Believe This!

 

 I've had weight loss struggles for most of my life and started this journey to Liveliving in 2009. After battling weight loss for so long I had a strong gut desire to lose weight under God's leading and not by worldly, well meaning weight loss programs or gastric bypass or any number of other plans put forth by well meaning, sincere proponents of weight loss who gladly took my money and gave me very little in return. I'd tried that and got literally nowhere. Been there, done that. So I prayed and went on line searching for a Christian program that would show my through God's Word how to become healthy spiritually, mentally and physically. Surely there was SOMETHING or SOMEONE out there who shared and understood my desire to get my direction on how to lose weight successfully from the Lord. After all, God created me, surely He had instructed someone out there who had a way for me to be led through His Word to a healthier me.
     It took some searching but I did find one new site which seemed to be offering all that I was looking for, www.LiveLiving.org. I contacted Etta Dale (now Hornsteiner) on her website; she responded by email and said they had been preparing a bible study on Health and Wellness, but it was online only at this time. That didn't work for me. I wanted something in my hand that I could learn from, share with others in a study setting and then share with others in a greater way.
     Little did I know when I put forth the prayer to God requesting He guide me in losing weight, that He would take my request and transform my whole life. My vision was to become a size 12 again and brag to others about how God led me through His Word to my weight loss goal. Oh, how small minded and limited was my sight.
     It's been, now, going on 6+ years and although I've lost some physical weight (certainly not the 100+ pounds I wanted),  have learned to eat healthier (although I do lapse now and again) and have witnessed deeper insight to my heavenly Trainer, He is showing me that my initial prayer was only a grain of sand on the beach of my transformation journey to fully live living. I thought He would wave His magic hand over my body and I would be thin within a year's time. Humph,  I actually thought giving Him a year was quite gracious on my part. It didn't happen in a year, and in my eyes it appeared it would never happen. After all, it's been over 5 years and I'm still "fat" in my eyes and have failed time and time again. However, what I'm learning is that in order for Him to show me the jewel He's created me to be He had to start at the very beginning of my inner life and expose those issues He desired to not only heal and erase, but transform. I have a lot of inner scabs and He desires wholeness within me so His authentic life within me can be witnessed by others.
     When my heart is open to Him (and sometimes I still try to shield parts of me from Him), but when it is open, He imparts precious aha moments to me at the most ingenious times. Just this morning I attended a Beth Moore simulcast entitled "Audacious". Within the first 15 minutes of the worship time I was particularly struck by the women on the screen who were singing praises to their God. At first I was puzzled as to why He wanted me to take a good look at them. What I saw was that they weren't a perfect size 6 with perfect teeth, make-up and "Stepford Wives" Christian-ese language. Not one of them was a size 6 or even a size 12! One woman was quite large with a quite largely beautiful voice and she didn't seem to mind that others would see her size 26+ body. Nope, she was just focused on singing praises to her God. They ALL, with great boldness and sincerity authentically bared their hearts to, not only God, but to the 8,000+ women in the Wichita, Kansas stadium and the thousands upon thousands of women (and a few men) across the 50 United States of America and 19 countries who were watching the simulcast. They were beautiful and I wanted to be just like them!
     And do you know what my heavenly Trainer said to me? He said, "Daughter, I've told you in my Word, and am telling you now this truth. By the way, see how they praise Me? I love that! Don't you know by now, I don't focus on what size you are outwardly. It's not about the outside appearance. It's about the inner you that I care about. It's about your heart. I love your heart!  Get and be physically, mentally and spiritually healthy. I will take care of the rest. All that's not of Me I will wipe away. You asked me to become healthy spiritually, mentally and physically. I'm doing that NOW. I'm answering your heart's cry, your prayer, NOW. My desire is that you celebrate who I have created you to be. You know who she is, I've shown you. Celebrate the awesomeness of Me in you! Let Me fully live through you. You keep in My Word and keep your eyes on Me, not your circumstances and failures. Look upon and trust Me."
     "Daughter, shake off what to you seems like steel chains and is bondage. To Me those chains are like paper. See them as I see them. By the power of My Son who lives in you...PRAISE!! All those things of your past that held you down, all the lies you've listened to (and believed)  about your worth and whether you'd be accepted by those you love, all the times you sabotaged your progress in being healthy because you felt you weren't good enough and deserved to fail, they are nothing in My presence. Celebrate that truth. The truth is that you truly are precious in My sight, you were fearfully and wonderfully made, I DO have plans for your life, you were created to show others that feel just like you do that My Word is true and that I love you and I love each one of them with a love that will never die. Your shame is undone in My presence. BELIEVE THIS!"

