Declaring a Truce with Your Body: Experience a "Revelation Within"

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi and welcome to our podcast Revelation Within on the Go. I'm Heidi Weilsma-Epperson, one of your hosts and the owner and lead coach of the revelationwithincom ministry.

Speaker 2: 0:11

And I'm Christina Motley, your other host, also a Revelation Within coach and Heidi's partner in all things Revelation Within. We're so happy to invite you to this episode of our podcast Revelation Within On the go.

Speaker 1: 0:31

Welcome, so happy to have you here, so glad you're joining us. Well, we're gonna take this bull by the horns. Uh-oh, yeah, uh-oh is right. Today we want to. We wanna recognize the fact that we are we have been at war with our bodies for a long time, yeah, and we wanna embrace body truths. We want, we want a revelation within. We really do. We are going to look a little bit at how have we perceived our bodies, how has that actually affected our bodies and their response to what we're doing and what we can do about it to have a truce with our bodies. Okay, so bear with us as we kind of flesh out some of this. The first thing is acknowledging that there's a war going on, and it doesn't take me very long of reviewing my history with my body that I've been with for so long To say that, yes, I have treated my body and thought of my body as an enemy. How about you, Christina? What do you think?

Speaker 2: 1:38

Oh, yes, so sad for me to think of this, but it's true, I'm sorry, no, no, no, it's good. It's good to think about it, because it's good to think about how far I've come and where I'm going to, where my hope is now. Yes, for so many years and many of you have heard me talk about negative self-talk and how, really since I was a young teenager, I have been saying terrible things to myself about my body that I never, ever, ever would have said to anyone else, and just feeling so much pressure to look a certain way, to be a certain shape, a certain size, to be fit. And for many years, tan was part of that too, where I grew up in Southern California, and the time that I spent running after that and talking with myself in a very condemning way it's sad to me to think about it it really is. God made my body. You know how sad is that, that I spent all those years so unhappy with it.

Speaker 1: 2:46

But there's no condemnation in Christ, and that's part of this is we don't want to beat ourselves up for beating ourselves up.

Speaker 2: 2:53

There you go.

Speaker 1: 2:54

Just so that you listener can identify or know if you identify with what we're talking about or not. Think of times when you have caught a glimpse of your reflection in a window as you walk by a store or something or a mirror. What are the thoughts that come to your mind? Unless, I'm mistaken, almost anybody listening to this knows the thoughts of self-contempt and that bashing that we tend to do no matter where we are in our journey. I mean, I know that even after I felt like I was the fittest I had been in a long time, if not ever, I still would bash myself. There was a war going on against my body, no matter what it did, no matter how well it behaved. So I remember seasons when I would get up first thing in the morning, go to the gym, do the stair master for an hour and a half, go home, do the stuff. I had to do with my life. I was a homeschooling mom even back then. And then I would go to the gym again later in the day and I would do another hour and a half. It was crazy, and I never was satisfied with how well I had done with my eating or how much exercise I had done. It was never enough, even when I was successful in accomplishing my physical goals. If you will, you know, I think about the years, like you said, christina, the years I spent in that negative state of mind and really I was doing all I could and beyond, yes, but it's like I missed it. I was motivating myself by shame and self-content. Can you relate to that too?

Speaker 2: 4:30

Yes, when you just said that I was motivated by shame and self-content, that's exactly what I was motivated by, and we all were. I mean, I had this whole group of friends that we were all doing that. We were all chasing after some kind of ideal body and shape and fitness level, and why did we never get there? You know, we worked so hard and when I think back to those times, I was also motivated by a lot of fear. Fear that I wouldn't be accepted, fear that I wasn't right somehow, fear that I would somehow balloon out of control if I didn't exercise like crazy all the time. Lots of fear, lots of self-content and no peace, Really no peace. The only time I felt a little bit of peace, but it wasn't a real peace, is when I was like right in the middle of the workout, because I felt like, ok, you're doing it, christina, you're doing it, don't stop. Well, I have to stop. And then what if you get sick? Right, what if you injure yourself? I would over-exercise to the point where my body would say, right, you too, noth, and I would have these injuries that took weeks and sometimes months to heal, and I was panicked during those times. Right, that's an awful, awful feeling. And then also the restrictions of the diets Don't have this at this time. Do have this, don't have these 10 things. Ok, you can have this. One thing. None of it ever felt like balance to me or peace. There was no joy in it, and I was constantly in this state of kind of panic that I couldn't do it well Because I couldn't do it well.

