You relish having the privilege of serving in the women’s ministry at your church. Your latest brainstorm, a “Spring Fling” mini-retreat event, is an exciting opportunity for women to gather, to worship, to fellowship, to deepen their understanding of life-changing truth with a gifted bible teacher who has the date you have suggested available. Your proposal for this event has now been presented to the Women’s Ministry Committee for their consideration. After discussion and questions, you are invited to leave while they decide whether to move forward with the event or not. At the conclusion of the meeting, they inform you that, because they have decided to host another activity led by another woman for the date two weeks prior, they chose to forgo your event at this time.
POOF!
Suddenly, there are precious few thoughts about the sovereignty of God or that He chooses the instrument for His ministry for His purposes.
There are precious few thoughts also about the faithful servant or the event that was chosen nor thoughts of thankful gratitude for her willingness to minister to others.
There are precious few thoughts about praying for her and for the team of women that she will lead.
Instead, there is the sense of having been wounded. This experience triggers a series of thoughts of:
“I was rejected.”
“I am not good enough.”
“They don’t like me.”
As the lid is blown off of Pandora’s Box, the disproportionate response to what has just happened causes you to plunge headlong into a carton of ice cream, a bag of chips, popcorn…it doesn’t matter. It can even be the most nutritious and delicious salad! Food! Anything to munch on! Even the loaf of bread isn’t safe. What has happened here?
For me, the wounds of the past used to be all rolled up in these kinds of situations. There can hardly be prayerful insight and wisdom because of all the voices, words, wounds of the past are bound up in the now!
When this happened, I tended to resort to the way of coping with pain I had depended on for years, seeking to anesthetize myself. Eating 0 to 5 was not on my radar screen. In fact, I would even be a bit mad at God for allowing whatever it was that seemed so horrible right now.
God began to show me about ten years ago, what was going on for me in situations like this. Why I could be “triggered” by my 4 year old’s defiance, for instance! It didn’t take much to send me flying to the pantry or fridge. The sense of needing to be comforted by food, of wanting the pain to stop…it all happened so easily and so often.
Years of experiences–little, big, long-drawn out, short bursts of “nothing much”–it doesn’t matter; if there was pain associated with them, gone unchecked, without surrendering them to the Lord, for me, it resulted in a well of pain deep down inside me just waiting for the right opportunity to be tapped. The way someone treated me in sixth grade, the word from my dad when I was fifteen, the rejection of a friend at 23. There were times–most times, of course–when it wasn’t at the surface, true. It was like it had all “scabbed over.” It didn’t take much for the scab to be scraped off and pus and blood to gush out, however.
In these times, the “wound” I felt was not relative to the present moment, but all of the wounds, in all of the situations, that all of the people caused that ever made me feel similarly–even on a “minor” scale.
All the eating I did to anesthetize my pain…it began to STOP the day God led me into the Valley of the Shadow. It was a path of suffering, but a path of forgiveness.
This week we are reading and completing the material in chapters 19 and 20. This material can be LIFE CHANGING! It has been for me!
But it may require a lot of time…even more than a week. That’s ok. Just hang in there and work slowly through it.
God is doing a new thing!!!
This week’s assignment:
1.)Please continue your list of God’s attributes. This list must be getting pretty long by now! 🙂 I would love to know what aspects of God you have found most precious during the past two months. In what way has God revealed himself to you?
2.) Please take time each day to praise God for some of the attributes on your list.
3.) Keep adding to your gratitude journal. I would love to hear what God is doing through the practice of keeping a gratitude journal. Share it with us if you feel so led. You can do that here, on Facebook, or at the Thin Within forums (which is even better!).
4.) Read and complete day 19 and 20. – all reading and activities through page 218. Now is not the time to give up! Even if you are a bit behind…hang in there!
5.) We are our own worst critics. The very grace that Jesus died to extend to us, we refuse to extend to ourselves. We are so bent (very often) on our performance. Jesus never uses our performance for a standard for his acceptance of us. In fact, Romans 5:8 says that he chose to demonstrate his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Jesus died for us–to win us–to purchase us. Before we had a single Godward thought, he declared us before the foundation of the earth to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he adopted us! All because he receives glory from it somehow. Isn’t this amazing? This is the gospel! As you read chapter 19, PLUNGE in! Ask yourself as you read “Do I believe this to the depths of my being?” If not, ask yourself if you don’t believe it because it is NOT the truth (in which case, please tell me so I can pass the information on to Judy and Arthur Halliday!) or do you not believe it because the enemy has convinced you to believe lies? We are still rebuilding our foundation…to be sure that it is THE WORD OF TRUTH! 🙂 Journal about these thoughts.
