Let’s face it, losing weight is hard and it can be draining, frustrating and even defeating at times. Right? It’s even harder, in certain seasons of life, to just keep going especially when you don’t see the results that you had expected, or that you might be used to. Maybe you’re there right now? You’ve been at it, trying to lose weight for so long, and you’re getting tired. You’re getting weary.Frustrated. You’re ready to just throw in the towel and eat all of the things. This Blog is for those of you who are feeling weary in weight loss. Today I want to help you to have a restored hope and faith and a renewed sense of purpose and commitment on your weight loss journey. What I am sharingtoday is straight out of the pages of the Bible. It’s a scripture that God directed me to help you to understand more completely what is going on with your weight loss difficulties and what you must do about it. He has impressed upon my heart that there are natural laws in his word that apply to you thatyou cannot escape, even in weight loss. I hope you might lean in, even take notes.
Galatians 6:7-9 says, “Do not be misled. You cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. So, let’s not get tired of doing what is good. In just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.”
Do you already see what I'm going to share with you?? Galatians reminds us that what we plant; we harvest. It is a natural law. For many of us, we’ve spent a lifetime planting seeds of flavor, fullness, quantity, ease, comfort, and even joy in our food life. And then we get surprised because of what we harvest from planting those seeds. The result of sowing all those seeds is our weight problem. We harvest the consequences which basically amounts to being unhealthy to the point of weight gain. This is where we begin to step into having middle age belly fat, that won’t go away because of our middle-age status, we can’t escape our fat pants and we seemingly becomeweight-loss resistant. Can you relate to this? And then, to make matters worse, the minute we want to lose weight, we struggle because losing the weight means also losing a bit of our identity. Of how we live in this world. Because losing weight means restricting ourselves and having to focus on eating healthy which kind of means that we on some level KNOW we lose the joy we have in certain foods. And we don’t like that. As we begin to step into a diet, we start noticing the loss of flavor, the loss of constant fullness, the volume on our plate, the ease of which we could get food before, the comfort we found in all our favorite and familiar foods and even the stories we had about all of those foods. We go through a food identity crisis to the point of sabotage. And this is where we find ourselves feeling emotional IN weight loss. Because breaking up with food and the bad habits that led us to weight gain, is emotional and hard because we’ve done it for so long and we’re so used to running to food for love, happiness, fullness, assurance sometimes, and even to avoid emotions. Can you relate to that? All of this is hard because deciding to lose weight means so much more than JUST changing what you eat. It means changing who you are, how do you cope, how you show up, and how you live. In fact, many of us don’t include God in our weight loss journey not only because we’ve never been shown how to, but because were also afraid of what he might take away or tell us to do. It’s like we don’t want to be parented in this area of our lives. DESPITE knowing we need to change.
What I need you to see today is that every action has a result. If you live to please your own desires, you will harvest a crop of sorrow and evil. What are the desires that you have been living to please that have given you a physical, spiritual, and emotional crop of sorrow? Think about your weight loss journey. And the other habits and actions that you take daily. What happens to your weight loss progress when you give into temptation? What happens to your thoughts, your willpower, and your motivation when you focus on the scale? What happens to your ability to eat well when you are tired or too busy or even too lazy to get up and meal prep? Temptation, willpower, motivation, the scale, chronic fatigue, busyness, and even laziness are all seeds of sorrow.
