My recent loss with the Battle of the Binge—and the TW Lesson on Gideon—showed me three things when it comes to losing and maintaining weight.
First, I had to admit that controlling my appetite is an ongoing battle.
I’m not sprinting towards a blue ribbon at the end of a twelve-week course. Food surrounds me daily like an enemy encircling camp. Waiting to sabotage me at every turn.
For example, last week, the slim hostess of our book club…not knowing I’m trying to lose weight…set a plate of cookies on the table in front of me. I moved them towards the middle of the table and kept my eyes on whoever was discussing the book.
Then someone had the audacity to eat a cookie in front of me. She licked the crumbs off her fingers. Licked the mint chocolate from her lips. Actually, that’s an exaggeration, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had a cookie. Craving sugar gave me hallucinations.
Instead of quoting a truth card or memory verse, I told myself, “There’s freedom in Christ. One cookie won’t hurt.” Only, that cookie tasted so good that I ate another one.
Yep, even though I observed and tried to correct, I succumbed to temptation. Every TW lesson shredded to pieces by my emotional longing to have a cookie.
If I’d been alone, I might have crawled on the table and made a feast of those cookies like the Cookie Monster in Sesame Street. Which is strange, because given the choice, I’d much rather have a cheese plate or a bowl of buttered popcorn.
Sadly, by succumbing to my sweet tooth, I drove home and made myself some fatty, greasy nachos. I’d like to say losing the Battle of the Binge made me feel ashamed. Not really. Like Scarlet O’Hara, I said, “tomorrow is another day.” And gave myself a heap of grace.
Secondly, I can’t fight this food battle on my own.Like Gideon’s 300 men, I need others to come beside me.
Had there been like-minded women at the book club, we could have smashed the cookies and exiled them into the kitchen trash. Or I could have played the heroine. Grabbed the cookie from my friend’s mouth to save her from those worthless calories.
That’s why the TW online community has been a delectable treat. Each day, I’m able to read about other warrior’s temptations, defeats, and victories! As we’ve encouraged and prayed for each other, the battle seems less overwhelming. I’m not alone. Neither are you!
Thirdly, I can’t fight the battle on my own strength.
Not only do I need to put on the armor of Christ each morning, I need to follow Him throughout my day.
Listing God’s attributes isn’t TW busy work. In order to trust God to lead us to victory, and lean on Him when we’re empty (no pun intended) we need to know Him. Not just intellectually, by reading His Word, but spending time with Him so we’re familiar with His voice. And thus, more eager to obey Him.
Yep, last week I went A.W.O.L. from my healthy eating habits. But nothing’s wasted. By losing that Battle of the Binge, I’ve learned the value of the right tactics so I can win the next one.
There are so many exciting changes ahead relative to God is Doing a New Thing and the Thin Within ministries! I am so excited to roll out each one by one. But let me just tease you a bit with that for now and get to the point of this post!
We may just be beginning the 2013 holiday season, but it isn’t too early to think ahead to January and that time when so many of us want to start fresh (though, truly we can start fresh EACH day—we don’t need to wait!).
In January 2014, I will be leading an online Thin Within group studying the Thin Within workbook material. The first orientation meeting will be Monday, January 6th. The class will wrap up Monday, April 7th, 2014. Posts will be accessible here at the blog for discussion, but we will also have a “live” online meeting each week on Mondays, from 4:30-5:30pm Pacific Time. The web url will be made available each week to those who sign up and who provide their email addresses to me for that purpose.
Here are some details about the Rebuilding God’s Temple Workbook Kit #1. If you have done this workbook before, you can still join the weekly chats January 6 – April 7 and work through *any* of the Thin Within workbooks as they are all designed so that they all have the same lesson topics each week.
The first kit is the most comprehensive and comes with three pieces:
Workbook #1
The Temple Toolkit
The Memory Challenge Cards (click on the image to see a large version and some images you can click again to see it magnified further):
The contents of Kit #1
First, the workbook itself, is a spiral bound volume that has material for 12 weeks of study. To download a sample of the material, visit this link. The download is an Adobe Reader (.pdf) file of Week One – “Hope.” After you download it, print it and take a week to try it out! 🙂
Each week’s unit consists of the following:
Lesson material – This is dense written material that you will read to glean the concepts that we are teaching or reviewing during the week. I usually recommend about an hour spent with this, highlighting, asterisking, and looking up the verses in my own bible. I may even write comments in the margin or, if I am leading a group, questions to be sure to ask participants.
