just hogwash! Just go ahead and eat!”
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But I want to tell you the outcome of the day!
I finished well today!
I did not let the enemy get the best of me!
What a huge victory for me. Yes, I fell off of the rails, but only for a short while.
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This time was different from all of the other times! I finished by eating a modest portion only two meals after I had blown it!
Had I had this fall in my bingeing days, it would have been a disaster!
But guess what? The mind renewal is working! It’s actually changing me from the inside out!
There are a few words that I have now banned from my thinking vocabulary. These are:
I’ll start tomorrow.
You might as well.
More.
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The word less is good; not more.
I still use the word tomorrow, but it has a new meaning and use…
Instead of saying “Well, you’ve blown it, so you might as well go ahead and eat now and just start tomorrow,” I tell myself “You can have that food tomorrow, if you want.”
Next time I will not get tripped up with just one bite. But I’m glad that at least I learned a lot from that trip!
Many have found that having a prayer/accountability partner is a huge help on their Thin Within journey. And it only makes scriptural sense: .
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Of course, we want the “third party” in that triple-braided cord to be the Lord Himself. As we all know, if He’s not in this with us, undergirding us, transforming us, drawing us to Himself, motivating us (with His motivations, not ours), and empowering us, then we may as well not even embark on this journey.
The Ecclesiastes author was speaking in general principles, but we can be more specific now that we have Jesus who has opened the way to the Father! So, before connecting with a prayer/accountability partner, we need to take care of that – as in get our hearts connected and our lives submitted to Him.
A prayer/accountability partner helps us stay connected to the Lord and encourages us to keep remembering that our help comes from Him, nudging (or maybe downright pushing) us toward Him!
And there are many ways we can do this! There are no rules; you can do it any way you like!
I prefer to do this thinking in terms of not receiving anything back; just in how to bless them. But see the very end of this article for a thought on that!
Here are a dozen quick, easy, and simple ideas to help you connect with your prayer/accountability partner. I share lots of pictures, each of which speaks 1,000 words! – making this a 22,000-plus-word article with very little actual reading!
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1) Share a Scripture that blessed you.
Here are three options:
Type it out on your phone or computer.
Go to a Bible app and copy and paste it from there.
Take a picture of the highlighted verse in your Bible…
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2) Share a victory.
Big, little ~ doesn’t matter! And maybe add why it was so significant ~ or so challenging ~ for you.
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3) Share an accountability form you completed.
This is one of Emily’s, used with her permission. (These forms are at the back of the Thin Within Rebuilding the Temple workbook.)
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4) Share an overhead slide that spoke to you.
These can be from a sermon at church or a workshop or conference you attended.
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5) Share a devotional that ministered to you.
This one’s in one of my favorite devotional books, Jesus Calling.
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6) Share a plaque or wall hanging you saw at a store that spoke to you.
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7) Share a link to a blog article…
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…or share a podcast that you know will encourage and bless your prayer/accountability partner…
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8) Share a truth card you made or found.
I made all of these… (Even though you and I are not prayer partners, I hope they encourage you today anyway!)
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(Bonus points if you use a photo they took and sent you ~ which this is! Debbie sent me this picture of the snowy scenery on her trip home!)
Here’s an article called Truth Cards 101 for more on how to make your own! It’s actually FUN! And there are LOTS of ways to do them and many sources for ideas – all of which I share in this blog article!
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9) Ask: “How can I pray for you today?”
Another way to word this is: “Do you have any challenging situations coming up that you’d like to have me pray for you about?” I like that because I may not think of any prayer needs, per say, but, when asked if I have any challenges coming up, of course I do!
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10) Share a challenging situation that you have coming up today.
I know I said this is all about blessing them, but most people enjoy knowing they are helping and blessing someone else. “It’s more blessed to give than to receive.”
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11) Share a truth you wrote in your journal.
It might seem simple and unprofound to you, but it could encourage and inspire your prayer partner – like Emily’s blessed me…
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12) Share an audio recording of yourself talking.
…about any of the above things… a scripture, an excerpt out of a book you’re reading, a truth card that impacted you, a prayer need or a situation you have coming up, etc.
Most people don’t like hearing their own voice, but remember that you’re not doing this for you; you’re doing it for your prayer partner!
You will need to find the audio recording – or maybe it’s called voice memo – feature on your phone. If you don’t know where it is, ask a friend who has a phone like yours if they can help you find it.
