The "Hunger" Games

It’s that time of year again! The time we’ve all been waiting for…

Bikini season!!!

Wait what?

You haven’t been looking forward to this?

You mean you haven’t been counting down the days until you get to show off the hot bod you’ve been working on all semester?

You’re saying you didn’t spend all winter trying on your swimsuit just for fun? Just to look in the mirror and say, “Wow- I look GOOD”??

Yeah, me neither.

The truth is, we as Christian girls have a love-hate relationship with our bodies. We love our bodies because we know that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. We find rest in the fact that our Creator did not mean to make us any differently. He didn’t make a mistake and then decide to settle with a less-than-perfect finished product. He didn’t mean to make me taller, thinner, or more athletic. He made us lovingly, carefully, and without mistake. In fact, when God finished making us He said, “Yes! This is EXACTLY what I was going for.” This, in some deep part of our minds, we know.

Yet, as fallen daughters of Eve, we hate our bodies. We hate the texture of our hair all the way down to the size of our feet. We look in the mirror every day and find something that can be changed, minimized, or improved. Each of us has insecurities that consume our thoughts. We believe that if this “problem” is fixed, we’ll be happier. If we looked differently, then surely we would be satisfied with our appearance. But this, my friends, is a mode of deception straight from the Father of Lies himself. Satan would have us question these two things when thinking about our bodies:

1)   God is not really good. If He were good, He would not have made you this way. He would have given you clearer skin, a faster metabolism, and a natural desire to exercise. He wouldn’t have made it this hard. He would have made it easier for you to like how you look. He made other girls taller, skinnier, and prettier than you. If he really loved you, why would he hold these things back from you? And,

2)    Your identity rests in the image you see in the mirror. Your worth lies in what others think of you. Since God is, in fact, holding out on you, your only option is improve yourself. Want to look like her? Try harder. Then more people will like you. You’ll find success and satisfaction, and, finally, you’ll be happy with who you are.

Ladies, without even realizing it, these are the lies we let ourselves believe day after day! Things haven’t changed much since the Garden of Eden. Satan is tempting us with the same deceit with which he tempted Eve- Is God really good? Don’t you want what He’s keeping from you? He makes us doubt, strive, and stumble, and it’s not until we’ve hit rock bottom that we see his deception for what it is. It’s a vicious, seemingly inescapable cycle, and the Enemy has mastered how to both trap and keep us there. (See 2 Corinthians 11:3)

But God (what a hope-filled interjection!), like always, has something different to say. In fact, God has a lot to say about what we think about our bodies, and even what we put into them. For so long, I saw the attempt to lose weight and look good as merely a worldly, physical struggle. I saw it as selfish, and, therefore, had no intention of taking it to the Lord. I figured that He only cared about the “big” stuff. My desire to like my appearance had nothing to do with my spiritual life. This burden, I told myself, I can handle on my own.

Until I couldn’t. My relationship with food and my body has been- like every girl’s- a broken one. I’ve over-eaten for comfort, when I’m feeling stressed, worried, or upset. I’ve eaten too much because I’m bored, or just because I didn’t have enough discipline to stop. I’ve also gone days eating barely anything- taking a few bites at meals just so people wouldn’t ask me about it. I’ve had weeks where I would work out three times a day and hope that my friends would either not notice or ignore it. In both extremes, I was consumed with thoughts of food, and it became my idol- whether I was over-eating for comfort or under-eating for control. Satan convinced me in both cases that turning my battle with food over to Jesus just wouldn’t work. I could survive these “hunger games” alone. He told me that God didn’t care about such a trivial matter. He said that it’s my job to clean myself up, to mend my relationship with food and my body, and then present myself to the Lord. Jesus isn’t concerned with petty insecurities.

