Life’s Too Hard Right Now…Or Is It?

By Julie Morris –

“I can’t lose weight. Life’s just too hard right now. Maybe later when things settle down,” Susanne said dejectedly.

She had come to me the week before, ready to take her first step toward healthy living, but after trying a few days to make a few simple changes, she had already given up.

She was clinging to food as if it were a life raft that was her only hope in a turbulent sea.

I encouraged Susanne not to rely on food to numb her worries, but the Lord as her only hope in these troubled times. And I told her what she already had discovered: there will always be troubles. Life is never easy, and if we put off making needed changes until that perfect time, things will just go from bad to worse.

Susanne and I had a long talk about baby steps she could take to start on her journey toward healthy living. We mapped out a simple strategy that would help her to stay on track with her eating, exercising and quiet time goals.

Here’s what Suzanne said she would do:

1. I will have a quiet time every morning for just a few minutes to write a prayer about my eating, asking God for the willingness to make healthier choices and the ability to cast my cares on Him—not the refrigerator.
2. I will listen to my Bible CD in the car on the way to work.
3. I will write down on a little tablet what I eat during the day.

She was able to do these things for two weeks, so she decided to add two more goals:

1. I will limit trigger foods that make my cravings worse. (For Suzanne these were things with sugar.)
2. After eating a sandwich and fruit during my lunch break, I will walk up and down the stairs in my office building.

A few weeks later, after success with those goals, she added another one.

1. Every time I eat, I will make the healthiest choice possible.

Finally a week or two later, she heard about a Christian weight-loss group and decided to join them. She made going to that group a final goal that helped her to learn how to rely on God’s power to eat right and make other healthy lifestyle changes… instead of her shaky willpower.

During our last counseling session, a thinner Suzanne told me that she felt so much better, and even though her challenges hadn’t changed, her ability to cope with them had. She said, “All of the things I’ve been able to do wouldn’t have been possible without my quiet time every morning. Those 10-15 minutes have made all the difference! And it’s also such a big help to have my Christian weight-loss group to encourage me!”

Then she added something that so many people need to understand: “I’m really glad I didn’t wait until things were easier to try to lose weight. I thought that overeating was making my life easier, but it was really making it harder. Carrying around all of those extra pounds and experiencing those sugar highs and lows made me too exhausted to deal with my problems. And thinking about food all the time distracted me from the Lord and the helping hand He was holding out to me.”

Experience

By Donna McCrary –

“One. Two. Three.”

“Shhhh! Don’t talk to me!”

“One. Two. Three.”

“Ouch!”

“One. Two. Three.”

These words dominated the conversation on my last date with my husband. Not our typical conversation to say the least. The awkward tension radiating through our limbs was not typical of our dates either. On this particular date night, we agreed to go ball room dancing with some friends.

This is so not like us! To bluntly clarify the drastic difference in our dance abilities, our friends  share talent, training, and time. We share four left feet, no rhythm, and trained only in ‘college day’ party moves.

In between songs, our friends would graciously stop and teach us the basic dance steps called out by the DJ. By the end of the night we could add the Waltz and Swing to our “party moves”. Well, that may be an overstatement. We could complete the steps as long as we continually counted them out and limited all other movement in our bodies to allow our brain to be fully focused on our left feet.

Throughout the night, I watched our friends effortlessly float across the dance floor. They would talk, laugh, and joke with each other as they transitioned from the Swing to the Cha-Cha to the Foxtrot like pros. My husband jokingly said, “We could do that if we shared twenty plus years of experience.” They didn’t have to count their steps. They didn’t have to slow down or check their dance posture. They didn’t have to follow the “rules.” They just danced!

Our friends at one point in time were the awkward couple on the dance floor. They both had a moment, however brief, when they had to count their steps, twirl awkwardly, and follow the “rules”. Their dancing abilities stemmed from commitment, time, practice, and even a few falls once in a while.

Experience, commitment, time, practice, and even a few falls once in a while is the distinctive difference in those who effortlessly spin, twirl, laugh, and immensely enjoy their relationship with Jesus. Most of us start out awkward, rigid, and counting steps when we first declare Jesus as our Lord and Savior. However, if we make the commitment, take the time, practice, and get back up when we fall, our relationship will start to flow effortlessly with experience.