Speaker 1: 6:18

Well, and what is true is that shame and self-contempt may get us to make some changes, but it doesn't sustain a lasting, positive change, and there's also such a cost involved. When we have such hostile attitudes towards ourselves, we're not demonstrating Christ's likeness towards ourselves, and we also will see farther on in the podcast today that there are some physical consequences to allowing our minds to go where they go so very often.

Speaker 2: 6:49

I just want to point out.

Speaker 1: 6:50

Colossians 312 says therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly, loved yourselves with compassion, with kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Oh, my goodness, I cannot even I mean, did I do that toward myself? Was I clothed with those things? What does demonstrating compassion toward myself even look like? What does it look like to you, christina, relative to your appearance, if you were demonstrating compassion towards yourself instead of waging war towards your appearance?

Speaker 2: 7:28

Yeah Well, just looking at this list, heidi compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience this is the opposite of the way that I treated my body for so many years. This is exactly the opposite. So when I think of compassion, it's easier for me to think of compassion towards someone else than it is toward myself. I struggle with compassion toward myself. I can be very, very hard on myself, so I'm going to think of this in terms of somebody else. The question that you just asked. That's not fair. That's not fair. Well, what does it look like to be kind of and then you need to turn it back on you in order to play with your. And then I turn it back to myself, because how are we received by the Lord? Every single time, with compassion, every single time? He receives us with kindness and compassion and gentleness and patience, every time. And so, yeah, so I'll start with how. How does that look? When I am compassionate towards someone else, I am accepting of them, I am celebrating them exactly as they are Right, I am loving them, I'm spending time with them, I'm enjoying their company, I am lifting them up in prayer, I'm encouraging them. Okay so it's so easy to do this with somebody else. I'm even just thinking of you, Heidi, and our friendship, and I'm thinking how do I want to be compassionate toward you. That's easy for me. But now let's turn that back to myself.

Speaker 1: 9:04

And your appearance. Specifically, we're going to do appearance, eating and activity level. So how do you do that relative to your appearance?

Speaker 2: 9:11

Well, yeah, and that's so much harder, but it's like, okay, this is the body that God made for me. He designed it. He didn't just say, okay, I'm just going to throw Christina together and put her on the earth. You know, he designed my shape, he designed my features, he designed my smile, Everything about me, and when I start thinking about that it really changes my view of myself. And also, he knew that I would go through difficult things in my life with my body illness and injury and how about having three babies. You know all kinds of things. He knew what I would need my body for in my life and so he created me a very specific way. So part of the answer to your question, Heidi, is how am I compassionate toward myself? I have to look to how God is compassionate toward me.

Speaker 1: 10:11

Yes.

Speaker 2: 10:12

How I'm compassionate toward others.

Speaker 1: 10:13

Otherwise I just can't even get there.

Speaker 2: 10:16

Really hard.

Speaker 1: 10:18

We want to be as Christ, like as we can in all respects, but as soon as we turn that towards ourselves, it's like, ooh yeah, I don't even want to go there, but he calls me to go there. So, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, you're cells with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience towards others, but towards ourselves as well. So for me, I think of demonstrating compassion relative to my eating. Now I want to kind of focus on that for a minute. There are times when I mess up in my eating, I overeat and I'm miserable, or I eat something that doesn't agree with me and I knew it wouldn't, but my taste buds were demanding that I eat it and I obeyed them instead of what I knew would be best. And if I'm going to demonstrate compassion towards myself and my eating, it's going to look a lot like our wonderful mind renewal tool of look and learn. It's where Grace enters in, and I look with compassion at what was going on. Was there anything in particular emotional? Was there anything in the physical proximity Interacting with somebody? Was I in a situation that might have caused me to be more careless? Was I sleepy, tired? Asking those questions is a wonderful way of demonstrating compassionate curiosity towards myself. That is a Christlike trait for sure. So even relative to my eating. But what do we typically do when we overeat or eat foods that don't agree with us and we knew it wasn't going to agree with us?

