Honorable Alien

11/22/2020

1 Corinthians 10:31 “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatever ye do, do all to the glory of God.”

“Beware of allowing yourself to think that the shallow concerns of life are not ordained of God; they are as much of God as the profound.”

                                                  ~Oswald Chambers

I write a Blooms post every evening between 5-7 pm, as I am doing tonight. Like many days, as I sit down to reflect on Chambers study and write the reflections that come, God reveals or reinforces what the Holy Spirit has been working on in my soul. Today is a doozy!

If you know me personally, it is clear that I struggle with my weight. This has not been a lifelong battle for me, but became one in my 30s. This morning, like many mornings, I was feeling that Holy Spirit tap of “get it together girl, I am here to help you through, I always am”. This certainly was true during my illness, which was a far bigger challenge, so of course it would be true in this area of my life. Back then, it took total submission and release to Jesus every minute of every day, and the healing came.

This time of Covid-19 and its life consequences has proven particularly difficult for me in this area.  The two areas Satan has always used to undo me are stress and boredom, which I am sure some of you can relate to. On the other hand, my husband – who has had a very difficult thing happen to him during this time – has had quite a different journey. After years and years of me bugging him to focus on his health, he has done so during this time. He wakes up at 5:30 every morning and walks for an hour, and he has adopted a lower carb lifestyle. He has taken to praying during his this time of exercise, so he is literally walking with Jesus. As a result, he has lost 40 pounds!!! To God be the glory. He looks great, feels great, and has his spring back in his step.

The fact is that no amount of my encouragement (nagging) ever worked; it actually had the opposite effect. He had been given a gift he has never had in all his years of hard work supporting our family: time. He concentrated first on his relationship with God, and devoted much more time to praying and being in God’s Word. Then he started focusing on his health and other areas of his life that had taken a backseat. He has always been a man of deep faith and integrity who is not afraid to share the truth of the Gospel, but now his life and how he treats his vessel definitely brings glory to God.

Now there is me, and all day long I have been feeling a deep rebuke in my soul. It started with our church service. Our pastor, Dan, is going through the Book of 1 Peter. (If you have not read it in a while I would encourage you to do so, as it is very timely.) His message was packed with wonderful teaching and wisdom, as always. The focus today came from Chapter 2: 11&12 (Yes, my amazing pastor can do a challenging and impactful sermon on only two verses!): “Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.” (NIV) These verses, like several in the Bible, speak of believers being in the world but not of the world. We are mere sojourners traveling this earth until we are finally home. Some translations call us aliens belonging to someplace else (which I quite like). Dan spoke of many challenges for us to implement in our daily lives, but the most powerful one for me was to live my life as an alien with honor and excellence for the glory of God. Bam, right between the eyes!

Then I read this verse tonight with Chambers words and, BAM again! Chambers is speaking today of God being in the shallow as well as the deep things in life. I think I often try to focus only on what I perceive as the “profound”, but Chambers advises to be careful of this, stating: “Beware of posing as a profound person; God became a baby.” Thwack! When God is trying to get my attention in any area of my life and I am not listening, He certainly finds a way to finally get it through my thick head.

So, does my current weight, and how I treat the temple God has given me, bring honor and glory to Him? Absolutely not! Now, I am not declaring that this is true for everyone, but because it is an area of my life the Holy Spirit is clearly bringing to light in my soul, it is true for me. I am not in alignment with what God is expecting of me in this matter, and I would imagine others’ matters as well. My relationship to food can certainly be a sinful desire that wages war against my soul. I have not yet truly submitted this area of sin and weakness to Jesus.  I have not trusted that He will give me the strength and power I need to fully yield it over to Him. I KNOW that when I do, He will carry me though. In this journey, however, I must also remember these wise words of Chambers: “Be careful of the production of contempt in yourself, it always comes along this line, and causes you to go about as a waking rebuke to other people because they are more shallow than you are.” Kaboom! I am pretty certain this was EXACTLY the way I was treating my husband through my “encouragement. “ I must be careful to always seek God in all things, and make my mess my message without bringing judgement on others. I should only bring support and the love of Jesus. I should always be an excellent and honorable alien who brings glory to God.

I covet your prayers in this area, my dear readers, for I am, as always, a work in progress.