Each of the reading portions of the lesson are divided into these segments:
Introduction – A brief overview of the week’s focus
Spiritual Information – The relationship this material has to the Scriptures
Physiological Information – The “mechanics” — what you can actually doto make additional changes in your eating to honor the Lord
Integration – How it all works together
Exercises – Don’t worry! These aren’t calisthenics! LOL! They are basically guided daily quiet times. 🙂 Each week includes “exercises” for each day of the week. Days six and seven are optional and a bit “lighter.” Days one through five include the following sections:
Going Deeper – This relates some aspect of the lesson you have read to your life
Bible Study – This shows how Scripture illustrates or illuminates the principles taught in the lesson
Knowing God By Heart – One of the best parts, this is a study of the attributes of God. We have found that the way a participant views God impacts how she will view food, herself, her body, as well as her willingness (or not) to surrender this aspect of her life to the Lord for His purposes.
Getting Practical – These are suggestions for putting some of the mechanics of the program into practice
Memory Challenge – Hiding God’s Word in our hearts will enable us to be reminded of our commitment to him when we are weak! Memorizing scripture is extremely helpful for renewing our mind and changing our thinking!
Review of the Week – This provides a space where you can summarize what God has shown you or questions and thoughts you have had. This section is especially helpful when you meet with others in a group setting. 🙂
In addition to these resources in the workbook, there is an extensive Introduction at the beginning and Appendices in the back, providing a great deal of material that will support you on your journey.
But wait! There’s more! 🙂 (Couldn’t resist saying that!) Not only do you get the Workbook, but when you purchase the first kit, you also get the Temple Toolkit. This is a resource that offers a place for you to log your own journey throughout each day during the full twelve weeks. As you progress through the material, the pages change to match what you have learned in the workbook. Let me show you what I mean.
The first image below shows Days 25-28. Click on the image to see a larger version and then click again to see FULL size what these pages look like in the temple toolkit:
Days 25, 26, 27, 28 in the Temple Toolkit
As you progress through the workbook and new material is introduced, the Temple Toolkit changes, too:
Days 49, 50, 51, and 52 in Temple Toolkit
Again, click on the image above and then click again on the bigger image to see it full size. You will see new tools have been added.
Of course all of the tools are optionalas you go through the 12-week workbook. If you have come out of a background of excessive charting and graphing, you may only want to use the journaling pages. Or, as time goes on, you may experience freedom with one tool and not another. The Lord will lead each of us individually. Some have freedom to use all the tools, charts and graphs. Some have the freedom not to.
By the time you are closer to the end of the first twelve weeks, you will have been introduced to all of the tools. Note how the material in the toolkit has evolved:
Days 77, 78, 79 and 80 in Temple Toolkit
Again, “Wait! There’s more!” 🙂 When you order the first kit, you get not only the Workbook, the Temple Toolkit that changes as you go through the material, but you also get the Memory Challenge and Temptation Buster Cards:
Memory Challenge and Temptation Buster Cards
Again, click on the image above and the larger image, to get a full size view of what these include. You cut them up and can carry them with you so that Thin Within isn’t just a bible study that you begin in the morning and leave behind the rest of the day. These resources are very supportive in helping you to keep the principles that God is leading you to embrace and apply with you throughout the day.
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.
Do what it says.
Anyone who listens to the word
but does not do what it says
is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and,
after looking at himself,
goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.
~ James 1:22-24
We don’t want to just accumulate head knowledge, but then leave it behind for the rest of the day! We want to ACT on what we learn in our times of study and in God’s Word!
$40 includes three months of workbook material and exercises, as well as the Temple Toolkit and a set of Scripture Memory Cards, one verse for each week. There is no additional cost to participate in the class at this time.
