Many of us tend to neglect our physical and mental/emotional health. Either we’re busy and don’t make it a priority, we’re lazy and don’t don’t want to think of why it should be a priority, or we think it shouldn’t be a priority because it sounds selfish. On the other hand, some of us make the appearance of taking care of our health by using worldly means and motivations. Whether by neglect of our bodies and minds or by unrighteous “self care” from ungodly sources, we’re being poor stewards of what God has given us to use for His glory.
The Bible talks a lot about stewardship, which, put simply, is using God’s gifts for His glory. The parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30) is a good example. The servants who invested the gifts for a return gave the gifts and the return back to the master, and the master greatly rewarded them. The servant with not enough faith and too much pride decided his gift wasn’t worth using, and he was punished and called wicked for not using the little that the master gave him.
Some of us have been given more abundant or more visible gifts than others, but we all have a responsibility to acknowledge what God has given us, to be thankful for it, and to use it for God’s glory. Not because we want to be our best selves, not because we’re scared of getting sick from something we read on a website with questionable sources, and not so we can show all our friends how healthy we can make our families. 1 John 4:18 says, “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear…” Stewardship should not involve fear, whether it’s fear of man, fear of judgment from others, or fear of death. We are good stewards when our motivation is our love for God.
And on that note, here are some practical and applicable health tips you can start integrating into your routine now.
3. Clear the Phone- Remove the visual clutter and potential time-suckers by removing apps from your phone or arranging them in folders (preferably off of your home screen).
6. If you’re prone to food fears, read Doug Wilson’s Confessions of the Food Catholic. It’s a good book on body stewardship that can help people with “information overload” to take a step back and let go of fears surrounding food.
8. If you need to lose weight, before you go trying to figure out the perfect fix, complicating your life and frustrating your family, simply try eating less food. You might not need to eat a lot less, but just ingesting fewer calories is almost guaranteed to work, and if you add some more physical activity to your routine, it can even work quickly. Find a friend to keep you accountable (if you can find one who needs to lose weight and also isn’t pregnant right now). Keep after each other to do it by reasonable means with the right motivations, and pray for and encourage each other.
Lastly, pray for God to reveal to you how you’re not stewarding your body and mind as well as you could be. Pray that God would remove your apathy, your laziness, your fear and anxiety, your pride--whatever is hindering your relationship with Him and making your health either too big or too small a priority in your life. And listen to the church God has given you. What are the women you look up to doing, and why is it you look up to them? Pray for rightly ordered priorities and a rightly ordered heart. “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” Matthew 6:35
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