Speaker 2: 11:55

What do we normally do. We normally beat ourselves up. We're very, very mean, very harsh with ourselves. Very very harsh, the opposite of compassion.

Speaker 1: 12:06

Right, and a lot of times, even before we eat something, it is chosen like I better eat this, even though I hate it. It's good for me, so I better eat it. And so I go into the meal with this attitude. It isn't a peaceful attitude at all. I am declaring war on my body and saying you better eat this, or else which is the abuse that my parents heaped on me was like as a kid, it's like am I going to continue that same behavior towards myself? That's not compassion in my eating. No, no, no, no. So how about your activity level, christina? How could you demonstrate compassion? And how could our listeners demonstrate compassion about their activity level?

Speaker 2: 12:48

Yeah, well, as you know, Heidi, this is a huge one for me and I know it has been for you over the years. However, I have shared in other podcasts that I was always the type of person that was full of energy and could go here and go there and do so many things in one day. And I love to serve and I love to be on the team, I love to be outdoors and helping, and that was me for a long time and I really took that on as an identity.

Speaker 1: 13:22

And I'm like.

Speaker 2: 13:22

Well, we have to be careful with that because my identity is in Christ and things change all the time. So if I am hoping in something that could go away, I'm going to struggle with that, and I did so. Many of you know that it's been nine years since I was diagnosed with chronic Lyme disease and so what did that do to my identity of go, go, go, serve, serve, serve, run here, run there. It knocked me flat and all of a sudden I was very much faced with the question of do I have worth, do I have value? And who am I if I'm not doing all this activity all the time? And that includes exercise, walks and aerobic classes and swimming and hiking and basically all of those things. God really brought me to a place where he challenged me, and this is. I'm a work in progress always, so this still comes up for me. You know what is my worth, what is my identity and how can I be compassionate, as the Lord is toward me and as other people are toward me, about my activity level, which at times with Lyme disease, is probably like 10% of what I used to be? You know, there are some days when I do very, very little because I'm feeling so poorly. There's other days that I can do more, but when I get back to the way that I used to be able to use my body. That's long gone and I did go through a grieving process for that, and I think I still do at times. So am I going to panic, you know? Do I panic over it? Do I beat myself up? No, god leads me to be compassionate toward myself toward my body and to listen to the signals of my body. You know we've talked about zero to five eating and that means eating between the parameters of physical hunger and, just right, satisfaction, and so for me, every day is a huge exercise and I can use that word in zero to five activity. When do I need to move a little bit and when do I need to rest? Every day is a little bit different. I have to listen to my body very carefully and sometimes I don't do that well, as Heidi knows, because she's always praying for me and that's my opportunity to look and learn with the Lord, and at times it feels pretty good, it feels balanced and just right. But I can be compassionate toward myself, as the Lord is, by listening to my body and making sure that my identity is firmly rooted in Christ, not in anything else.

Speaker 1: 16:12

Right, absolutely. Thanks for sharing on that. Yes, christina and I have both been challenged with a shift in our activity levels because of health crises, of various kinds. And demonstrating. You know, it's this attitude of oh my gosh, I can't get out there today because I'm feeling so poorly I'm not going to be able to. I mean, I remember when I would tell Christina well, that was a wimpy workout, I just did and she pointed out hey, did you listen to your body? And I had to say yes. Why is it saying what it's saying, though? And she would say that it was a wise, wonderful workout.

Speaker 2: 16:45

And I'm like, okay, how about a wimpy wise wonderful workout.

Speaker 1: 16:49

No way, no way. That's not compassion Me saying wimpy about what I'm able to do and listening to my body and responding to it.

Speaker 2: 16:58

that's not wimpy at all.

