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In the late "80's" pop song, It's my prerogative, Bobby Brown declared that he could in fact do what he wanted to do without explanation, permission, or validation of anyone.
Well this same young man went on to have a chaotic life, marriage, drug addiction that lasted for many years, all because he did what he wanted to do, the issues was he did ALL he wanted to do. He had too many options so nothing of value held him in place long enough to gain the success he really desired. Success in any area comes down to doing the one thing you do well, loving that thing, then placing all of your focus in that one thing. Goals are great, but having too many can be a problem if they are things you want to do, but not things you were called to do. Before fully entering into my health journey and began to see real success, I wanted to lose weight, but didn't want to leave the food. Like Bobby's song I still wanted to do what I wanted to do, because I left the door open to all the options to eat the food I wanted. That way of thinking led only to short term success which caused frustration. The real heart issue was I still wanted to control something. I felt had given so much already, plus I was a good Christian and did good things so I thought. Well I now understand that God will not take anything from your that you still want so if you want the options, you can have them, but you will also keep the bondage. Success God's way mean giving up our way. Learning to cut off every option that gives us our way, and following Gods directions will always leads to success.
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God will finish the work!
2 Chronicles 20:15 Amplified Bible, Classic Edition (AMPC) He said, Hearken, all Judah, you inhabitants of Jerusalem, and you King Jehoshaphat. The Lord says this to you: Be not afraid or dismayed at this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but God’s. God is mounting an offense in you against His enemy that has now become yours. It is His plan to fully advance you toward the expected end He has destined and promised. He already knows exactly what you will ever face, and His plan for victory is Yes! And in Him Amen. In this battle the enemy will never be the issue, the issue will be us letting go of control, and cooperating with Gods plan. He has instructions for us to follow to put us in the right places for advancement to happen. Learning to let go of control is a work that’s done through trusting God. In order to trust Gods plan we must conclude everyday that He will always have our victory in mind, knows the right time, and most importantly that He loves us, 1 John 4:16 Amplified Bible, Classic Edition (AMPC) And we know (understand, recognize, are conscious of, by observation and by experience) and believe (adhere to and put faith in and rely on) the love God cherishes for us. God is love, and he who dwells and continues in love dwells and continues in God, and God dwells and continues in him. We must remember and spend time with the Father daily to understand, recognize, and become conscious of our experiences of victory with God, that will pull us back into the place of fully resting in His instructions, and embrace how he wants us to advance forward to our next place called there. We must remember, He wants to fight through us with His power and might, and not with our own plans involved. When our hearts are fully giving to His plan, we can rest knowing that we always win. Lacy I was reading through an Instagram post of a young woman who was boasting about the fact that she had weight loss surgery and still ate all the food she did before. As I was reading the comments, I became very aware that she like most people in general, still had the "magic potion mindset" concerning weight loss.
For years all I wanted to do was to loss weight. I didn't want to eat right or give up the items that caused me to binge. I just didn't want to be big any more. I wasted years looking for the "magic" pill that would make all the fat just go away. I took pills, drank powders, went to thousands of meetings, and yet healing didn't begin until I was willing to let go of the pain, and the food that locked me into my self-imposed jail cell of fat. The weight wasn't the issue, it was never the issue. The weight, and the chaos was the suit-case that held the pain, unmet needs, and unresolved issues. The issues expressed themselves through the way I ate and lived. During my journey to having weight loss surgery, I begin a different healing journey. I stopped focusing on the outer appearance, and focused on the heart, my heart. While focusing on the inner healing journey, God started to instruct me to process my emotions, take care of my body, eat well, and get the sleep and rest I needed. I found the truth that made me free! I needed to do the work, the healing work with God, then I had to do the natural work. I had to change the way I ate, the way I processed my emotions, and the way I rested. Health, healing and wholeness is not a magic pill. There is no potion we can drink that will make the pain of yesterday, and fat on our bodies go away. Wholeness is God's desire, not just weight loss. It is a full, complete process that we must commit to, and take full part in. Lacy Lange As I was watching my 600 lbs life, the young woman who was very obese made many comments on how much she hated her body, and being the weight that she was.
