by Heidi Bylsma | May 12, 2010 | Blog
What happens when your life is eaten up, not by wrongs currently being done to you but by the lack of forgiveness that you allow to remain for yesterday’s wrongs? Who really is affected by my refusing to forgive?
ME.
I have found that apart from forgiveness, I will be MUCH more likely to chow down, inhale food, binge, and also to do that constant-just-a-bit-more-than-I-need munching in agitation.
When I keep accounts up to date and run to God to tell on the one who has wronged me, feel the pain, and then choose intentionally to release it to his care, to embrace his death on the cross as being sufficient, something …well… “magical” happens. It is supernatural. It is God’s kind of magic.
I don’t mean the “sanctified denial” that says, “Yes, Lord, I know I am supposed to forgive, so I forgive all my family members and the kids I knew growing up for being mean.” That is a great place to start, but at least for me, I found that God walked with me and showed me I needed to get down and dirty…and really deal with how I felt at the time of the wrong (even going back 40 years! It affected me today!), allow the pain and sadness and anger to wash over me but this time, this time, take the hand of Jesus Christ as he walked with me. He led me to look to him for his intentions and purposes in allowing the pain in the first place.
If you know that there are people in your life…no matter how small they may seem or how far removed from now…that you need to forgive, I want to encourage you to do it. When we get hurt today at the grocery store by the rude clerk, often, it is like rubbing salt in an old wound that never healed. We over-react and we wonder why the lady we don’t even know got such a rise out of us. Often this is an indicator that there are unresolved (unforgiven) issues from the past. I need to intentionally go with God to these places and ask him to help me to forgive.
I did that in detail with my mom and I have to continue to do it each time it resurfaces.
This has transformed my relationship with food and my body (and my mom!). I believe it can for many of us.
Who do you need to forgive today? Will you?
by Heidi Bylsma | May 9, 2010 | Blog
Mother’s Day is tough for me. It is hard to get misty-eyed and sentimental for her.
My mom has played a huge role in
my battle with disordered eating.
True Confessions: Eating “nutritious” foods–those dense in vitamins, minerals with a lot of nutrient bang for caloric buck–is impossible for me without gagging. I can’t do it. Nope. Nothing doing. At least not as a general rule. I can’t eat salad or steamed veggies to save my life. I really can’t do it. I grimace involuntarily at even the *smell* of a stray piece of lettuce on a snack wrap at McDonalds ordered “sans” anything green on it.
An exception: I can eat my husband’s fresh, home-made salsa…by the spoonfuls! My mom never made fresh salsa. So, she never beat the tar out of me for *not* eating it. She never literally shoved it down my throat. She never greeted me the next morning with it and declared I couldn’t have any other food until I had eaten it like she did with the peas…cold…shriveled, the asparagus…withered, limp, or the green beans…
Is it any wonder I took to sneaking food? And yet the behaviors that I learned as a child, before I had obvious conviction of sin and God’s saving grace, became spiritual strongholds as an adult. Behaviors that had helped me to cope when I didn’t know what else to do…as an adult they stood in the way of coping.
I wish I could say the freedom that I write about here at the blog after ten years of exposure to Thin Within includes enjoyment of foods that are wholesome and beneficial. In fact, I would love to be able to snack on carrots and apples and other yummy foods that God created to be enjoyed.
But the truth is, I can’t, I won’t, I don’t even bother trying any more.
Once upon a time, I prayerfully stood over my kitchen sink and begged God to enable me to defeat this. With tears, I begged him to infuse me with tastebuds that LOVED a carrot…and as I took a bite, in faith, that THIS time would be different, the gag happened and I ended up feeling traumatized, a flashback to when I was 8 years old. Only this time, traumatized at my own hand. And I wondered why God didn’t answer “yes” to a prayer that seemed soooo according to his will. :-/
I have worked through a truckload of forgiveness of my parents–including my mom for this very thing. I don’t feel bitter about it. But it is a part of what I deal with, still, today, now, and it follows me everywhere.