What Color is the Water?

 

So I'm at the pool exercising and chatting with the Lord yesterday and about 1/2 an hour into it I ask Him, "So am I going to be fat forever? I mean, I've been at this for almost 10 years off and on and a -25 is all I seem to have kept off. I'm just being real with you Lord, will I always be fat?" 

And He answered. (I love that!) He said, "Daughter, YOU are not fat." 

"WHAT?" I responded. "Have you looked at me lately?"
Daughter, the you I created is not fat. And you have lost so much excess baggage in your life over the past 7 years that you have allowed Me access to your life; I've worked within you so much that the person who sought me out to lose the physical weight doesn't exist any more. You are so much more than the seeker you were then. Don't you see that?" 

"Yes, Father, when I step away from the struggle I do see that. But when I exercise all I can see and feel jiggle is the fat."

 "Daughter, what color is the water that you're exercising in?" 

 "What?" I responded. "What color is the water? "Well, when I look at it from here, where I'm standing in the water, it's blue." 

"But when you lift the water out of the pool, what color is it? What is it's true color?" 

 So I did that, I lifted a handful of water out of the pool and realized what I already knew, that the water is not actually blue. 

"It's clear Father." "
That's right. The truth is not what you SEE from where you're standing within the situation, it's what you know, what I've spoken to and over you. The truth is clear, just like the water. You are who I have created, and am in you."

 "So," I pondered, "how does that relate to right now, to this body?"

 "The water takes on the characteristics of whatever container it is in. If it's in a pool where the floor is painted blue, it appears blue. If it's in a lake or pond, the water is whatever the bottom of the lake or pond is composed of. If it's in an ocean, it takes on the ocean's characteristics, sometimes blue, sometimes green from algae, sometimes dirty brown. However, the truth is, the water's true color is clear, no matter what the "container's base composition. All these years you have been "seeing" yourself as still that dirty water, still that unclean person you were before I saved you from that life, and you have been feeding that person unclean thoughts, unclean food, pure and simple, uncleanness, day after day, all in a effort to be YOU and feel better about you.
  Remember when you sang that solo at the high school arts show, "I Gotta Be Me" (originally sung by Frank Sinatra)? You so wanted to be free of the uncleanness you had allowed yourself to keep "swimming" in, and from the depths of your heart the real you wanted to be rescued, so much so that you even had to sing about it. All the past 30+ years you've been swimming in water that was not the you I created. Now you are seeing the real truth. The YOU I've created has been washed by the water of my Son's blood shed on the cross and my Holy Spirit now lives in you. Your true composition is holy, pure and clear. YOU are no longer "fat". That fat represents your past life, and is no longer truly you. YOU are holy, pure, clear, beautiful, smart, creative and am becoming the very image of my Son. Can you see that now?"

 "Wow... Wow. I think I like this person so much more. Okay, so what I need to do is not "see" the fat, but "see" the me you created and "feed" that person. Cleanly. In every area of my life I need to nurture that true me, everything from what I read, eat, think, listen to, speak and allow in my life. When I do that I will "see" clarity will with each step. The fat will fall off in every area of my life, not just the physical.
Wow. This is so much MORE than I originally asked for. Thank you. I'm so amazed that You would do that for me. Wow. Thank you Father. May I be so aware of your life within me that each step becomes a journey of joy that will feed others. 

Thank you. Wow."