Did you knowthat there are 3 additional workbooks, each covering 12 weeks? The material is designed so that people who have gone through workbook #1 before, can do workbook #2 or #3 or #4, even while most in the group use workbook #1. Each of the workbooks are presented in 12 weekly themes that parallel each other. These are the themes for all four of the workbooks:
Hope
My Body–God’s Temple
Identity in Christ
Celebration of God’s Grace, Part One
Restoration
Counting the Cost
The Fight of Faith
Celebration of God’s Grace, Part Two
Building Godly Boundaries
Forgiveness
Prayer
Celebration of God’s Grace, Part Three
When the group is on week five, everyone will be studying, reviewing, learning about the theme of Restoration. This helps prevent the material from becoming stale! It is a great system that allows people of all experience levels to enjoy a group together, studying and reviewing together.
Workbooks #2, 3 and 4 cost about $25 each.
To order materials, call Thin Within 1-877-729-8932 (9:00am-5:00pm Eastern) or visit this link at Amazon.
To sign up for the class starting in January 2014, visit this link and fill out the form. This email list will only be for the class information.
The group I will be leading starting January 6, 2014 is an “open” group. You can join the chat at any time. There will be more details to come—but if you want to get the information sent directly to you, please sign up to be on the class email list. Hope you can join us!
How About You?
Do you need and want support? Now is your chance. I will probably not be leading another class through the workbook in 2014. Sign up today and purchase your materials! 🙂
Want to lead a group? If you want to live dangerously :-), you can lead a Thin Within group. The best way to do this is to plan to use the material here at the blog and the videos will be created along the way. Plan to join us for the discussions here, the videos, and the class sessions on Monday. Then, following the Monday classes, you can meet with your own group of people live and in person to lead them through the material using the resources provided to you by your own participation in the online class! By the time class time rolls around for us online each Monday, you will have all the material under your belt and be ready to teach it yourself! I would love to know if this interests you! 🙂
This week we have had the opportunity to look at the freedom we are invited to experience in setting aside dieting rules, dieting laws, dieting “Good Foods” and “Bad Foods” lists and dare to trust the God who created our bodies fearfully and wonderfully.
Is Psalm 139 beginning to take root in your heart? Do you believe you are fearfully and wonderfully made?
In the material we studied this week, what resonated for you? If you aren’t doing the book or your book hasn’t arrived yet, share what rang true for you or was impressed upon you here at the blog or in the comments. So much wonderful discussion has been going on! I would love to hear from you about it!
Have you been a “die hard” dieter in the past?
Are your dieting thoughts affecting you even now as you try to set them aside?
Do you have an accountability partner yet? If you go to the Accountability page here at the website, post your information and if you see someone you might like to connect with in email, please send me an email. Please don’t post to me in the comments on that page, as I probably won’t see it in a timely manner. Shoot me an email instead.
Turn to page 36 and have a look at the HEAL pyramid. You will refer to that during this video. If you don’t have the book, I think you will be able to visualize the pyramid just fine as I describe it. You will want to have your book or a journal to write down responses to the questions as we go through.
FOUNDATION – Relationship with God. When you get to the spot in the video, turn off the video, pray, then write down what God is leading you to establish as a goal for this level of the HEAL pyramid. What goal will you have for your relationship with God? We would love to hear in the comments, too. What action steps will enable you to realize your goal?
Second Level – Relationship with FOOD. Again, when you get to the spot in the video, stop, pray, and then write down what God is leading you to establish as a goal for your relationship with food. What action steps will enable you to realize your goal?
Third Level – Hunger/Fullness Eating. In the video, I indicate when to stop. Then pray and jot down what God wants for you in this area of your life. What action steps (or perhaps secondary boundaries) will enable you to achieve this goal?
Tip top level – Beneficial Food Choices. I urge you to approach this category with caution. If you have a history of obsession with dieting, it may not be time for you to establish a goal for this area. You want to learn to trust the Lord that you can eat anything between the parameters of 0 and 5 or hunger and satisfaction.
I hope that you have experienced God’s personal leading as you have established your goals in each of the areas of the HEAL pyramid. Please feel free to allow God to lead you to adjust these as we continue.
I would love to hear what your goals are! Let us know in the comments which area of the HEAL pyramid and what your goal is. If you like, share your action steps, too. In fact, you could use this for your accountability with your partner, too, if you like.
