Thoughts From Day Two...

Left:  my grandson, Isaac, age 1. Remember 

when eating a chocolate cookie was

pure joy with no guilt??  Me neither.  

Here are some thoughts from the day 2 devotion in One Hundred Days to Freedom:  

…your salvation does not come from a diet, or exercise, or “getting your act together.” Your salvation is in the Lord alone.

Abiding in the Lord requires constant realignment to His perspective. 

God shows us that we are to discipline our bodies, not in an attempt to save ourselves, but in order to walk according to the dictates of His Spirit rather than of the flesh.

The world instructs us to eat right, exercise enough, and keep our weight within normal ranges. We treat these rules, based upon human wisdom and human teaching, with a fervor that grants those who religiously follow them a comfortable sense of protection from the dire consequences of disobedience to health rules. When we've adopted a righteously healthy lifestyle, we also sometimes feel that it's acceptable to judge others who do not follow healthy rules for living.  Let me emphasize that I do recommend good health habits; the warning here is that we not allow good health habits to take the place of following hard after the Lord through Scripture, praise, prayer, and Christian fellowship.  We are to seek these things first, ahead of everything else. 

Walking according to the Spirit rather than giving way to the demands of the flesh is a desirable, necessary spiritual discipline. But the enemy of our souls would turn us from seeking God's wisdom to prioritizing the world's teachings.  If the devil can't turn us to evil, he will try to distract us with the good that is not the best.  Mary sat at Jesus' feet and was told she had chosen the better portion. 

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Romans 8:3-4