The Agreement of Spiritual and Physical Success
My husband would frustrate me so much regarding my health and exercise regime (or lack thereof). I have a close relationship with God, excited about my work for the Kingdom, I’m an active member of my church, and I love God with all of my heart…. good health is a guarantee, right? I’m young and at a healthy weight, so I felt no need to take supplements, eat extremely healthy, or exercise.
Then the Holy Ghost hit me with it one morning:
“Just because you’re at a healthy weight, doesn’t mean you’re healthy. You’re a good daughter,” He said, “but you still have to do your part.”
It was like my eyes were opened. I saw things I didn’t see before. While my husband was walking around muscular and fit, I was eating a pint of ice cream. I started to get a good look at my energy and stress levels. Having two children with special needs plus a young toddler requires extra energy and can be stressful on top of other things. If stress shuts down the anointing, then I had to figure out a way to eliminate that stress and increase my energy levels. I thought about my children and how they needed their mother. But what good would I be if I dropped dead due to something like high cholesterol. Cholesterol …the silent killer…. my dad had high cholesterol and I take after him. I began to think about how I’m just now walking in boldness in the gifts and talents God gave me. What good are they if I’m not here to fulfill my duty for the Kingdom simply because I didn’t take care of the body God gave me? See, it’s not about vanity or fear; it’s about glorifying God by taking care of what is His. My body is no longer my own, nor is my life; but it is His. It is that day, at the end of that thought process, that I realized I have some work to do. As Christians, we want to believe God for healing, but slack when it comes to maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
Thankfully, I have a husband who is an ex-NFL player and a fitness expert to help me get myself together. I also have the best group of friends that are also on this same journey of healthy living. We call ourselves MOBB: Mothers of Blessed Babies. We are a group of like-minded women who love Jesus more than anything, are wives, and mothers with different gifts and talents from God enabling us to continuously edify one another. We chat about our new workout regimes and healthy food recipes we have discovered. We also gripe about how hungry we are after the healthy meal. But that’s ok! We are still learning and growing in this area. The Bible says in 3 John 2 “…that you may prosper in every way and that your body may keep well even as I know your soul keeps well and prospers.” That word “prospers” in the Greek (the original text of the New Testament) is euodoo and it means to be successful. God wants us to be a success spiritually and physically!
I purposed in my heart that I would glorify God in my body. That I would make my husband happy by taking better care of myself. God spoke to me on this matter because my husband was concerned for me. I was in rebellion and he couldn’t get through to me; but he left it to the Holy Ghost knowing and trusting that He would have a talk with me. He did. And I obeyed. I exercise five days a week. I have changed my eating habits; well, that part is still a work in progress actually. But I have made significant changes. I noticed my stress levels were going down and my energy levels were going up after the first week of exercise. I also noticed other things not so positive.
I became so obsessed with fitness that I began neglecting my time with God. My personal time with Him was being substituted with the gym. One morning at 4am while I was still asleep, the Lord said to me, “Are you going to make time for Me today?” I had to repent! The most important One in my life was being pushed aside and I was becoming unbalanced. 1 Timothy says “For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.” That same day, one of the ladies of MOBB posted this Scripture in our group just reconfirming what the Lord had shared with me. Thankfully, I didn’t go long without my morning talks with God, but even two days is too long. So many things can fail due to lack of prayer in just two days. I don’t want to be disconnected from God for even two seconds!
Yes, God wants us to be healthy and glorify Him physically, but our first priority is God and our time with Him. We can’t become lop-sided; but train ourselves to be balanced in glorifying God whole-heartedly and in every way. Besides, we wouldn’t wake up at all to exercise if it wasn’t for Him providing the very breath in our bodies that keeps us. I am grateful for the outlet the gym gives me, and the feeling of being physically fit. But God satisfies me completely and it is because of Him, that my stress is low and my health is good. I’m just simply doing my part and showing Him that I care, too, and I will do my part in everything. After all, Jesus did not say, “I sent the Holy Ghost down to do all the work for you. Eat, be merry, and die is all you have to do.” No, the Holy Ghost is a helper which means we have to do some things in the natural as well.
