Whole 30: Day 16
As an advocate for Holistic Health, it’s only fitting for me to talk about the most important element – spirituality. Now, I’m going to approach this from a Christian point of view, as I believe and know Jesus to be the Way, the Truth and the Life. I’m not going to give a theological/apologetic argument, or explain the law of morality, or compare various religions. I’m simply going to state my experience as a Christian and how Jesus lead me to true wellness, wholeness, and an abundant life.
When I was 8 years old, I started to believe in Jesus and asked Him to be my Lord and my Savior. My aunt was the one who told me about Jesus’s love for me, and later told me how hungry I was to know Him. From a very early age I recognized that I was created for more, that the one who created also loved me so much that he came and gave his life to bridge the gap unintentional and intentional sin had created between me and God. From this period until the first couple years of college, I learned a lot about Jesus through the Christian school I attended and the church I went to. I knew God loved me, yet I couldn’t quite grasp the depth of His love or who His love purposed me to be. However, there is one thing I did know to be true, that He was present during the one of the darkest periods in my life – the season where I struggled with not eating much and then the season I struggled with emotional eating – eating too much. These periods were dark and extreme. At one point in my life, I dealt with excessive exercise and little eating to cope with various situations going on around me, and to somehow like my appearance more.
Then, everything switched and I dealt with the stress through the soothing effect processed foods had on me and in the end, gained back all the weight I had loss through healthy and unhealthy methods. This back and forth instilled a deep sense of shame in me, shame I didn’t know I really had. During this time, I prayed to God for help, help to control how I ate and not go to food for comfort. He did help me, but there was something deeper going on. I later realized that I was going to food and a perfect appearance for comfort instead of the One who created me and gave His life for me.
It wasn’t until I went to an InterVarsity Christian Fellowship conference in 2009 that I recognized the great, unfailing and unchanging love Jesus had for me. It was at that conference I confessed my struggle with food to my staff worker and from that point on, God began to heal my broken relationship with food, restore my identity in him, and remove the deep sense of shame I felt. Every year since that conference, I sit and reflect on how God has brought me through, such as:
- I remember how I did a veggie/fruit/nut fast for some friends and felt no desire to overeat after.
- I remember how I felt God telling me to give up diet coke because I was using that as a “free calorie” source to consume and deal with situations.
- I remember how God led me to First Place 4 Health, a Christian health program focused on holistic health. I remember how through that program and the support of the First Place Group, I lost 27lbs, started running, and felt freedom unlike ever before.
- I remember how I was introduced to Crossfit and Paleo over a year ago by some friends, and have done things physically I never knew my body could do through Crossfit.
- I remember how through Paleo, Whole 30, and just honestly eating real, whole foods, I became unafraid of eating and started to see food as fuel, not as a friend or enemy.
- I remember loved ones encouraging this year in my dream of becoming a health coach to see others made well by real food, holistic health, and the healing Jesus has to offer.
- I remember July 1st, 2015 when I signed up with the Institute of Integrative Nutrition to become a health coach.
I remember, I remember, and I see. I see God’s hand on my life. I see how God saved me from a destructive way of living, eating, and thinking and set my feet on solid rock. I see his redemption in my life, his past and continuous act of redemption. I see how much he loves me through healing my health, but also through his provision in finances, his answers to my prayers, him providing me a husband who loves Him more than me, and him placing amazing people in my life that constantly point me back to Jesus. I see and pledge my love and life to Him, because He has proven that He’s worthy of it all.
I have experienced that I can try to be healthy physically, emotionally, and mentally all I want, but I will never be my healthiest without pursuing health spiritually. God is the source of my life, the source of my decisions and the source of my purpose. I love because He loved me first and I do health coaching because he coached me first. He is the ultimate health coach, He is the ultimate nutritionist, He is the ultimate doctor. He is our Jehovah Rapha (Hebrew for Healer, Restorer).
God sent His Son Jesus to walk this earth and show us what love in action is. Whether through healing the sickest, spending time with the outcast, teaching on God’s Word, and ultimately, giving His life so we can be saved and live a full, joyful, and abundant life – Jesus is love. Jesus is the Way to God. Jesus is the way to a whole, full, abundant, and well life.
He has healed me and is healing me day by day in so many areas. And if you are interested, I promise He can and will do the same for you. In the Book of John 5 in the Bible, Jesus offers this hope to a man paralyzed for many years. He offers Him healing he never had before. And, he offers you the same. I pray you will explore Jesus for yourself and see if He is true to His words, love, and actions.
John 5:5-9
5 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals.2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda[a] and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.[4] [b] 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
7 “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”
8 Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked.
