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Welcome to our final week of studying through Barb Raveling’s Weight Loss Bible Study. We have plans to revisit this material in the future–for sure!
This week, we will look at the pressure we feel in social settings. (If you subscribe via email, you may need to come to the blog site to view the video)
This week, please complete Barb’s Day 15 of her study, “Social Eating.” You can find those questions at this link here.
Additionally, I will be adding another study/question set for you to do on “Preventative Eating.” So you will still have two days worth of material to get through. I love that we have been taking our time with this material, wading through it slowly. Before we begin our next study, there is time to complete any of that material you may not have had time for or to review the material that God brought home to your heart. We will do that next week, in fact.
Please keep renewing your mind about your renewing of the mind goal or the adjusted renewing of the mind goal that you have established. How has that gone for you? I found that I “forgot” to include that in my routine and so what a surprise! I ended up with my resolve diminishing and then it was easier for me to justify eating outside of my boundaries!
Today, I am recommitting to renewing my mind! Will you join me?
Do you have any potential social situations this week that you may need to make a plan for? What plan might work for you to emerge victorious?
I’m so discourages! One step forward, two steps back!! Ugh!
WICH gratitude,
Emily Moss Which Wich? Superior Sandwiches Cincinnati@Harper’s Station – Coming Soon http://www.whichwich.com 513-608-0592 – Cell
Watch the video and maybe that will help. 🙂 Do the study and that WILL help! 🙂 Hang in there! 🙂
Your closing remarks are such important thoughts for me to meditate on today… I will not be perfect this side of heaven… and I will persevere each and every day. I had been getting a little discouraged that I “got behind” in the study, but this morning I am PRAISING God for carrying me through the past two really busy and intense weeks… and he’s going to carry me through this week ahead. It’s funny about “my” perceptions of what constitutes a busy time (and praising God for carrying me through…) because that implies that I think there are less busy times where I have it more under control?!? Okay, this line of thinking is getting more entertaining by the moment here. Ah, the self deception. God’s grace is carrying me through each and every day, whether I perceive the day to be busy/easy whatever. He’s so patient with us.
Yes – I have a wedding weekend away with extended family! I plan to bring my index cards with renewing mind goal, scripture etc and read several times a day – and prayer time.
I really liked the end of Barb’s study – if life is about God and others, thanksgiving is a lot easier than if life is about indulgences (and me me me). It makes me think about how Heidi had said that it’s tough to have gratitude with an attitude of entitlement. So, I think my additional strategy this weekend will be praise!
When I started this week’s bible study, I thought it wouldn’t be super relevant for me, since social eating is not that much of a problem. As soon as Barb started talking about fairness, though, I knew this was exactly what I needed to hear (read)! Being overweight since I was very young, I have felt for most of my life that it wasn’t “fair.” And unfortunately, there has been a lifetime of complaining directed at God. Barb and Heidi’s takes on fairness are so convicting and so right on! I keep remembering a young man I just met, who has some paralysis and partial blindness due to a stroke. He said he used to question and complain to God until he realized that his “unfair” disability is meant for God’s glory. I was blown away by this young man’s spiritual understanding. I wonder, can I begin to see that my lifelong struggle with weight could be used to bring glory to God? How can I glorify God in my ongoing fight to maintain godly boundaries? Questions to ponder, for sure.
Wow, Cindy! Thanks for that. Yes, I didn’t think social eating would apply much to me either. But the question about the roomate with ice cream is just like when my naturally thin sweet-toothed husband has a sweet treat. I feel entitled to have one with him. I have to learn to save room for the sweet if we are going to have one after a meal or say “no” if it is outside of my boundaries. I also relate to the fairness thoughts about what I “can/can’t” eat (I’m renewing my mind about good/bad foods, etc), weight, how clothes look, etc. I am going to keep that young man’s words in my mind – how can I glorify God today, in all things?
Wow, Cindy. Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts about this. Yes…convicting! Good stuff to consider. God is convicting my heart so much!
Holy Toledo…”It’s Not Fair” in this week’s Social Eating whooped my butt – dang it! I was shocked as I worked through the A-E questions, at just how immature my gut responses were…they’re the ones that I acknowledge a nano-second before my good Christian responses reverberated through my head justifying my self-centered focus at potlucks! I would show up with my own “10 inch” dinner plate and “20 oz” soup bowl so as I could be sure to get MY fair share! Yes, I kept a plate and bowl at my desk for just such “social eating” events. I still have a plate and bowl but they are now child sizes and shaped like owls! Amazing how the issue of “It’s Not Fair” has been able to keep in the shadows for so long…lots of journaling for me this week to renew my mind – gulp! Per Heidi’s suggestion, I am definitely going to have to review this study.
LOL, Lesley! Me, too. I feel like a spoiled brat! How is it going? 🙂
I am finally able to study this wonderful material again. The “It’s not fair” attitude does hurt us spiritually in so many ways. Primarily we become self centered and are not able to be like Jesus. We must accept the truth that life is about loving God first with everything we have and then loving our neighbor as our self. It never says love yourself first. The culture always tries to feed us the lie that we are number 1 and everything else is number 2. This helps me with eating because the next time I go to a social function, I need to make it about the love of God and neighbor and not about the love of food first. Thanks for great study. I have a lot to work on.