(This is just a picture of the prompt to access the one Emily sent me. I have not figured out how to get her recording into this article. If anyone knows, please let me know! Emily gave me permission to share hers!)
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You can do as many of the above ideas as you want – or even just one – on any given day! Again, no rules. Just jump in and do something. And “any and all the above” give you a place to start.
Don’t get hung up or slowed down on doing it perfectly! Or on how much or how little you’re doing. Or on how consistently you’re connecting. Just DO it! And have FUN!!!
One last bit of encouragement… Even if you have a prayer partner who’s not able to bless you back as much as you would like, you’ll still be blessed because….
Who would’ve thought that my mind needed to be renewed about apples?!?! But God has been speaking to me about them and I am so glad! What started this string of related events was that my grandson, Jonah, came up to me one day with an apple in hand and, because I was actually at a zero, the apple actually looked appealing!
That was a bit surprising to me, because I have never been an apple fan. I might eat a few pieces when Dave slices up an apple, but I’ve just never been wild about them.
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So I was pleasantly surprised to find Jonah’s apple looked good to me. I hoped it had nothing to do with Eve’s apple looking good to Adam back in the Garden. No way to know that, so I knocked that off the list as being a possibility.
What it did have to do with was the fact that I was all the way down to a zero ~ the perpetual challenge for me.
When I’m truly hungry, pretty much anything looks good to me at that point. But that’s okay; I’ll take it!
Jonah graciously let me have a few bites, and as I enthusiastically gobbled them down, I thought “Wow! What have I been missing?!?”
Jonah told me I should have one a day. To make sure I didn’t forget (he knows I have occasional memory issues), he fixed up this little set-up on the kitchen counter:
In case you can’t read the sign, it says: “Don’t forget to eat one apple every day, gramma. ~ Jonah.” This was a sweet confirmation ~ and reminder ~ that the apple is something good for me that the Lord had in mind since ~ well, it would appear since He first created Man and Woman, and put them in the Garden. I loved that God was redeeming the apple for me! But He wasn’t done yet!
The next morning, the very first email I opened was from Jeff Reagan who operates Patriot Health Institute (dot com). As one might expect from the name, both patriotic and healthy topics are Jeff’s focus. And I was pleasantly surprised to find an email from him that touted the merits of…
(You’ll never believe it…)
APPLES!!!!!!!
In fact, I will share an excerpt of it with you here…
Apples. They’re just too good for you to pass. Eating apples regularly is associated with a long list of benefits. And it’s a nice combo when something so good for you also tastes good. Apples reduce your risk of diabetes, because they’re chock full of phytonutrients that regulate blood sugar. They’re very rich in antioxidants, and more important they’re tops for “free phenolic compounds.” That means the nutrients aren’t bound to other compounds, so they get into your bloodstream more easily. Apples reduce stroke, fight bad breath, prevent asthma attacks, and can help you maintain your weight. Plus, they drive down C-reactive protein, a marker of inflammation that, when elevated, means you’re on the road to heart disease. And not to compare apples and oranges, but they’re full of vitamin C too.
My gooooooodness! That’s ELEVEN wonderful benefits right there!!!
I knew the Lord was blessing me by opening up my interest in this wonderful world of apples and even, since I’m a bit dense, hammering it in a bit ~ though lovingly and gently.
But isn’t it just like Him to add a “cherry on top”?!?! Get this!!! ~ In the very next porch chat that Christina put out, she said at the very end: “And YOU are the APPLE of His eye”!
Thank You, Lord, for redeeming this amazing fruit that You created, and then for even using it to let me know how precious I am ~ we all are ~ to YOU!!!!
Christina and I are prayer partners for the current two-week span and she sent me this picture of the snowlady she and her daughters made in their front yard…
She wrote, “Fun in the snow! ❄️⛄️❄️ Isn’t she just adorable??? We named her Meridith!”
Recognizing that scarf as not only being Christina’s favorite flower, 🌻🌻🌻 but as having seen it ON her person in one of her porch chats…
Screen shot of Christina doing a porch chat
…I said, “Meridith is just toooooo cute!!!!! ⛄️ Did she have permission to use that scarf?!?!?? 😆”
She responded, “Of course! She and I are already becoming good friends! 🌼💕❤️🍃😀😀”
Aware that the warming weather would soon have “diminishing” effects on Meridith, Christina added “I don’t think she will be here long, though…😳☃️🍃.”