But like I said, God has something else to say about this. Because we know that if the Enemy cares about how we relate to food and our bodies, then our Father cares about it infinitely more. In response to Satan’s lies, the Lord said to me,

1)    My goodness is infinite. Furthermore, there is no good apart from Me, for I am the giver of all good things. I do not withhold this goodness from My children; it is theirs to have. From this goodness I crafted your form purposefully and flawlessly; I weaved you together with my own unwavering hands. I made you unique; each part of you is special to me. Because of this, I love you- every inch of you- as you are right now. (Psalm 100:5, Psalm 16:1, James 1:17, Psalm 139, Isaiah 43:4)

2)    Your identity rests in Me. Your worth lies in how I perceive you. You have been covered in the righteousness of Christ, and therefore are unconditionally accepted by the One who created you. My approval of you is all that matters, and it will never diminish. I will not love you better when you become better. In fact, there is nothing you can do to make Me love you any more or any less. You will never find satisfaction until you rest in this truth. (2 Corinthians 5:17, Ephesians 4:20-24, Romans 8:35, 1 John 4:16, Psalm 46:10)

Is that a breath of fresh air, or what? When we exchange the darkness of Satan’s lies for the light of Jesus’ truth, we find relief beyond what we can comprehend. Praise the Lord!

But wait, you say you already know these things? You’re telling me you’re not cured from your problems with body image now? You’re still insecure? You still struggle with comparison and the temptation to use food for comfort or control? Well guess what?

Me too.

But I’m reading this great book by Lysa TerKeurst, that everyone should read, called Made to Crave.

           

 

The premise of the book is “Satisfying your deepest desire with God, not food.” When I picked it up, I honestly thought I could just use it as a tool to help other people. (How prideful, right?) I don’t have an eating problem, I thought. Until I realized that I do, actually.

I realized that this is a journey that I didn’t want to invite Jesus onto, because I thought He’d tell me that I just need to be content with my body and not concern myself with what I eat. But the truth is that Jesus does care about this! He wants me to be healthy, to eat well and to exercise more. He desires that I have a balanced relationship with food. He doesn’t want it to become my idol by eating it too much or not eating it enough, but He understands that it’s a central part of my life, and He does care about it.

Yes, He wants me to be content in who I am in Him, but He also wants me to be disciplined in how I take care of myself. When we channel the desire for self-improvement into the desire to glorify Christ, we see that this isn’t merely a selfish, worldly, or physical struggle. As our motives are increasingly centered on Him, we realize that this is a deep, spiritual battle that Satan can use to hinder us from making an impact for God’s Kingdom. The fact of the matter is, we can’t survive these “hunger games” alone! We need our Ever-Present Help, our Almighty Burden Bearer, our Refuge and our Sustenance, to fight this battle for us. Because He cares about our bodies. He cares about food. He cares about how we relate to these things. And we can’t overcome this struggle without Him! So, bikini season? Psh…  We’ve got better things to think about.

“Cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you. Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers and sisters throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings. And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will Himself restore you and make you strong, firm, and steadfast.”

                                                                                                            1 Peter 5:6-10

#YOLO

YOLO… You Only Live Once. I love that. Because it’s true- we get no second chances after our time here is up. We’re born, we live, we die. As much as we’d like to avoid thinking about the inevitable, there will be a day when each of us ceases to exist on this earth. It’s the one thing we can’t manipulate, disprove, or put off.

That much our culture gets. This life will pass us by more quickly than any of us would like to admit. But something in that truth has gotten lost in translation. The thing we haven’t yet grasped is that only living once has far heavier implications than we seem to think.

The phrase usually precedes questions like…

What’s one more shot?

Do I really need to stay in to study when everyone else is going out?

Who cares if I just met him tonight?

So what if it costs half my life savings?

Isn’t college the time to have fun?

Can’t I save the “serious” stuff for later?

We use it as an excuse to avoid responsibility and run after temporary pleasures. We exchange maturity for recklessness and call it “spontaneity.” We push back our consciences and silence our inhibitions, and just go for it. I mean, why not? We can think about the consequences later, right?

We were all created with a desire for adventure- to escape our bounds, to do something radical, to make a difference. Yet when we satisfy these longings with lesser things- be it alcohol, drugs, hooking up, clothes, food, friends, success- we will unavoidably come up empty. It’s like we’re trying to cure starvation with a breadcrumb, and we’re surprised when it doesn’t work.  

This is exactly what Satan wants. He wants to convince us that giving our hearts to worldly things “is not that big of a deal.” He wants us to forget consequences and follow what we feel. He makes us believe that this will make us happy.

More people will like you if you drink.

You don’t need to worry about your responsibilities tonight- you deserve to have fun.

Sex will satisfy you.