Speaker 1: 16:59

And so I want to demonstrate compassion towards my activity level as well, whether it's shifted or whether I just am somebody who isn't able to move for some reason, as much as I might like. So all of us could probably look over our histories and see where we have been at war with our bodies, our attitudes towards our bodies, towards our food, towards our exercise or lack of, or activity level. But we also have another influence on us. There is this sense of you have to be at war with your body. It comes to us through the diet, culture and then through these unrealistic beauty standards. You have to be, you know, rail thin or you have to have a face that I don't know. Where do they get that? I think it's all airbrush now that's.

Speaker 2: 17:45

I'm.

Speaker 1: 17:45

Yeah, I think it is. Do you feel like you've been affected at all by diet culture, christina, and the unrealistic standards that are imposed via that mode?

Speaker 2: 17:57

Oh yes, for so, so many years. You know, I've talked about being raised in Los Angeles several times and it was so strong. There it was everywhere. Everywhere you went, you looked right, you looked left. It was all about dieting and exercise and looking a certain way. There was a tremendous pressure, especially on girls and women. Yeah, I was growing up there so much so that, when my husband and I were talking about getting married years and years ago, I said I don't want to raise kids here. I want to get out of here, and that's not to say if you're in Los Angeles right now. I love you and I miss lots of things about Los Angeles. It's an amazing place, but the pressure that is there and it continues with Hollywood and all of that, you know there's tremendous pressure and, like you said, heidi, it's unrealistic, and so we're constantly striving towards something that isn't meant to happen. It's not designed, yeah, and that's where, of course, you know, plastic surgery comes in and extreme attempts to look a certain way, but we're always disappointed. It's like, well, that didn't turn out right and that didn't. Well, that wasn't what I expected. Well, I'm going to try this cream or I'm going to try this kind of workout, or I mean, obviously, social media is full of ideas from ideas and expectations from the dieting culture, and I'm actually so excited that people really in their teens and twenties that I'm hearing are coming out of that now, and even coming out of that, there's a whole new school of thought out there about respecting your body, accepting your body, celebrating your body, and I'm so glad that we're finally getting there. It'll take a while, I think, but I'm excited about that.

Speaker 1: 19:59

Well, and it's people in our generation and above and maybe one generation below us that we're still all about letting diet, culture form and shape our views of ourselves and we are at war with our bodies. I must admit, there are times when the people that I have the pleasure and privilege of interacting with in our community, it breaks my heart because that's still going on for many women my age, a little younger and a little older and I just long for them to. It doesn't mean that we're giving up on being healthy, but we're. We're stopping the war, and that's what kind of where we want to go. Next is we want to declare a truce with our bodies. Psalm 13914 says I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. I know that full well. So what we want to really convey is it is time, gals, it's time guys, if you're there to, it's time to declare a truce. Our bodies have served us so well and will continue to no matter how we treat them but we want to shift from this war mentality to that kindness, to that compassion we've been talking about and be aware of the fact that our attitudes towards our bodies, they have a huge impact on our mental health, emotional and spiritual health. We're giving all of that up the emotional, spiritual and mental health, sometimes because of that promise that, if I set this aside, said this aside, I can have that promise of the thin body. But we're sacrificing so many things on the altar and we're going to talk about that. It's really vital for our prolonged health, the very attitudes we have about our bodies maybe working against our best health. We have to declare a truce.

Speaker 2: 21:50

Yes.