So, when you sow lazy seeds, you harvest the results of your laziness. When you sow into temptation, you get those results, sorrow and evil. Remember, evil means something that brings you sorrow distress or even misfortune. You know all of this. You have experienced all of this. You’re likely even defeated by it. There is a natural law of sowing and reaping. We harvest what we plant, even in weight loss. I know you already know all of this but today we’re going to look at this from God’s perspective. God will help you to lose weight, but only because of you seeking to find your life in him! Why? Why is because this Life of yours, even your ability to successfully lose the weight, has more to do with who you are becoming than it is about just losing weight. You already inherently know this, but you just haven’t connected and allowed your faith to heal you. So many women think it’s vain to ask God for weight loss. And maybe for some it is. Especially if that’s all that is in their heart. But it is not vain to go to God and to ask him to help you get out of a house of bondage that you’re in with your food. To help you release pride, idolatry, gluttony, selfishness, and even wrong emotions associated to wrong actions. This is about how we as Christians, ashumans, have a sin nature. We naturally want the joy things in life the easy path, the path of least resistance. We naturally cheat on our weight-loss journey because it seems so harmless. We look for hacks and we constantly wait to just feel like it. We think motivation will be there. We rely on willpower. Not even realizing how much we have become a weapon formed against ourselves. And that is because when we were born again, we were saved in our spirit. Our spirit was born again. Our flesh is still carnal and prone to follow our sin nature; to take counsel from our flesh & and to easily conform to the patterns of this world. Especially with food because we’ve kept it separate. But your faith can heal you in your mind and body. Your job is to see what your part on this journey is. Your part is going to God for renewed thinking so that you can stop conforming to the patterns that have conditioned your thoughts, and step into a transformed life. If you are stuck in weight loss it is because this area of your life is still under the authority of your flesh. And not your spirit. You worship God and follow Christ, but your weight loss journey is separate. Almost in a metaphorical box. You might not even see how you have kept God out of your food choices. In your old sin nature, your flesh mastered you and sin was acceptable to the point of becoming sin sick. If you followed me for any amount of time you should know by now, what the real definition of sin is. I encourage you to look up James 4:17. In your new divine born-again nature, your spirit wants to lead you, but you need to be shown how to no longer be mastered by your flesh. But instead, be mastered by your spirit, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
So how can you fix this? How can you change? How can you get out of your own way and actually lose the weight?
Your weight loss success is going to depend on you seeing and remembering that you are a spirit who has a soul and who lives in a body. Your power and authority rests in your spirit. Even in weight loss. Through your faith you can begin to heal your body and see the right seeds for restored physical, spiritual, and even emotional health. Weight loss is a byproduct of health. And restored health is a byproduct of your learning to lead your body with a renewed mind, yielding to the Holy Spirit’s leadership, instead of being mastered by your flesh. How you do this with weight loss is in remembering that you are not here to be thin. You are here to serve him. When you begin to focus on God, his strength, his will, and his ways, you begin to sow the right seeds that will yield weight loss. Weight loss is a process that will take time. So much needs to happen inside before the outside will ever show progress. Just like what needs to happen when you plant a seed. You know this. A Gardner needs to tend to that seed, make the conditions appropriate, repeatedly. And then, once the seed has taken root, it begins to transform. Undoing the patterns of a dieter’s mindset, where you repeatedly start and stop different diets, and yield to the voice of the Temptation, and sabotage yourself as soon as things get uncomfortable, takes time. As does the renewing of your mind as you step into becoming a Seeker and you release being a dieter, focused only on weight loss. The minute you drop weight loss and pick up the pursuit of life gain, seeking God and holiness as you walk in righteousness You begin to plant seeds of health. Health in your thinking about food & your actions necessary. Seeds of supernatural energy to suddenly have the desire to prep and cook where you had previously been too lazy. Seeds of joy in the journey instead of joy in the food and flavor. Seeds of faith in God as your comforter when you’re feeling doubt & despair in your progress. Versus seeds of trust in your food or habits as your comforter. If you plant seeds to please your own sinful desires, you will reap a harvest of sorrow and evil. But if you plant to please God, you will harvest joy and everlasting life. Where restoration takes place and weight loss is the byproduct. So, what kind of seeds are you planting? What kind of seeds should you begin to plant? And what will you do when you are not seeing progress despite your right efforts? Stop disconnecting your weight loss journey from your faith. Your faith is the way to restored health because restored health is the means to which you can be around long enough to do Gods will in your life. Jesus said in Mark 5:34, “Your faith has healed you.” It is only faith that releases Gods healing power. Though you don’t see immediate results, be reminded that God’s work is at hand and progress is all on his timetable. He is birthing something new inside of you that must take place before the outside of you will ever look different. I never knew this! My weight loss took me three years because I had to heal my soul first. I FINALLY planted seeds of trust, obedience, suffering, yielding, crucifixion of my flesh, spiritual warfare daily, diligence, endurance, self-control, patience, joy, and seeking God. And from that my harvest has been all of the fruits of the spirit during my transformation. And from all of that, I have stepped into the blessing of restored health, spiritual maturity, and even weight loss! Even more I have lost my old ways of living and being as I found my life in his will. I encourage you to plan for weight loss to be a byproduct of restored health as you pursue life in Christ, every single hour of every single day. Do not get discouraged by what you don’t see yet. Keep doing the right things as you practice yielding to the spirits guidance as you work with God to renew your mind and transform your entire life inclusive of your body. Trust in God for the results. Do what you can do, and he will do what you cannot do. And in due time, you will reap a harvest if you don’t succumb to being weary, and you don’t give up to every whim of your flesh. Even in weight loss!