The reason I bring all of this up today is because Mother’s Day is painful for me, so, I wonder if Mother’s Day is painful for any of you. Is it true for any of you that Mother’s Day isn’t the perky positive rosey flowers and chocolate event that Hallmark and Dayspring have us wanting to believe it is? In church, when people stand up to give verbal testimony to their moms, I always feel so…well…unchristian for not finding something to say that elevates my mom to appropriate levels of esteem in the eyes of my friends.
God has used my heartaches, trials, and, even, the abuse for my spiritual formation. I am desperate for him, largely because she was so wrong. While I must own my sinful choices now, I also acknowledge that my eating issues are directly related to the way my mom chose to treat me. My eating issues keep me ever always dependent on him, clinging to him like the hemorrhaging woman in the dirt. If only for a touch of the hem of his robe…if only to experience him, his power…and to be healed.
Apart from this weakness–which really is a product of a Mom with her own issues getting in the way of handling a young, strong-willed daughter–might I be even more independent, even more arrogant, even more resistant to hear his voice in the whisper?
God redeems. I have no doubt of this in my mind.
Yet, Mother’s Day is painful for me. I won’t blog a post saying otherwise. I wish I could. But I can’t.
So, how about you? Is Mother’s Day hard for you? Is there some way in which God may want to redeem the challenges you face today, perhaps due to a very human, fallible mother years ago? Will you let him?
More on that in Part 2…
by Heidi Bylsma | Apr 25, 2010 | Blog
Recently, someone asked on the Thin Within forums about how to know when to stop eating and how to stop when you know you should. These are some thoughts about that:
For me, considering the boundaries that are a part of my life helps me.
1.) Dog has a fence. Keeps her safe from deer hooves which flail when a deer is attacked. Seriously. And the cougar that was prowling the neighborhood. One view of the “kitty” apart from the fence, Daisy (my golden retriever) would be off like a shot to play with the “kitty.” The boundary keeps her safe.
2.) The yellow line down the middle of the road is a boundary. Oncoming traffic has to stay on one side of the yellow line and I have to stay on mine. I am thankful for that boundary, keeping us all safe.
3.) I have taught my kids that they can’t help themselves to whatever they see that they want at the mall. If they want something, boundary number one is easy enough–“Do you have the money for it?” They *can’t* take something they can’t pay for. It is a boundary.
4.) I need only so much food to sustain my energy and bodily functions. Eating according to this boundary keeps me healthy and safe.
When I think of stopping my eating at “satisfied” as a boundary that is like other boundaries in my life, it doesn’t seem so negotiable or offensive. It really is helpful, loving, and respectful.
If I want to drive on the other side of the road, that is not only disrespectful to other drivers, but it is also “disrespectful” to me…not to mention stupid. The same is true of eating. I know the risks involved with overeating. The physical ones are bad enough.
But for me, even *more* devastating is the attitude “just one more bite won’t hurt.” I play the guitar. When I have gone a few weeks without playing for some reason, I have no calluses left on my fingers. Playing HURTS until I get the calluses again. When I think about my attitude of “just one more bite won’t hurt” when the sweet voice of the Spirit has whispered, “Enough, child…” and I blow through it…when I think about what that does to my heart, in effect making it calloused so I don’t feel the pain of sin quite so readily (just like my calloused fingers keep me from feeling the guitar strings and the pain they cause to my non-calloused fingers), it isn’t worth it. It is like throwing open the gate when I see Daisy wants to chase the deer or cougar and letting whatever happens happen, acting like it doesn’t matter. It *does* matter.
We focus so much on our physical weight. Ignoring the voice of the Spirit may not cause me to gain a ton of weight physically, but the “weight” of the callouses that grow on my heart is too high a price to pay. (Boy, am I mixing my metaphors or what?).
None of this is meant in a condemning way. If it comes across that way, please reject that. Romans 8:1 says there is no condemnation for those of us in Christ. I find freedom in admitting what is going on in my life…the lack of boundaries and the need to adhere to them. His forgiveness is amazing.
How about for you? What is a boundary that you have established for yourself? What are ways you can support yourself and show respect for yourself relative to this boundary?
by Heidi Bylsma | Apr 3, 2010 | Blog
1 “Come, let us return to the LORD.