Speaker 1: 21:51

So I hope you'll permit me to geek out for a few minutes, and this is something that I've been wanting to have a podcast on, but I'm going to weave it into this one and probably others. You know, everybody knows, we have a central nervous system, and bear with me as I share this, because it does make a difference. I'm going to explain how. But when we think of our nervous systems, we typically think of the central nervous system, the brain, the spinal cord and nerves, all of that that makes it possible for us to speak and move and bounce around and have a great time with it. But there is a second nervous system that does all kinds of important work in the background, and it's called the autonomic nervous system. It takes care of all kinds of things that we kind of take for granted, like blinking and swallowing, breathing and heart rate and the same question to and. So that's the autonomic nervous system, but it has two parts. One is the sympathetic state or nervous system, and one is the parasympathetic nervous system or state. So I'm going to explain those and then I'm going to explain why. I'm going to explain why the sympathetic state and the nervous system is often referred to. You guys have heard of this as the fight or flight response. When your sympathetic system is activated, it gets you ready to respond to perceived pressures by increasing your alertness, by increasing your energy, and it's crucial in emergency situations. God has made us fearfully and wonderfully. This sympathetic state helps us to either confront the threat that we might feel or escape from it. And here's some ways that you can know if you are in the sympathetic state. Is your heart rate increased? This is vital when you have a threat. Dilated pupils sweating will increase to help regulate your body temperature. Of course, during physical depression and faster breathing. Suppressed digestion Did you know that when you are feeling a threat, your digestion is flowed way down as your body prepares for fight or flight and adrenaline release escalates. Other stress hormones as well. They release into bloodstream, increasing your energy and focus. So you're amped up, muscle tension increases, preparing your body for that quick escape. And increased blood sugar. Isn't this interesting? Your blood sugar levels rise, providing extra energy for you to use in that stressful situation. Okay, this is a survival mechanism intended by God to protect us from immediate threats or perceived immediate threats, and that's what we're going to come back to in a minute. Perceived threats and if you have a prolonged activation of your sympathetic state due to chronic stress, this can have a negative effect on your health and this can lead to anxiety, high blood pressure and immune system suppression. These are really big deals. So, interestingly enough, now I'm going to kind of bring it home to what we were talking about a when we are filled with self-contempt and pressure ourselves to eat this not that when we struggle against the dieting rules and hop on and off the bathroom scale, when we rebuke ourselves for eating something that wasn't on our program, our bodies, our minds, our autonomic nervous system perceives that as a threat. Our bodies will go into that sympathetic state. This is not good for us. Our immune systems are going to be compromised by our dieting mentality. By being at war with our bodies, we can even cause inflammation throughout our bodies as well, just by having this attitude of I'm at war with my body and all of the ways that that manifests. So God has given us an alternative to maintain overall well-being, and we want to balance our sympathetic response with what I referred to a minute ago as the parasympathetic state, and this is what's often called the rest and digest mode. It allows your body to relax and recover. So since it's often called the rest and digest, it kind of makes sense that that's where I need to be If I want to be at my best. God has wired us for shalom and this is that state of parasympathetic. So when the parasympathetic system is activated, it helps me to relax, to recover, to conserve energy, to heal all those good things as often as possible. If I stay in this state, it's going to promote my well-being and allow me to digest, heal and repair. And I metabolize my food better. When I'm in the parasympathetic state, I absorb nutrients better. So this is how you can know if you're in parasympathetic or not. Your heart rate has slowed down. There's even a sense of calm and relaxation. There's reduced sweating. You know how sometimes something happens and you just start. You break out in a sweat. Well, that is the opposite of what the parasympathetic. You have calmed down. You really notice the difference. And while that is going on, your digestion is working the best. It breaks down the nutrients and absorbs the nutrients. It also, with the release of endorphins that comes about by being in parasympathetic, you have reduced pain levels. Does that not sound like a wonderful place to be? It also lowers your blood pressure so that you can remain in a more relaxed state. Your muscles become more relaxed, there's reduced tension. Imagine if you have a neck that's tight. A lot of the time it could be because you live a lot of your life in that sympathetic state. So there are lots of ways to get and stay in the parasympathetic as much as possible, but we want to do that as much as we can. Declaring war and staying at war with our bodies keeps us in sympathetic and all of those things that go with being in this sympathetic as though there's a threat, is activated by our own war with our own body. It's really sad and it's scary. I think a lot of us struggle, more than we realize, with health conditions that are probably triggered by self contempt about what we see in the mirror by jumping on and off the scale. I must eat this and not that, even though I hate it. What do you think, christina, about this?

