The Struggle

I would like to tell you where I have been spiritually and mindfully. For years I have struggled and gotten very weighed down about who I was in the physical. The mirror was my enemy. My moods, my personality, my outreach and yes even my gifting has been effected by my struggles of feeling inadequate and incapable of success in any area of life. I have listened too and fed into words spoken to me, about me and over me. Mostly words I have spoken about myself. I have always allowed this to dictate who I was and what I became. I had become very angry and disappointed in myself because of my weight and knowing I have health issue's that can be controlled or completely gone with eating right and exercise. Knowing that in doing so it would create weight loss. What most overweight people don't talk about is how obesity hurts: In my own personal experience sitting too long hurts, standing hurts, walking or running hurts, climbing stairs hurts. Abusing my body hurts. The hurt doesn't just affect me in the physical though, it also effects my heart as I feel as if I am doing dishonor to my Father by destroying His temple. A temple that was entrusted to me by the Creator. That was my mindset last week when I felt the Lord say enough was enough.

 

That's when I realized my spirit of gluttony and laziness were acts of sin which was hurting myself and my relationship with Christ. Not because He loved me less, because nothing I do will ever make Him love me less, but because I felt incapable of being anything God desired me to be as long as I was allowing sin to control my behavior and my habits. If the food was there I ate it, if no one would work out or walk with me then I would make that as an excuse to stay home and vegetate in front of the television. I have always allowed my choices to depend on the actions of others. There was this dark struggle of feeling trapped within myself. Then last week I felt as if the Lord was asking me: Do you love Me? Of course my answer would be Yes Lord I love you. Well if you love Me than you must love yourself because it is I that dwells within you.

 

It was at that moment that I realized I indeed disliked myself. Not because I'm clinically considered obese but because of how I allowed myself to get there. How I could tell others to lay their sin and shame before the King and yet I held on to mine as if I was clinging to life. So before extreme shame and condemnation set in I began to pray and ask the Lord to help me in this life long process. That being healthy becomes a joy and not a chore. The lord answered me by revealing this scripture to me.. 1 Kings 6:12 As for this temple you are building--if you walk in My statutes, observe My ordinances, and keep all My commands by walking in them, I will fulfill My promise to you.... I know that the Lord was talking to Solomon about the physical temple in Jerusalem but it goes the same for our physical temples... If we walk according to His word, live by faith and keep His commands then we have just achieved a relationship with the Father. It's impossible to spend so much quality time with something or someone without getting to know one another and building a relationship.

 

Once that relationship with Jesus has been transformed then your only desire is to be pleasing to Him. To genuinely love Him and loving Him means loving yourself because He resides in you. I am now on my 5th day of loving me and I must say that I feel much more alive now then I did a week ago. I look forward to waking up each day and going to work out. I enjoy the challenge of cooking healthier foods. I have more energy, my skin is refreshed and my spirit is joyful. I know there are going to be hard days and nights and change can be very scary and intimidating, but I am learning that beautiful diamonds are created under great pressure. With that said, we diamonds also sit under a much Greater God. So I encourage you to search yourselves and if there's any area in your life that you struggle with or something about yourself that prevents you from being all God has called you to be then please go to God and allow Him to release the struggle from within yourself. To remove those burdens from your shoulders so you too can feel free.  Let's look ahead with excitement instead of fear, knowing that it is God that orders our steps and not ourselves. Trust Him with your whole heart because He has created you for a purpose and that purpose is not fear, doubt, condemnation or shame like I have believed for myself. Imagine how amazing His kingdom would be if we all realized our purpose and potential and actually began to walk it out. Imagine how our lives would be if we stopped running from God and started running to Him. Run to an unchanging God with an unchanging love.

 

 

                              Karen Hurl

                                2/3/2016