She also made statements that she felt her life would be so much better, if she would just lose the weight. As a former obese person I can understand her pain, but I also know a truth that it has taken me many years to learn. The overeating is not the issue. The fat on her body is not the issue. The issue will always be all of the underlining, unresolved, hidden pain of the heart, that expresses it's voice through the violence of overeating. The deeper issues takes time to get to. Sometimes you must be willing to commit to seeing a counselor, therapist, or other medical professional as well as Christian professionals for the healing and restoration we need. Be willing to look at the real issues, and not just what you see on the outside. We learned to self sooth as babies by sucking our thumb, or by our parents giving us a bottle. Learning to process painful emotions was not a part of our daily routine.
Most likely we were told we should be seen and not heard, or they kissed our "boo boo" and "made things better", but the fact of the matter is, we didn't allow our souls to vent. Because of this, we went back to the self soothing techniques we learned. As adults who never learned how to process emotions, we still self sooth, but now the soothing has turned dangerous. Drugs, sex, shopping, and eating too much are just a few of the ugly coping skills that have turned dangerous. What we didn't know then, but we must learn to conclude through a relationship with Jesus now, is that we do have a soothing place in the arms of our Savior who promises rest. The issues with self soothing is it only soothes for a moment. We have to keep going back for more and more only never to find rest or peace from the upheaval of emotions. The only place that promises peace without all the baggage that all false affection leave, is going to the ONE with whom there is joy at his right hand, and leaving our painful emotions there with Him, and we leave with His peace every time. Ps. 16:11 Matthew 11:28 Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Do you "really" want to leave.
It’s not just losing the weight, it’s about this very strange, distorted, destructive relationship with food. Food is the abusive lover in our life that promises never to hurt us again, but it always does. It’s the friend that hurts us after telling all our secrets to the world. It tells us a little won’t hurt you, but you know deep down it does. If I still get a payoff from this very harmful relationship and some how still think I can control this enemy within, sooner or later the abuse will happen again. The saddest part is, our own hands take part in the very action that brings us, yet more scars from this very destructive “friend”. Lacy Don’t you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living. Ro. 6:16
It took many years to finally admit to myself that I was a slave to overeating. Because it is a learned coping mechanism, there are still times when I find myself wanting to eat beyond full. There would be times that I would hear the food call my name to come a dine with it, as if I was having a secret love affair, and the fact of the matter is I was. I was having an affair with a false lover, and friend that made empty promises that there was no way to keep. The enemy took occasion through my own lust to enslave me to my base need. We all need food to live, but there is no life in it. Life is in the blood, (His Blood) Lev. 17:11 How do you know if you are enslaved? Can you put it down? How long can we fast? Can the Lord tell you to put food down and you do it? Who do you obey? That will tell you who's slave you are. From, not because.Many of us believed that when the new year of 2019 came in that a supernatural action was going to happen and POW! we would be changed, just like that.
Well, we see almost a month into the year, and if our thinking is not different, we in fact are still the same. So it is with the endless love/hate relationship with the scale. The scale has ruled our life for so long that we have been enslaved to it, and yet we need the measurement of it in order to grow in greater respect of our personal boundary with our body. Although we do need the scale, keeping it in the correct place is whats needed. To keep it from ruling our sense of self-worth and esteem we must understand and acknowledge where our real value comes from. Our value will always come from God, and what He says about us! That is the ultimate place. This settling place where we can rest from our labor of needing to be a certain number to fulfill some unrealistic expectation of what we think would make us happy to weigh. Our number weight will not make us happy. Wearing a certain size won't make us happy. The only place to find true joy and happiness is in the arms of the Father, who arms will always be wide enough, to hold our hearts. Greed
He told the people, “Be careful to guard yourselves from every kind of greed. Life is not about having a lot of material possessions.” Luke 12:15 Pride, fear, and rejection are only a few teachers that will train you to be greedy with your food. It was such a moment of freedom when I had to admit to God that I was a greedy person. For years I had no control over anything in my life, except what I could fit on my plate, and the toys I claimed as mine. The many years as an adult I've come to understand that it wasn’t the food, it was my orphan heart in need of love that pushed me into the false love of food. Food or any false comfort will never fill you with love. Need can be filled, but greed is a deep, empty pit that only the Fathers love is deep enough to teach the bottom. Maybe your eating is not about need, maybe it’s about greed. Let your need lead you to the arms of the Father, not to food. |
You are always giving yourself something" AuthorLacy Lange is a writer and Empowerment Speaker who lives in Michigan with her husband of 25 years, Roger and has two adult sons, and two grand-kids. Archives
February 2020
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