6.) What do you have the most difficulty receiving God’s forgiveness for? What do you have the most difficulty forgiving yourself for? Journal these things–what they are, how they have affected you. Then write across the top of each page of your journal where you have written about this:
Nothing can separate me from God’s love for me. (Romans 8:35-39)
7.) As you complete the activities on page 197-199, refuse to be subjugated by a spirit of condemnation. The enemy is alive and real and wants to cause you to take this exercise and find condemnation instead of the very freedom that God intends. Don’t let the enemy have his way. Be watchful and know that your great Lord, King of the Universe, loves you and is the victor. He has made you more than a conqueror in Christ. If it helps, use the affirmations on pages 125-127 to combat any feelings of despair. Those statements are based on the TRUTH of scripture! Many of us have believed lies for years and the process of being transformed from within requires the renewing of our minds as we have been learning! If you feel so led, tell us about what you experience as you progress through chapter 19 and the activities listed here or in the book.
8.) Chapter 20 continues to lead us down the path of suffering in many ways. This may seem like a needless (and painful) exercise in futility. But I can attest personally that this is one of the most freeing exercises that you will be able to go through. This is vital and it also is a way of living out the Word of God. As you read, study, and complete the exercises in this chapter, be extremely prayerful. Each paragraph you read, each line you write, ask the Lord to show you what is necessary in order to experience the healing he died to purchase for you. You may think that all you want to do is lose weight–God has MUCH more in mind for all of us!
10.) Come to chat with us this week! Our chats are on Wednesday from 5-6pm Pacific Time (7-8Central and 8-9Eastern) and Saturday 7-8am Pacific (9-10 Central or 10-11 Eastern). Hope to see you!
11.) Use the opportunity to interact with the community of folks that visit this blog by responding to this post or to others. Watch for an opportunity to win a workbook kit #1 — a $45 value! 🙂
Thin Within has taught me nothing if not to listen to the voice of God as he speaks personally to me. John 10:4 says that Jesus’ sheep follow Him because they know his voice. A reasonable conclusion from this verse is that Jesus speaks! If we listen, we will hear him! Isn’t that astounding?
This is what the LORD says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.
– Jeremiah 6: 16
Image courtesy of istock.com
When he speaks, we can listen and hear him. We can choose, like those in the passage above, to reject his instruction. Or we can embrace that road to which he calls and embark on the adventure He has in mind for us.
I am at a crossroads in my life. Truthfully, it is time for me to stop saying, “Lord, I hear you directing me to go that direction, but this one is a good one and is so rewarding, so I will just put you off a bit longer, ok?”
I do this and go on about my business as if it will be fruitful service for him! This is deception.
So, God is calling me to lay some things on the altar. Eating what I want and when I want it…sure. I have some practice with that. 🙂 Doing what I want and when I want it…well, truthfully, I have been using good, wonderful things to run from that which is best. The good, wonderful things give me a reward…a sense that I am “ok” in my skin. I don’t feel so “good” or “successful” from the things that I want to run from.
Here are the facts about the things I have been running from:
1. They don’t define my worth and
2. “Success” isn’t measured by perfection, but by faithfulness.
It is time for me to be faithful.
I want to encourage you who visit this blog to embrace this concept, too. How “well” you “do” Thin Within (or anything else, for that matter) doesn’t define your worth either! Your “success” isn’t measured by your strict adherence to 0 to 5 eating. Are you faithful to return to the Lord again and again when you stray? Do you humbly receive his loving rebuke and discipline and prevail upon his grace instead of your performance? That is faithfulness. That is what we are called to, my friends!
What about in other aspects of life? Say in your workplace or home life and in your friendships? These principles are true there, too!
So, in the days and months ahead, I will try not only to listen to the Lord, but also to heed God’s call–to follow my Savior. I will continue my postings for our book study and anything else that he leads me to post.