Speaker 2: 28:29

One of the things that is happening right now is that I'm listening to you. I explain all of this is that I'm thinking about myself and I'm sure that many of our listeners are doing the same thinking about, well, what about my stress level? What am I dealing with on a day to day basis in my life, and I just want to put out there. You know, some of you right now are in a really crazy season. Some of you are stressed all the time because of what's happening with your health, with your family, with something that's going on. God meets us in that. I love that.

Speaker 1: 29:08

So there are ways that we can, of course, even on the fly, get back to that parasympathetic state where, no matter what's going on around us, we don't have to go into that fight or flight response. We can take a moment to pray, to be still with the Lord. Even on the fly, we can use some of the mind renewal tools God I love, for instance, going through what are you grateful for, thinking through some of the blessings that he has given you, just practicing gratitude, engaging in activities that bring you joy. When you've got a lot of demands on your life, it is hard to take a moment to do this, I'm sure, but whenever you can, don't add to it by demonstrating self-contempt. That's really what I'm most concerned about and I want to convey to our listeners is yeah, life is tough and we will go into the sympathetic state and that's the way God has wired us. That's okay, but we don't want to add to it by demonstrating self-contempt. For us, our body perceives that as a threat it was wired to and so life goes on around us and we were wired to go in and out of sympathetic, in and out of parasympathetic, and to be able to have the freedom of that flow in and out of both states. We don't want to add to that sympathetic state, because that's where cortisol and adrenaline and all of that is rushing into our bloodstreams. So we want to declare a truce. That's the bottom line is, I want to encourage us all to declare a truce with our body. It's important for us to be our best and for our health, for our minds, our bodies and spirits too.

Speaker 2: 30:51

So what we're really looking for is a revelation within our bodies, by looking at them from God's perspective. And this is really where it's at. If we want to shift in focus and mindset, if we want to get to a place of that abundant life that God promises us, we want to ask God for what his thoughts are about our bodies. We want to be Christlike in our attitudes towards ourselves. So the second Corinthians, 10 five, says we demolish arguments in every pretension and sets itself up against the knowledge of God and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. We want to embrace compassion and gratitude. Wow. Ephesians 432, be kind and compassionate to one another for giving each other, just as Christ forgave you. And Ephesians 210, for we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do. So what is the truth about our bodies If we say Lord, what is true? What, from your perspective? The truth is that we are God's masterpiece. We are carefully crafted for Him, by Him, for a purpose, a really important purpose.

Speaker 1: 32:23

So there are ways of getting ourselves to believe what God says is true about our bodies, and in one of our coaching groups this week, we had assigned our members to create a truth list about how to think about their bodies, and Christina and I both did this exercise as well. And boy, this ended up being super helpful for me. So I'm gonna share with you all and Christina is gonna share as well the truth list, or some of the truth lists that we wrote about our bodies. And remember that when we create a truth list, the exercise isn't just about making the list. It's about using that list to speak it out loud, to read it again and again, maybe to do some other way of getting it into my mind so that I begin to think those thoughts on the fly, whether I have a piece of paper in front of me or not. My body has endured a lot of injury and illness and has remarkably returned to good health each time. You know that's something that when I have declared war on my body, I minimize that. But when I look over the course of my life, there have been a lot of injuries, a lot of illness I mean not a lot of really dire illness, but one major health crisis and, wow, my body has done an amazing job. My next one on my list is for my entire life. My body has taken me to beautiful vistas, to explore majestic waterfalls, snorkeling in the world's oceans, to see astonishing underwater worlds and to walk along thundering rivers. Without my body, I wouldn't get to experience so many beautiful things. My body has given me joy as I hiked, swim, played softball, tennis, volleyball and then million other sports and activities. Even when I haven't treated this body with kindness, it has recovered from illness, healed from injury, overcome hurdles and carried me through life. And then one of my favorite ones is this body has given birth to two babies and nursed them for the first year of their lives. Wow, that's amazing. My body was all that they needed. God used my body to house them in my inside and to give them what they needed nutritionally. And then, when they were born and they nursed, wow, I can't even describe it, it's so amazing. And then my body is simply an amazing work of God. Now, when I think of these statements and I wallpaper my mind with these statements, when I catch a glimpse of myself in that window as I walk by a store, or in a mirror or whatever, if a thought comes up that's demonstrating self-contempt, these thoughts now rush into my head because I've been renewing my mind with them so much, and I can refute the lie, that contempt that I have for my body at first glance, with any one of these or other statements that I have renewed my mind with. I wanna think God's thoughts on the fly. I wanna declare a truce with my body, and this is one of the practical ways I can do that.

