Big G versus little g and idolatry?!!

Big G versus little g and idolatry?!

I could sit here and write a blog in a singy-songy, cookie cutter type format, but I decline to do that. I’m going to share something with you that’s nothing short then a blessing, revelation and a sad truth. However, I feel that by sharing this I will be blessing someone with understanding that I was quite ignorant to if it weren’t for the wonderful gift of the Holy Spirit.
The fact of the matter is that I always knew I had issues with compulsive over eating and emotional eating. I never really paid it any mind. I just thought that was issue to deal with. There was a time that I was very embarrassed about it and ashamed. I never talked about it or shared it with anyone. I merely just sat and binged in my own personal hell, me and all the sweets that I could stuff in my mouth. I would eat to the point of being sick to my stomach or over dosing on sugar. That was my drug of choice! Sugar, candy, brownies, cake, cookies, anything sweet-I devoured it and went crazy. I would wake up in the middle of the night and stuff my face and then lay down in pure disgust! It was my dirty little secret. I’d stuff candy bars down my mouth in the car, because I was scared or embarrassed that someone would catch me or say, you’re going to get fat if you eat that! It was my secret and my secret alone. This has been my issue since I was a child!
However, in the past few weeks it hit me really hard again. I was like an addict. I would go on bouts w/ no sugar and be fine and then out of no where, I’d fall so far off the wagon that I just hated myself and what I did. I had been doing extremely well these past few weeks and was so proud of myself, well it happened again.
I fell off the wagon and when I fell this time, I hit the ground extremely hard. Enough was enough. I have been in a bad mood and I do believe this was the root of most of it!
This past week, I found a book on christanbook.com, Love to eat, hate to eat. I purchased it and started reading it Saturday evening!
This book was a blessing and brought many, many things to light! I know that the Holy Spirit led me to purchase it.
So, what’s the big revelation you ask?! Let me tell you, be forewarned-if you’re anything like me, it’s not nice but it’s the truth. The truth hurts sometimes.
I realize that I am glutton! Yeah, Ms. I have to run to the gym, 6 days a week, eat perfect 7 days, and keep a nice figure is a glutton! I suffer from gluttony! Now, do you realize what gluttony is? A glutton is the equivalent to an alcoholic! I eat in excess, I eat and eat and eat just because, like an alcoholic drinks! It was an addiction (I say was, because I’m NOT claiming it anymore).
This book showed me not only that I suffered from gluttony, but I was also breaking so many of the Lord’s sacred commandants! I was suffering from idolatry! Yeah! Imagine that! How so? Thou shall have NO other god’s before me! For the most part, I never thought I was putting anything or anyone before the Lord! If someone had told me this, I would have verbally blasted them while standing on Mount Greater then thou! However, when the Holy Spirit lays conviction upon your heart it’s a feeling that you can NOT deny let alone run from! Run if you want, but it will surely find you and keep convicting you!
I was practicing idolatry with food and the gym. See, instead of the Lord being the beginning and ending of my day, food was! Food controlled me and everything in my life! If I ate well, I had a good day! If I ate well, I felt like I was reaching my goals! If I ate badly, I felt bad and beat myself up! I was worshiping food, not the creator of the food! Food was the god in my life (that’s little g number 1). The gym is little g number 2.
Everything in my life came 2nd to going to the gym. NO one or anything cut into that gym time! Now, that is good but bad, good if it’s just a mere mortal but bad when you put the gym before the Lord! If it wasn’t for the Lord, I wouldn’t have money to pay for the gym! If it weren’t from him, I wouldn’t have the passion, desire, or love for the gym! He is pleased by that, because he has placed that desire and passion in my heart, however what he is disappointed in is that I put the gym before him! That is what he dislikes! The gym was my god! I never, ever, ever, realized that! I thought by whole heartedly praying and praising him I was placing him first! False: faith w/out works is dead. I had faith but my works (which should’ve been going to church on Sunday morning) were non existent!
The Lord truly opened my eyes to my own religion that I had started and didn’t have sense on how to realize it! Let me tell you something, there is nothing wrong with eating clean, working out, reading books and magazines about the gym! There is nothing wrong with wanting to be healthy and look good and feel good about you! You have to love yourself! It’s a commandment, Love your neighbor as yourself! So, if you don’t truly love you, you can’t love someone else! However, when the battle of the bulge rules you and everything in your life-there is a problem! I realized that! I had to honestly sit back and think and ponder that idea. My whole life, weight has been my issue!