As I help my 18 year old son finish his graduation requirements for high school and begin college, as I encourage my wonderful (but perfectionist) daughter to survive new academic challenges that she will face enrolled in Liberty University’s Online Academy, as I strive to love my husband so much better by just being there for him–really present–as I choose to bless my home, myself, and my family and friends by giving attention to our home and keeping it hospitable, I will be doing that to which God calls. I will miss the good thing that I have enjoyed while escaping from the challenges, but I will know that I am doing what is best.
This isn’t a good-bye. Not at all. This is the call to a new adventure instead.
How about you? What might you be running from? To what do you run? Will you choose to listen to the voice of your Lord as he tells you which way to walk? What will that look like for you?
Hi. If you are following along with us on the summer schedule for the study of the Thin Within book, I want to be sure you know that I have updated the schedule to reflect the cancellation of some of the chats.
I feel like I am burning the candle at both ends, so have reduced our chat times to one a week. I hope that you can make one or all.
Please try your best to attend the final chat on September 3! I hope that will be a big encouragement and celebration for you!
Today’s guest blogger is super special to me. She is my 16 year old daughter. You can find the original post here. Although it doesn’t have to do directly with releasing weight or images of body and food, I thought it would be applicable. Besides, I have to share what my daughter said with the world! 🙂 =======
Last February, I, and several of my friends, had the amazing, fascinating, and educational experience of dealing with head lice. I had the especial privilege of being the first to discover it…er, make that the first to have it discovered. I was getting my hair cut when the stylist found them. Extremely embarrassing. Knocked my pride down a few pegs, certainly (especially since one of the only physical features I actually LIKE about myself is my hair!). As I was hyperventilating, having nightmares (“day”mares?) about having to chop off all my hair, my mom was busy doing some research about what exactly it was that we were dealing with. The answer was not encouraging
Neither my mom nor I had any past experience with lice. We had always associated them with…well…dirtiness, not realizing how common they are, nor how easy they are to get no matter how often you wash your hair. One female louse can lay ten nits a day, eggs that unrelentingly stick to tiny strands of hair. The live bug may wash out when you wash your hair, but the nits are firmly GLUED in, and won’t come out unless they are tediously picked out. And they are so small you might not even notice them until they are already hatched adult lice laying more eggs.
Picture doing this with hair that is waist length! Photo courtesy of istock.
This got me thinking…sin can creep into our hearts just as subtly as lice can creep into our hair. Just as one louse can lay many nits, one little compromise can give birth to a whole epidemic of sin. Each sin lays a bunch more “nits” in my heart. I can spot treat the obvious”big” sins…but by the time those are killed they have already birthed more. The way to truly treat “heart lice” is to go through my heart, little bit by little bit…picking out those evils that can easily take over the whole of my heart. The process is tedious and painful and requires letting go of *my* plans and preferences…reclaiming the infested pieces of my heart (possibly ripping out a few pieces in the process) and giving the whole tattered mess to God.
Sin is sin. And guess what it always produces as fruit? More sin. Lice don’t clean up after themselves after they’ve been in your hair for a while…they just keep on laying eggs. Sin won’t clean up after itself either. It takes effort. And, just as you can’t remove nits from your hair yourself but need help from someone else…you can’t remove the “heart lice” of sin without help from your Heavenly Father. Ask him to “comb” through your heart and reveal what is truly thriving inside.
After a couple weeks we were satisfied that the lice were gone from my hair for good. My hair was not in too bad a condition (all things considered), but was certainly the worse for wear after going through pretty much every treatment in the book, natural and otherwise. Gels, special shampoo, apple cider vinegar washes, sleeping with my hair soaked in olive and tea tree oil…taking two hours out of every day (for TWO WEEKS) to comb through my hair with a fine tooth comb…you get the picture. Not a fun process. But what a joy to be freed of the critters I didn’t even know I was sharing my life with (and who were the reason behind my itchy scalp!). And as I continue with the process of picking and praying my way through the junk in my heart…what a joy to be freed of the unseen but often felt weight of sin and compromise I have carried with me for so long.
How about you? Has sin subtly crept into your life and begun to hatch yet more sin? Do you have someone in your life that can help you with the “nit removal?” Ask God to show you and to bring someone with whom you can share your burden!
