(No catchy title, for this) - My Current Struggle

There are things I'm working through right now that I'm not sure most folks will understand but there are some whose hearts will ache as they read. A certain part of my life, I have constantly refused to allow God to take and change. There is a secret (but physically evident) sin that I not only struggle with, but have until now, not even recognized as a sin. I'm grinding through the process of repentance but it is minute by minute, hour by hour surrendering of will. Many will have to fight back the urge to laugh because the Church has either totally ignored this particular wrong or has made it into some sort of sick punchline. But there is nothing humorous about it. I've come to the place of realization that gluttony is the most prevalent and most deadly sin in my life and I am ashamed.

I cannot remember a time in my life when I wasn't fat. (If you are uncomfortable with that word, you are not alone but I won't shy away from it.) My weight has always been a source of shame for me. Playing sports, I would cringe when "shirts versus skins" time came. Even worse, the girls just wanted to be friends. By the time I went to college, I had developed mechanisms to deal with the shame. Humor is easy but it is degrading and while I would laugh with people outwardly, my soul would yearn for a better way to deal. Kids are relentless but your "friends" can be just plain mean. I learned from an early age to self-medicate my problems away with the soothing arms of food. This is where my sin started but shamefully, it has continued and become more than I can handle on my own. The common "wisdom" (ignorant skinny people) posits that people struggle with their weight because of self-esteem issues and that they only need to find a way to feel better about themselves in order to stop their destructive eating habits. I disagree. The issue is pride. When I am consistently turning to anything but the Creator God to heal my emotional state, I am not in need of a stinking pep rally - I am in need of repentance! (More about this in a later post)

Last October, my in-laws approached me with an offer for a birthday present. The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences has a clinical weight control program and they offered to pay for the program if I would get serious about my weight problem. I was initially hurt but I can see now that they were motivated by a love for me and a concern for my well-being. I accepted. I enrolled and started the program the Monday after Thanksgiving. On my first weigh in, I tipped the scales at 271 pounds. Friend, I had no idea that my problem had gotten that far out of control. For the first time in my life, I felt the impact of my "sin finding me out". I cried that day; for quite a while. 25 years of that soft idolatry had produced rotten fruit and I was at last confronted with the consequences; and I was ashamed. So, beaten and broken I started the program. I lost 12 pounds the first week and 8 pounds the second week. By May 1, I was sitting at a no-longer obese but still overweight 210 pounds. 60 pounds of excess had vanished by the time I ended the program and I was considered a near complete success. I was now armed with the knowledge that I could control my weight. I started eating real foods again and those old habits that I had suppressed came right back to the surface and I easily gained 15 pounds of it back by the end of May. Along with the regained weight came those same old negative feelings which in turn caused me to turn to the old reliable goddess of food for my comfort.

Hear this, please: God has used my failure to communicate some real brutal truth to me. You see, I can change the things I eat and the times I eat and the amount of exercise I suffer through but until I learn to honor my God with my body, all the changes I make are temporary quick fixes meant to band-aid a gaping wound. Until I begin to make food choices motivated by his glory, I will not be healed from my disease. I am struggling with what this means with every bite I take and it is very difficult. I am a glutton and I need repentance but God is revealing some powerful things to me.

In the next few days and weeks, I'll try to post some of my thoughts and some thoughts of others about this subject and some of the things I think I've learned and am still learning. If you can relate to this struggle, stay with me and let me know what you think.

In the next couple of entries, I'd like to try to define what gluttony is and how is affects the church and her individual parts and then also clear up some of the misconceptions I think people have about the word.