I’m to fat, I’m not pretty, and guys don’t like fat girls! Uh-oh, my weight went up 2lbs! I can’t eat that, I’ll be fat! If I eat this, I can’t eat for the rest of the day! I have to go to the gym everyday, if I don’t surely the world will look and say I’m a slob! Yeah, everything in my life has been about me and my waist or lack there of! No matter how small I have got I was NEVER satisfied. See, I read that our little gods are never satisfied, they have an insatiable hunger and desire to rule our lives and that’s what happened to me!
After reading this book, I realize that food was more then a stronghold in my life, it was my life! I realize now that food and my weight were both strongholds over me! I realize now that this is displeasing to the Lord!
We are to glorify him in all things and that means the way that we eat as well! Being a glutton, bulimic, or anorexic is not glorifying him! Do you realize that we are killing ourselves! Thou shall not murder! We are killing ourselves and our bodies, his temple, by these crazy shanagans with our eating! Our compulsion to be a certain size, shape, or way-it’s displeasing to him! You have to love yourself where you are right now today and try to get better, but start from the inside and work your way out! Stop the insanity! I’m saying this and I am about the most insane about this! Stop, look, and listen, not to me, but to the Lord!
I realize now that I don’t have to live like this! Sin is NOT the master over me and I realize that my eating habits will change w/ his guidance, strength and wisdom. I know that this is my cross to carry forever! I will never be ‘cured’ per se, but I know that I am delivered and I am claiming that and walking w/ that attitude!
My outlook on food has changed in about 2 days from reading this book and the Holy Spirit and this is something I have tried to change alone for over 18 years. Now, you see the difference in trying to change alone versus a revelation and conviction from the Holy Spirit? What took me 18 years to change, the Lord has changed it in about 2 days! I know that everyday will not be perfect and I will fall, but I refuse to live a life in bondage to food, the gym, the scale, my weight-anything of that nature! Sin is not the master over me (2 Timothy). I say that to myself over and over and over!
The book I read gives, steps and a plan to control your eating and eat in a fashion that is pleasing to him! It’s wonderful and I am still learning the principals and I plan to learn, memorize, and exemplify them in the utmost! I realize now that eating a brownie is NOT a sin (sin to man, but not to God), the sin lies in the lust for that brownie, the sin is the bondage that, that brownie has over me, the sin is that, that one brownie will cause me to go completely buck wild and binge till I become sick! THOSE ARE THE SINS! We as Christan people are to have self-control, self-discipline! Where is the self control in compulsive eating? When is God’s glory in eating out of emotion?
Yes, I suffer from emotional eating as well. So, tell me, how is God glorified or magnified if I’m running to ben and jerry over him and his word? Where is his glory in that? Where is the glory if I run to a bar of candy, box of cookies, brownies? God gets nothing, but my little g gets everything! How sad!
I realize this now, I don’t think he held me accountable for my own personal self made religion or idols before, because I truly, truly had no clue what I was doing. However, from this point on out, I will be held accountable if I continue down this path and if I do NOT share the knowledge that I have! I am passing it on! I don’t want anyone to go through what I did or feel stuck! He can help you, I promise! He can help if you open your heart to him and ask him to step in and intercede, because that is what I had to do. I had to get so tired of being tired of the bringing cycle that I had to fall on my knees in tears and literally cry out, HELP ME! HELP BE GET CONTROL, I CAN NOT STOP DOING THIS! Imagine, falling to your knees in tears crying and begging for God to help you w/ eating?! I did it and I did it for a few days and I told him, Lord, I’m not going to stop hounding you till you pull me out, open my eyes, deliver me, something, but if I have to wrestle w/ you till sun up-I’ll do it! I’m not going to leave you alone! Help me! You say, you’ll never leave me or forsake me! Show up! Show me a way out of this black abyss, because God I can’t see it and I can not live like this!
Yes friends, he showed up and made himself known and yes, he gave me the revelation and tools I needed to open my eyes and deliver me! It took a few days, but man, I feel like a million bucks again. I feel good, I feel free.
I saw a tub of gummi bears on my buddies desk, I thought about it and I thought about God and I said, sin is NOT the master over me! I realize a handful of that stuff, would’ve caused a binge. I passed and I feel good. I feel okay.
So, on that note, be blessed and keep your priorities straight. If you would like info on the book, please let me know and I would be more then happy to share it w/ you!