I hope you have been blessed by the focus on the truth God speaks over you, that you are fearfullyand wonderfullymade.
It has encouraged me to no end to see you participate in the study with one another in your comments and there are a bunch of you who have posted on the Accountability page! Be sure to email me and let me know if there is someone you want me to send your contact information to. Let’s get paired up for the next 5 weeks. 🙂 I don’t want anyone left behind!
This week, we have a chance to look at the *mechanics* of this way of eating and living. Where last week a foundation was laid for our relationship with our good and patient Savior and establishing the fact that we want to EXALT Him instead of making it be about ME ME ME, this week, we learn to rely on the signals that our Great and mighty, creative, God has put in our bodies. He has made our bodies to be trustworthy indicators–especially as we submit to our God in prayer and ask Him to guide us to be obedient and honest.
Here is today’s video:
You may need to renew your mind if you are fresh out of dieting or if you have been vacillating back and forth between Thin Within and a diet. Just jot down (in a moment when you are convinced) truths about eating based on the physical cues of your body vs. eating according to a plan provided by a dieting company or industry (who loves to make money out of our failure).
What IS true about letting your body signal you for hunger and satisfaction? Here are some truths to get you started:
When I am hungry and eat, contrary to popular “wisdom,” I am not going to go into starvation mode and not lose weight. Instead, I am showing my body that it is perfectly safe to get hungry as I will eat when I am hungry!
It may seem like a small amount of food that satisfies me. That is because it is! But I can eat again as soon as I am hungry!
My body is so efficient!
When I eat when hungry and stop when I am not, I choose an effortless, easy way of regulating my food intake.
Eating when I am hungry and stopping when I am no longer hungry is the most natural way of eating the amount that my body needs in order to be it’s God-ordained size.
Eating when I am hungry and stopping when I am not enables me to eat all kinds of foods that I enjoy. I don’t have to count. This works. It has for millennia!
This approach frees me from obsession about food and nutrition information. I am free to use what I know about nutrition and free not to. I can listen to the Lord’s leading instead of the “leading” of the popular diet guru.
God knows me intimately (Psalm 139) so it stands to reason that his way will provide me with what I need.
This is radically different from the world’s way of doing things!
Colossians 2:20-23 confirms this:
You have died with Christ,
and he has set you free from the spiritual powers of this world.
So why do you keep on following the rules of the world, such as,
“Don’t handle! Don’t taste! Don’t touch!”?
Such rules are mere human teachings about things that deteriorate as we use them.
These rules may seem wise because they require strong devotion,
pious self-denial, and severe bodily discipline.
But they provide no help in conquering a person’s evil desires.
So let me ask you the same things I ask in the video…the same things we are asked in the material we are studying:
Has being obsessed (even just a bit) with food, eating and your body, hindered your growth to be all that God intends?
This is a convicting question! Notice that it zeros in on being obsessed with food, eating and your body…obviously, God has a plan for all of us that we haven’t yet realized! But the focus here is…what is keeping you from it? Is it possible that the very thing that you pursue because you “want to honor God” is pursued in such a way that it stands in the way of being what you could be?
If the Father seeks worshipers who worship in Spirit and in Truth, and we are thinking about ourselves so very much…does that, perhaps, tell us the answer?
What self-destructive lies have you believed?
What TRUTHS can you embrace to counter the lies?
Are you willing to befriendyour body? What might this look like for you? Do you need to renew your mind about your body in order to do that? Here is what that might look like for me:
My legs have enabled me to hike and bike ride and see amazing scenery where no car can travel.
My abdomen–the one that has stretch marks (now faded)–carried both of my children into this world.
My chest nursed my children to give them a good start. Even if I think I look like “National Geographic Woman” now (everything is dripping a bit south), I know that my body has done a remarkable job!
My hands have played the guitar and keyboard for the worship team and our church family
My teeth have chewed the food I need to get the nutrition I need and while I have sometimes used them to chew more food than I need, I am still thankful for them!
My feet–which I so often criticize for being too big–have carried my body for 52 years (less the first year of my life, I guess). They have taken me all kinds of places!
My shoulders–as broad as they are–have enabled me to be strong to move hay, to carry furniture when needed and other heavy burdens.