Are you dancing or counting steps in your relationship? Does your experience set you apart?

PRAYER: Father, give me a burning desire to spend time with You. Help me learn how to dance daily in Your presence.

BIBLE VERSE:  “Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil” (Hebrews 5:13-14 NIV).

Remember September 11th – About the Muslims – Part 2

By Dianne E. Butts –

Continuing from last month, as we mark the tenth anniversary of the attack on America on September 11, 2001, here are two more Questions and Answers excerpted from Dear America: A Letter of Comfort and Hope to a Grieving Nation (still available on Amazon.com):

Q: Muslims say they worship the same God as Christians and Jews. Does the Allah of Islam differ from the God of the Old and New Testaments of the Bible? 

A: Yes. Here are three big differences:

1. Muslims believe Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses and Jesus were prophets, but Mohammed was the final and greatest prophet. Islam lowers Jesus to just another prophet and just another man equal with Abraham, Moses, and the others. But Jesus was not just a prophet—Jesus was and is the Son of God!

2. Muslims believe each person is attended by two angels, one to record their sins and one to record their good deeds. The good deeds are weighed against the bad to determine a person’s eternity. But the Bible clearly teaches that even one sin brings about the consequence of death. No amount of good deeds can “undo” our sin. The only way to eternal life after sin is to accept the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on our behalf. The Bible says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

3. In the days following the Attack on America, I heard a Muslim gentleman call in to a radio talk show and explain that his religion is “The Third Great Religion.” He said the Jewish faith was the first great religion, Christianity was the second, and Islam is the third, implying that religion “evolves” and older religions become outdated and are replaced. Muslims believe their Koran is the holiest book and supersedes all previous revelations of God (meaning the Koran supersedes the Bible).

However, when Jesus hung dying on the cross…, his final words were “It is finished” (John 19:30). There is nothing left to be done or said or written.

Judaism sets the stage for Christianity. Christianity fulfills Judaism. There is no “Third Great Religion.” There isn’t even a “Second Great Religions.” There is only one true religion, and that is Judaism fulfilled in Christianity.

End of story. It is finished.

Q: Was the Attack on America part of the “End Times” Christians talk about? And why do Christians get so excited about those dreaded “End Times”? 

A: I don’t know if September 11 was specifically a part of the “End Times.” But in a sense, everything that occurs is leading us to and moving us toward that time.

The “End Times” refer to the final seven years of human history described in the Bible in books such as Daniel and Revelation. This will be the most dreadful time, “For then there will be great distress, unequaled form the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again” (Matthew 24:21). But Christians, as crazy as it sounds, get excited about the End Times for several reasons:

–  The End Times culminate with the return of Jesus Christ.

–  The End Times is the final battle between God and evil, and God wins!

–  Following the End Times, God “will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Revelation 21:4). That’s a lot to look forward to! But the only people who will enjoy this eternal peace in heaven with God are those who choose to trust him, love him, and follow him here in this life. Are you among us?

On a Bright Sunny Day

By Elaine James –

On a bright, sunny day, I was enjoying a bike ride. Like always, I rode from my home to a familiar path and would safely go a couple miles and then head back. But on this day, I took a different trail and entered an unfamiliar path. I came to a steep incline with bushes on each side that made the path extremely narrow.

The only words I could think of were, “Don’t think about it. Just go.” As soon as I focused on the trail, my bike got wobbly and I began to fall. I had to force myself to look down at the trail and say over and over “don’t think about it, just go.”

I was tickled by this reminder from God to not over think things. It was fun to go down that path, hearing from God and trusting Him. I had quite a sense of accomplishment at the end of the trail.

My mind drifted to similar stories in the Bible.

Rahab, the prostitute, was raised hearing of the miraculous stories of the God of the Israelites. Surely, despite all her mistakes, she wanted the Lord to be her God, the God in heaven above and on the earth below, so they promised that they would come back and save her and her family. So, she agreed to hide the spies for Joshua, and she took an oath. “Our lives for your lives!” the men assured her. But, what if she would have thought too much, as she waited for the men to come back to save her and her family? Her guilt and shame could have held her thoughts captive and caused her to flee. Instead she chose to not think about that and focus on anticipating making their God her God. As we now know Jesus came from her bloodline.