So the next morning I asked her, “How is Meridith doing? Is the warming-up weather imposing rapid weight-loss mode onto her?!?! ⛄️😄
(Just so you know, we DO actually talk about spiritual things as well! Right after this I shared my prayer for her from Psalm 22!)
On our Thin Within coaching call (with Heidi and Christina) later than afternoon, Christine told the rest of the girls in our group about Meridith, and sadly added that the sunshine had been shrinking Meridith quite a bit. A few of us shared with delight: “She’s melting down to her God-given size!!”
Christina went on: “Okay! Here comes the good part, girls! All Meridith had to do to shrink down to her God-given size was just be in the light and warmth of the sun! Isn’t that COOL?!?!?”
I said “I feel a blog article coming on!” and asked Christina to send me a picture of Meridith in her current melting state. Christina then asked me to do “before and after” pictures of Meridith, and to “use my magic” to put a face on her since hers had fallen off… which I did using carrot and leaf emoticons, and the “draw” feature of my photo editor. Not the greatest, but better than a blank stare!
So how might this look in real life? I started pondering what “melting in the light of the sun” might entail, and remembered I had already written about this very thing in a blog article I wrote a couple years ago called “How Does God Redeem Stuff?”
In it, I share five “methods” (actions, ways) God has led me to – and used in me to – redeem many things in my life. Two of those items – “expose” and “soak” – are perfect for our snowlady analogy as they explain what it means to expose ourselves to – and soak in – God’s warm light!
I’m going to share those two sections of that article here! (Well… Assuming I can get permission from the author! I hear she’s quite a stickler!)
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EXPOSING
Let’s start by thinking of a rock on the ground. It’s been sitting in the sunshine, so it’s nice and dry and warm…
Turn the rock over, and what might you see on the underside of that rock? … Scampering bugs, wiggling worms, dirt, mud.
What’s the best way to get the underside of that rock as warm, dry, smooth, clean and bug-free as the top of it? Should we urge the rock to go to a rock spa and get a make-over and scrub itself off?
Nope! Just turn it over and expose it to the Sun! Given a little time, the wet-turned-dry dirt can just be brushed off, leaving that underside nice ‘n’ clean – with no effort whatsoever on the part of the rock! All it had to do was let itself be exposed tot he warm rays of the sun.
Need a human picture? This guy is perfectly emulating this concept:
Likewise, I have had many bug-infested “rocks” in my life. Rather than try to clean myself up, the Lord has many times led me to just allow Him to gently turn one of my [many] rocks over in His loving hand and expose it to His warming, penetrating, healing, freshening rays! – which do all of the healing, cleansing work! All I had to do was simply lay there with my wound, dirt, or ugliness exposed to Him!
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SOAKING
My mother-in-love made the most amazing pickles! But they didn’t start out their pickley lives as winners. They began as dill – or, for the sake of our analogy, we’ll call them sour pickles.
To be transformed into the amazing sweet pickles they became, all they had to do was SOAK in the NEW brine that I put them in!
What does that brine consist of? 3 cups of sugar and 1 cup of vinegar. (See my “Grandma Shelton’s Rebrined Pickles” blog post for the recipe and directions.)
Two of the “sweetest” things we can soak in are:
God’s Word, theBible – “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)
Worship – Whatever we look at, we become more like it. The more we focus on fashion, the more we want to be fashionable. (And thin!) The more we focus on food, the more we want it. But as we dwell on the Lord, the more we want Him, and the more we actually become like Him! And “As the Spirit of the Lord works in us, we become more and more like Him.”
(In the article I share a bitter, “vinegar-esque” thing we might soak in that actually aids in the transformation process, but we’ll just stay with the sugar aspect here.)
These pickles take a week to be completely transformed into the best pickles I have ever tasted! EVER!!! And they didn’t even have to go on a self-improvement kick! They just soaked in that transforming brine, getting sweeter as the days went by!
Likewise, if we soak in God’s Word, letting His “higher thoughts” soak into us, renewing our minds… If we get our eyes off of our sour selves and worship our mighty, loving God, we will become more and more like Him, and get sweeter as the days, months, and years go by!
So thank you, Christina and girls, for creating Meridith and sharing her with us, thereby inspiring any of us who are struggling to melt down to our natural God-given size to:
• lay down our striving to fix ourselves and…
• simply spend more time exposing ourselves to the Son, soaking in His healing warmth.