He has torn us to pieces
but he will heal us;
he has injured us
but he will bind up our wounds. 2 After two days he will revive us;
on the third day he will restore us,
that we may live in his presence.
3 Let us acknowledge the LORD;
let us press on to acknowledge him.
As surely as the sun rises,
he will appear;
he will come to us like the winter rains,
like the spring rains that water the earth.”
~ Hosea 6:1-3
After the rabble and agony of the previous day, the Sabbath following the crucifixion of Jesus was penetratingly quiet. There are times when silence is louder than any cacophony. This day was one of those.
Disciples of Jesus, having stolen away into hiding to avoid being accused and punished as one of the “King of the Jews'” followers…wondered, “What now?” Hopes dashed to pieces.
If Judas’ betrayal of Jesus was at all an intention to force the hand of the Messiah, to hurry him to bring on the kingdom of God on the earth, by Saturday the answer was final.
“No.”
Despairing, Judas surrendered his neck to a rope hung from a tree, for sin without forgiveness brings death.
Loving, Jesus willingly gave his life to the nails on another tree, for a sin-debt paid brings life.
On that Saturday, there was a vast empty echoing silence for those who didn’t yet fathom the significance.
Despair, doubt…
Have you ever hoped in the Lord and wondered at his apparent delay? Like Mary and Martha, perplexed by Jesus’ seeming nonchalance about the urgency of their brother’s illness…Lazarus was in the grave, body grown cold, all hope gone. Then, and only then, Jesus came and promised the impossible, the unthinkable–that they would yet see the manifestation of Resurrection and Life.
Sometimes, the greatest redemptions of life are birthed during the agony of delay.
The disciples waited. Watched. Maybe, even, prayed.
Silence.
Did any of them remember, in those long moments that passed, that Jesus promised he would come to them? As surely as the spring rains. As surely as the sun that rises.
He promises he will come.
Practically Speaking: Do you ever feel like you have been working so hard, maybe for years, to be free from tyranny to unhealthy eating and thinking and living? Do you wonder why God delays in lifting the turmoil from your life? Prayerfully consider–is it possible that this delay is a birthing of something greater in you than you might ever dare to imagine?
by Heidi Bylsma | Mar 15, 2010 | Blog
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed
us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he
chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless
in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through
Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will – to the praise of
his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In
him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in
accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all
wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will
according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ… –
Ephesians 1:3-9
—-
He has blessed me in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing!
With how many blessings?
EVERY spiritual blessing in Christ!
He chose ME before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in
his sight!
What did He choose me for? For hardship? For misery? NO!
TO BE HOLY AND BLAMELESS! In *His* sight! (Even when I am not in
my *own* sight!!)
He predestined ME!
He adopted ME!
And WHY did he do these things?
He did this according to HIS pleasure and will!
He did this for the praise of HIS glorious grace!
He has redeemed ME!
He has lavished the riches of His grace on ME!
He has made known to ME the mystery of His will!
And WHY did He do these things?
He has done this for HIS pleasure!
For some strange reason the God of this Universe, the One who brought the
Heavens into existence with a single command, the One for whom the morning
stars sang, the One who holds it all together…for some reason, this One,
this great I AM has chosen ME. For some strange reason it brings him
pleasure to save ME, to adopt ME, to pour out *every* spiritual blessing on
ME.
If these aren’t reasons to fall head over heels in love with this One, I
don’t know what would be!!!!!
Compare this One, this incredibly strong, intelligent, creative,
coordinated, loving, compassionate, merciful, gracious GOD to the
god–*food*–that I have served for so long. There is NO contest! This ONE,
this mighty Lord of Lords and King of Kings is the best thing going and the
old “love” is ancient history!
Let’s ponder this One! He is MIGHTY, wonderful, loving! Food [in excess]only robs, kills, destroys.
Lord, thank you for such a clear picture of just how incredible you are. I
feel like the young peasant girl who has been swooning over the
amour-bearer of the Prince only to see the Prince Himself on his gallant
steed come to sweep me off my feet! For so long I have been focused on
food so much that I missed just how awesome you are. Forgive me my
blindness, Lord. I ask you to reveal any other idols in my life and give
me the strength to hang on to only you. Amen.