Speaker 2: 35:39

Okay, so here's my list. And my list is a work in progress. Always I'm adding to it. God is always showing me new things, and I love that I'm never done. I will not arrive with this journey until I get to heaven but, I love the process with the Lord. It really brings me into deeper intimacy with Him. Okay, lord, what is true about my body? Jesus made me fearfully and wonderfully. He formed me inside of my mother's womb. He planned and prepared and crafted every detail of who I am. He doesn't make mistakes and he loves what he made in me. So much of that is from Psalm 139, by the way in case anyone's wondering, Jesus never said life would be easy in this world. Helps me to think of this and to remember he knew that things would go wrong, that I would get sick, that I would get hurt, that I would have problems with specific issues with my body at certain ages and stages of my life. He has given me seasons of weakness and seasons of strength, and I know that many of you who are listening can relate to that. Jesus does not waste anything. Every trial, every challenge, every disappointment, every difficult season with my body will be used for good for me, for my loved ones, for those that my life crosses paths with and, most of all, for His glory. Nothing is for nothing. Nothing will be wasted. This is so important for me I need to renew my mind about that. All the time, Jesus has given me a body strong enough to fight and survive all kinds of challenges over the years. My body is a masterpiece. The parts work together in the most miraculous ways. Even when something is wrong with one or more parts, the other parts compensate and allow me to keep going, to keep living. Every ounce of strength and function that I have is because Jesus gave it to me. I'm proud of Him. I need to tell myself that all the time, especially when I'm very disappointed with what's happening with my body. Let's see Jesus planned in some really nice things about my body. So this is kind of fun and I want you to think about it. If you were to write a truth list, what are some of the things that you like about your body or that Jesus?

Speaker 1: 38:07

likes and wants you to like.

Speaker 2: 38:09

Exactly so. He gave me a beautiful face, a lovely smile and bright blue eyes. He gave me a curvy shape. He gave me internal organs that work amazingly well. Jesus gave me good teeth and good skin. He did. He gave me a body that could grow and deliver three beautiful babies.

Speaker 1: 38:31

And.

Speaker 2: 38:31

He gave me the ability to move and use every part of my body. My hubby loves my body. Everything that works in my body, everything that is pleasing and good and strong and lovely is because God gave it to me. Jesus calls me not to hate my body. Not to hate what he has so carefully made. He has called me to treat my body with respect and good care, because it is the temple that he lives in. He has called me to be grateful for the body he's given me imperfections and all. He longs for me to be content and to feel comfortable in my own skin. He deserves gratitude for giving me life, for choosing that I go on living and loving and working for Him here on earth. You know so many days I have, in which day will be my last. He calls me to praise Him, no matter what I'm facing with my body.

Speaker 1: 39:32

And one more almost done.

Speaker 2: 39:34

Jesus owns my body because I have given Him my life and my hearts for all eternity. My body is not my own. Jesus owns my energy, my strength, my capabilities and my limitations. He is not at all made weak by what I can't do. His plans will be accomplished and he is completely in control.

Speaker 1: 40:00

Hmm, beautiful. So for the listener, I would suggest, for a real, practical way of halting the war on your body and declaring a truce, you start by sitting with the Lord, invite Him in and ask Him what is true about my body from your perspective, lord, and write those things down and begin your own truth list and then add to that as you go along. We add to our truth lists all the time. And then, christina, how can they use these truth lists to be able to experience the change in their thinking, so that they can be transformed, like Romans 12, 2 says?