Let us be prosperous and successful spiritually and physically. Let us also make sure that our faith muscles (spiritual muscles) are bigger than our physical muscles by keeping God first in all that we do.
Then the Holy Ghost hit me with it one morning:
“Just because you’re at a healthy weight, doesn’t mean you’re healthy. You’re a good daughter,” He said, “but you still have to do your part.”
It was like my eyes were opened. I saw things I didn’t see before. While my husband was walking around muscular and fit, I was eating a pint of ice cream. I started to get a good look at my energy and stress levels. Having two children with special needs plus a young toddler requires extra energy and can be stressful on top of other things. If stress shuts down the anointing, then I had to figure out a way to eliminate that stress and increase my energy levels. I thought about my children and how they needed their mother. But what good would I be if I dropped dead due to something like high cholesterol. Cholesterol …the silent killer…. my dad had high cholesterol and I take after him. I began to think about how I’m just now walking in boldness in the gifts and talents God gave me. What good are they if I’m not here to fulfill my duty for the Kingdom simply because I didn’t take care of the body God gave me? See, it’s not about vanity or fear; it’s about glorifying God by taking care of what is His. My body is no longer my own, nor is my life; but it is His. It is that day, at the end of that thought process, that I realized I have some work to do. As Christians, we want to believe God for healing, but slack when it comes to maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
Thankfully, I have a husband who is an ex-NFL player and a fitness expert to help me get myself together. I also have the best group of friends that are also on this same journey of healthy living. We call ourselves MOBB: Mothers of Blessed Babies. We are a group of like-minded women who love Jesus more than anything, are wives, and mothers with different gifts and talents from God enabling us to continuously edify one another. We chat about our new workout regimes and healthy food recipes we have discovered. We also gripe about how hungry we are after the healthy meal. But that’s ok! We are still learning and growing in this area. The Bible says in 3 John 2 “…that you may prosper in every way and that your body may keep well even as I know your soul keeps well and prospers.” That word “prospers” in the Greek (the original text of the New Testament) is euodoo and it means to be successful. God wants us to be a success spiritually and physically!
I purposed in my heart that I would glorify God in my body. That I would make my husband happy by taking better care of myself. God spoke to me on this matter because my husband was concerned for me. I was in rebellion and he couldn’t get through to me; but he left it to the Holy Ghost knowing and trusting that He would have a talk with me. He did. And I obeyed. I exercise five days a week. I have changed my eating habits; well, that part is still a work in progress actually. But I have made significant changes. I noticed my stress levels were going down and my energy levels were going up after the first week of exercise. I also noticed other things not so positive.
I became so obsessed with fitness that I began neglecting my time with God. My personal time with Him was being substituted with the gym. One morning at 4am while I was still asleep, the Lord said to me, “Are you going to make time for Me today?” I had to repent! The most important One in my life was being pushed aside and I was becoming unbalanced. 1 Timothy says “For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.” That same day, one of the ladies of MOBB posted this Scripture in our group just reconfirming what the Lord had shared with me. Thankfully, I didn’t go long without my morning talks with God, but even two days is too long. So many things can fail due to lack of prayer in just two days. I don’t want to be disconnected from God for even two seconds!
Yes, God wants us to be healthy and glorify Him physically, but our first priority is God and our time with Him. We can’t become lop-sided; but train ourselves to be balanced in glorifying God whole-heartedly and in every way. Besides, we wouldn’t wake up at all to exercise if it wasn’t for Him providing the very breath in our bodies that keeps us. I am grateful for the outlet the gym gives me, and the feeling of being physically fit. But God satisfies me completely and it is because of Him, that my stress is low and my health is good. I’m just simply doing my part and showing Him that I care, too, and I will do my part in everything. After all, Jesus did not say, “I sent the Holy Ghost down to do all the work for you. Eat, be merry, and die is all you have to do.” No, the Holy Ghost is a helper which means we have to do some things in the natural as well.
Let us be prosperous and successful spiritually and physically. Let us also make sure that our faith muscles (spiritual muscles) are bigger than our physical muscles by keeping God first in all that we do.
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