It’ll make you feel better about yourself if you have more things. You’re only worth as much as you have.

Don’t worry about those people that say this is wrong. They’re judging you.

You can get around to the serious stuff later.

But the Lord has something different to say. Psalm 16:4 tells us that if we chase after these things we will have more problems than when we started; all the things we thought we would obtain aren’t actually given to us. We’re rudely awakened by a hangover, the feeling of rejection after a one night stand, our new purchase not getting us the attention we wanted, or the dissatisfaction of just “living in the moment.” Yet, instead of turning from these things, we run back for more, thinking, this time I’ll be satisfied. This time.

Can you imagine if that was it- if we were bound to this cycle of oppression, of fulfilling cravings with less-than-adequate sustenance? How disheartening would it be if this is was all this life offers us?

The great news is, it’s not. There is lasting satisfaction- a Source of contentment that never fails us, never runs out or comes up short. There’s a Hope that makes this one life we have worth living.

“Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water I will give him will never be thirsty again.” John 4:13-14

“Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.’” John 6:34

“I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” John 10:10

Did you get that? Jesus wants us to have a FULL life! We don’t have to be constrained by dissatisfaction anymore! Jesus’ love and grace is more than enough. It’s the only thing that’s permanent, trustworthy, and unchanging. Therefore, it’s the only thing worth chasing after. The old hymn still rings true, “On Christ the solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand…”

So… YOLO. It’s true. Listen to your heart’s desire to live dangerously and leave a legacy. Go outside your comfort zone and do something just because. But know that all of this is purposeless without the foundation of Christ, and every second spent running after something other than Him is tragically and irrevocably wasted. If we truly believe that this life on earth is passing us by, we’ll live like it. We’ll stop settling for less, and we’ll choose to satisfy the desires of our heart with the One it’s always been waiting for.  #praiseJesus 

Here We Go...

I'm Allie. 

I'm from Dallas, TX and attend Furman University in Greenville, SC.

Obviously, I'm starting a blog. 

Typically, blogs are about whoever's writing it, right? 

Right. 

As they should be.

It'd be weird if they weren't. 

But-- what if I told you I want something different out of this blog?

What if I told you this is more than my online journal? More than a tool to update you on my latest fashion find, Starbucks date, or pin on Pinterest?

Don't get me wrong- those are all wonderful things! 

Honestly, I just don't believe I'm interesting enough to write about. 

Really. 

Do you really want to hear about how my friend and I literally (figuratively) died today attempting to do p90x yoga?

Do you want me to attach an Instagrammed photo of us crying our way through the grueling two minutes of holding warrior one? 

I didn't think so. 

Which brings me to my thesis: 

This blog isn't about me. 

Wait... What?

Isn't that the point?

No- that isn't the point. 

Not of this blog, or of anything else for that matter. 

Because it's not.

About me, that is. 

Of course, I'll be writing it. So you'll inevitably get my views and perceptions, my life, and my interests. But I want to point to Someone whose opinons are way more worth your time than mine are. 

I simply want to explore the idea that one can, in fact, "deny himself, take up his cross, and follow" Christ by living every day life (Matthew 16:24).

In my opinion, you don't have to drop out of school, quit your job, and move to Africa in order to fully sell yourself out to Jesus.

The fact of the matter is, everything points back to its Creator. God created all things, so we have the ability to glorify Him through the entirety of His creation. But this requires making specific choices- big and small- to make sure that we are using what He's given us for His glory and not our own. 

I am not great at denying myself and taking up my cross daily, as you will see. But Jesus' grace is allowing me to try, and I want to share this journey with you. It's not that I believe my life or what I'm doing here is unique, and I praise the Lord for that. There are thousands of other "typical" Christian college girls who are trying to do the same thing I am- live for Jesus and love others through Him. 

Some of my posts may seem trivial to you, because I do, in fact, plan on chronicling Starbucks adventures and the incredible items found in Anthropologie's sale section. I may even Instagram some pics of my friends and I attempting p90x or whatever workout we found on Pinterest that day. If you're lucky. 

But my main goal is to point you toward the only One who's really worth talking about- the Mighty Warrior and Loving Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Please, let me know your opinions- I desperately want to hear them. Thanks for taking the time to read this. More posts to come!

"Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love." Ephesians 4:15-16