Speaker 2: 40:45

Yeah, you know what we want to be using these all the time. It's not just a one and done. The process is very important, the ongoing process, and then we want to say these truths out loud. We want to speak to our own souls. If you don't have privacy, you can whisper. Also, writing them out is very, very helpful. Maybe just take one or two that you're really struggling with believing or you know processing and write those out. And then, of course, in inviting God, in asking him Lord, what are your thoughts about my body? I want to hear your truth and your wisdom going into the word, of course, finding your truth there. Repetition is really, really, really important with this. It really is. If this is the good work of mind renewal, you've got to pick it up and do it often, because we've been thinking the same thoughts for so many years. So many years, so many years, and they are lies and they are destructive and they bring us down. So we got to take those thoughts captive every time they come in. Like you said, heidi, and replace them with what is true, so important and, over time, your thoughts really will change.

Speaker 1: 42:03

Definitely. What are some additional mind renewal tools that might help us to embrace declaring a body truths? We have the truth list ideas. Anything else you can think of, Christina, that might help our listener practically to move into thinking differently about their bodies?

Speaker 2: 42:25

Yes, one of my favorites. I just used it a couple of days ago because I'm struggling with some things right now with my body. One of my favorites is what is good? So I'm struggling right now with Lyme disease symptoms and issues of pain and sciatica and things like that. Okay, so I can stop in my discouragement and I can say, lord, what is good? What is good right now about my body? What is good is that all my internal organs are working absolutely beautifully. I am having no issue my lungs and my heart and my liver and my digestion, all those things that I don't see and I don't think about. And then my five senses are working great. Wow, I can see, I can hear, I can touch, I can. You know all of those things so so important that I just take for granted every day what about my brain? I am so thankful that my brain is working well and that I can think clearly every single day. And then I think about what I can do. So I'll say, lord, you know what is good. What is good is that I can be here for my kids, I can be a mom just the way I am. I can love them, I can listen with my ears. I can hug them with my arms. I can be there for them. I can be there for my husband. I can work. Maybe I'm not out in the field, you know, doing hard physical labor, but I'm doing work that God is calling me to, even though I might be in pain or not feeling well. There's so many things going on in my body that are working well. So what is good helps me to focus on what is going well and also on gratitude for the one who made me.

Speaker 1: 44:12

Yeah, beautiful ideas. So those are some great practical ideas and we hope that you find that, as you try these practical strategies for renewing your mind about your body, thinking God's thoughts about your body, that you will experience a truce and even more than a truce with your body. Maybe you would be partners with your body. So, let's just summarize for a minute some of the things that we talked about in this episode. The first is there is a war. There is a war and we've declared war on our bodies. If you look back over your lifetime, I'm sure that you can see as most of us can that there is definitely kind of an antagonism towards your body. We've even referred to it as the battle of the bulge. Yes, yeah, I've got to fight this fight and attitudes like that about am I ever going to defeat my tendency and defeat just this whole mentality? We use war language about our body and wanting to shape, shift, and so let's make yeah, yeah, let's admit there is a war. And then our bodies have been wired by God to go into the sympathetic state when they feel a threat, and we can sometimes be our own worst threat, and that's a pretty big deal. So we want to stop it. We just want to stop it. And then our bodies were wired by God for Shalom to operate best for healing and digestion in the parasympathetic state, and this can only happen when we feel safe. And that's a really good reason to declare a truce. Instead of warring with our bodies, we want to esteem them Absolutely. I love that.

Speaker 2: 46:04

So join us and Revelation within in working to adopt a new perspective on our bodies, seeking God's revelation and practicing compassion and gratitude. Doesn't that sound?

Speaker 1: 46:18

amazing? Yes, it does, and it is as we make that shift. There is peace, there is Shalom, and what is so awesome about this is, as we do this, we find ourselves approaching food and eating with a more peaceful attitude, and our bodies respond really well to that.

Speaker 2: 46:41

Yes, absolutely. Well, we're so glad that you joined us today so glad, so glad and we hope that something that we share here will be helpful to you. Be sure to join us next time for our next episode of our podcast Revelation Within on the.

Speaker 1: 47:00

Go.