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Past Thought for the week messages Think before you open your mouth!
Past Thought for the week messages Think before you open your mouth! | Think before you open your mouth! |
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FIrst of all an apology to regular readers: It's Summer - holiday, visitors, gardening etc. So I'm late again! Please forgive. Fit For Life Forever is all about learning to walk in the Spirit so that we do not fulfil the lust of the flesh, which in this case means excessive or inappropriate eating. ‘Walking in the Spirit’ although a Biblical term, can easily become a religious cliché – a phrase which rolls off the tongue and sounds….well…..spiritual! ‘Ah yes,’ we confer, nodding wisely in agreement, but when asked what it means practically, we aren’t too sure. The Devil just loves us to take things to extremes. If he can’t get us to ignore God’s Word; if he can’t get us to live our lives independently of the Holy Spirit’s guidance, then he will try to make us so fastidious, so nit-picking, that we are almost scared to breathe in case we are out of line or doing things in our own strength. I once met a religious group who took as one of their main guiding Scriptures: ‘whether you eat, drink, or whatever you do, do all in the Name of the Lord.’ All very well and good, but it got so that if they took a box of eggs down from the supermarket shelf, they muttered inwardly, ‘I take these eggs now in the Name of the Lord!’ When they made their beds in the morning they did so, ‘in the Name of the Lord.’ In my teaching I speak of the importance of listening to the Lord when it comes to our eating - asking Him to show us when we are truly hungry or when we have eaten sufficiently; involving God in our food choices, especially when we are out shopping. But this doesn’t mean that we have to be obsessive in our seeking, or feel guilty when we eat without constant referral to our conscience. We read in Proverbs that ‘we shall hear a voice behind us, when we turn to the right or to the left.’ Now this isn’t saying that at every turn we are to listen for a voice saying, ‘right here,’ or ‘turn left’ – the voice is there to nudge us when we are about to make a wrong turn! Providing that we have turned our day over to the Lord and know that we have placed our eating behaviour under His Lordship, then we can proceed naturally and peacefully, happy in the knowledge that we shall not go far wrong before the reins start to feel a little tight! There are times when my spiritual hearing is fine-tuned and I am very sensitive to when I am out of sync, but there are other times when I don’t hear so well – usually because I don’t want to! That’s when I am in danger, and it isn’t usually until I step off the kerb (so to speak) and nearly get run over, that I discover how pre-occupied I have been. Food-wise, it means that sometimes I have eaten two slices of toast when one would have been enough, or I have eaten too much because I didn’t want to throw something away. I discover, after the event, that I missed it, because my waistband feels too tight or I have a heavy feeling in my stomach. ‘I wasn’t listening, was I?’ I confess. ‘Please help me to be more sensitive next time.’ It’s no big deal – there’s no condemnation, no guilt, just a gentle tap on the hand and a loving reassurance of, ‘Hey, I’m on your side, remember. I’ll help you at every mealtime. Just think before you open your mouth!’ And so we learn to become naturally spiritual and spiritually natural. Last night I had one piece of Toblerone whereas I usually have two. This morning I got two slices of home-baked bread out of the freezer for breakfast, and then put one back! At lunchtime I chose salad and meat on a plate over a meat and salad sandwich. I’m listening again, and feel great!
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