I think you get the idea. Sometimes, I need to renew my mind several times a day about whatever it is I am struggling with. To “befriend” my body, as the authors suggest, I might need to review this list a number of times!
How about you? What do you need to renew your mind about as we progress this week and begin to get in touch with our hunger/satisfied signals? Does befriending your body seem impossible and, even, repulsive? Ask the Lord to show you HIS truth!
Assignment:
Complete all of Lesson 2, the personal study and the group study.
Write out your responses to the questions on page 45 under “Sharing and Discussion Questions.”
Create personal HEAL goals for each level of the HEAL pyramid (page 36)
Renew your mind about anything that God leads you to renew your mind about. I recommend doing this as part of your time with the Lord first thing in the morning–even if it is in the shower or as you dress and get ready for the day.
Select an accountability partner if you haven’t yet!
Optional:
Consider memorizing the verse on page 42
Add to your God List and have a praise fest! Do this at least once this week, if not several times.
What do you sense God is leading you to make a priority this week regarding your eating, renewing of your mind, your time with Him, an accountability partner, and anything else mentioned in our study so far?
Much of today’s post will be written by YOU in the comments! I hope you are ready to join in! 🙂
First, put on your holy imagination! Pretend we are on a picnic in the middle of nowhere…enjoying a crystal clear blue sky, the music of the meadowlark, the clouds drifting lazily by, and the majestic mountains in the distance. My living room wasn’t available this week!
Yes, I captured this week’s “group session”–our first for our study of Healthy Eating and Abundant Living–while on the road trip with my son! I was thinking of you non-stop as I drove over 4000 miles and so when I saw this view and the relatively quiet opportunity to record some thoughts roadside, I grabbed it!
So, please get your bible. Open to Psalm 139 because we will read it together! Just like we would in person! (If you are an email subscriber, you may have to visit the blog in order to view the video.) – In time, I hope to get better about lighting and all. For now, just know I was TOTALLY enraptured by the joy of being in that beautiful place, imagining you all with me and reading this glorious Psalm!
Are you beginning to believe what God says about you yet? That you are fearfully and wonderfullymade? 🙂
If we were sitting together…all of us…on a lovely picnic blanket under the azure sky, I would ask you the questions in our books:
What does “wonderfully made” mean to you?
And just because I am a maverick, I might also ask:
What does being “fearfully made” mean to you?
This blog and website has been a wonderful place for many of us to share in ways we don’t often with people face-to-face. But in person, I would ask a challenging question, suggested, again, by the authors of our book:
In what areas of your life have you been living in the dark?
Some of us are giving in to tickling the back of our throats again…
Others of us are using laxatives in order to move the (usually large quantity of) food through our systems quicker so as not to absorb it.
Some of us may be “riding the zero”…more than we know God would have us.
We hide our eating by sneaking fast food in the car and then coming home and having dinner with the family as if we haven’t just had a full meal.
Or it might be another way completely.
Jesus tells us in John 8:32 that knowing the truth sets us free and, although he was talking about his teaching specifically, there IS a principle that we can draw from this verse…and it is that running from truth or hiding from truth is not the way to freedom. Facing IN to truth is.
Here is another thought…your truth…is with a little “t.” What if you were to let God TRUMP your little “t” truth with His BIG “T” TRUTH? Your truth may be true (then again, it may not be), but God’s Truth supersedes and overrides and commands all other little “t” truth.
What do you think?
What scares you about living in the light?
Have you hidden your struggles with food and your body from God and others?
Have you visited the Accountability page here? Do you have a prayer/accountability partner yet? How is that going? What can I do to help you with that so that you no longer feel the need to hide, but have someone that is praying you through and that you can support, too.
One of the amazing things in God’s Word is the principle that when we minister to others, our *own* healing takes wing! We experience healing in deep places in our lives when we support, encourage, and minister to others (see Isaiah 58:8-12). Connect with someone and give it a try!
What are your thoughts about being knit together, stitch by stitch, in your mother’s womb? What does that say to you about the God you serve?
How can we pray for you in the week ahead?
Get your typing fingers going and chip in below! 🙂 I love seeing you minister to one another!