What if Peter continued to think too much about identifying with Jesus? Two books of the bible filled with his lessons would have had to be deleted. What if Mary of Bethany would have thought too much about anointing Jesus with expensive oil? She taught us the importance of spending time with Jesus.

So many stories of faith and trust depended on the men and women of the Bible to not think too much. How many times did I miss out on experiencing God because of my thinking too much? How many times have you missed out on God by thinking too much?

AUTHOR QUOTE:  Stop thinking too much! It could hinder the work of God.

BIBLE VERSE: “But Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to Jericho-and she lives among the Israelites to this day” (Joshua 6:25 NIV).

With Two You Get Eggrolls

By Kathi Macias –

I can’t remember if the “eggrolls” title above was a book or a movie, but my dad was famous for saying it every time he took us out for Chinese food (which wasn’t often, as people ate out a lot less often in those days—took too long to harness the horses to the buggy, you know).

Seriously, with Mom and Dad in the front seat and us three kids in the back, we’d have the “eggrolls” discussion long before we arrived at Hissing Dragons. “Let me do the ordering,” Dad would say (as if that were a novel suggestion). “I know how to get the most food for the least money, including free eggrolls. So just keep your mouths shut until the food arrives.”

Since all I really cared about were the fortune cookies, that wasn’t much of a problem. But fifty-plus years later, I realize how much of my dad’s training has stuck with me. My husband absolutely adores Chinese food, so we go out to eat it fairly regularly. The minute we sit down and open the menus, I start looking for specials—two-for-one, buy-this-and-get-that-free, etc. I can’t tell you the times I’ve ordered something I don’t even like just because something else I don’t dislike quite as much comes with it.

Old habits die hard, as they say, and my 90-year-old mom is the proof of that. In the facility where she now lives, she shares her meals with two table-mates, Rita and Laura. The three of them compare notes about health, families, activities (or lack thereof)…and food. That, of course, is a big one. My mom actually called me the other day to complain that they served liver and onions for dinner, something she refuses to eat.

“So are you still hungry, Mom?” I asked in response. “You know, I left some sandwich items in the refrigerator in your room. You can ask your caregiver to help you make a sandwich.”

“Oh, no, I’m not hungry,” she assured me. “I seldom eat what they serve for dinner anyway because I’m still full from lunch.” (That’s not surprising because they finish lunch at 12:30 and go back down to the dining room for dinner at 4—just long enough in between for an afternoon nap.) “It’s just the principle of the thing,” she explained. “I hate liver and onions, and I thought you should know that’s what they gave us for dinner.”

Sigh. I’m never sure how to handle that sort of situation, so I usually just change the subject. But as much as she despises liver and onions, there is one meal at the facility that ranks at the top of her favorites list: eggrolls. At last twice a month they serve eggrolls (along with a few other items) for either lunch or dinner, and Mom always calls me to rave about them. But the last time she had them, she also had a revelation that really rocked her world.

“They give eggrolls to everyone,” she said, amazement evident in her voice.

“And why wouldn’t they?” I asked.

“Well, I just assumed I got them because I share a table with Rita and Laura, but today I noticed there were a couple of people sitting at tables by themselves, and they got eggrolls too!”

It was nearly too much for her to comprehend, though she quickly added that it wouldn’t be fair if they didn’t get them. After all, it was sad enough that they sat by themselves at mealtime; there was no reason to punish them further by depriving them of eggrolls.

I’ve learned a lot watching my mom age, and not just about eggrolls and who’s entitled to them. I understand a little better now that the Scriptures tell us that the death, or passing, of God’s people is precious in His sight. And it isn’t limited to that one moment in time when a believer takes that last breath and departs for heaven. It is the sometimes lengthy process, that cutting of earthly ties so we can finally soar into God’s presence. Barring some unexpected event, Mom will probably get there ahead of me, but I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if, when I arrive soon after her, I find she’s already sitting at the banquet table, sharing eggrolls with my dad. Something tells me they won’t mind if I join them.

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