I'm Still Worthy

1Corinthians 8:7-8 says: "7But not all people know this. Some people are still so used to idols that when they eat meat, they still think of it as being sacrificed to an idol. Because their conscience is weak, when they eat it, they feel guilty. 8But food will not bring us closer to God. Refusing to eat does not make us less pleasing to God, and eating does not make us better in God's sight."

I know this is talking bible days when people sacrificed animals and food to false idols, but yesterday when I read this passage it lit up and flew off the page and filled my heart.

Food and dieting have been the two major idols I've worshiped in my lifetime. There are so many foods I have labeled evil and horrible, that if I eat them create in me an unbearable feeling of guilt and despair. Let me just repeat that word: DESPAIR. This isn't the ordinary guilt someone might get from eating one too many oreos. This is guilt that brings up the voice of my disease, "Danielle, you are fat, and stupid, and worthless. What the heck is wrong with you? Where is your self control??? Just THINK of what that food is doing to your body right now. You are dirty. Unworthy. Horrible. You should go throw up. You should take laxatives and get it OUT OF YOU." Then later, after I've berated myself, the voice starts to try and pump me up, come up with plans to manipulate and punish me for what I have done, "Tomorrow, you are not aloud to eat. Absolutely nothing. Just drink coffee, and make sure you work out." Sets me up for failure almost every time. One extreme to another.

Verse 8 says that God will love me no matter what I eat or how I eat it. I cannot, by manipulating my diet, make God like me more or less.

Now, to what in verse 7 says that not everyone knows- the truth I know now: "4So this is what I say about eating meat sacrificed to idols. We know that an idol is really nothing in the world, and we know there is only one God. 5Even though there are many things called gods, in heaven or on earth (and there are many 'gods and 'lords'), 6for us there is only one God--our Father. All things came from him, and we live for him. And there is only one Lord-- Jesus Christ. All things were made through him, and we also were made through him."

An idol is really NOTHING in the world. What matters is that there is only one God. So to let go of the diets and the compulsive eating and this obsession with food I have, I have to go to him and allow him to guide me in this life. I will not make him love me more or less by dieting successfully or unsuccessfully, but because he has made me, he can REmake me. He can remove these things from my life, if I let him show me the way. Only HE can restore the balance in my life I so desperately need.

Recently, he has removed those labels I've attached to certain foods as "evil". He's helped me to see that I can eat, and I'm STILL WORTHY. He has created a love and a longing in me for myself, my own spirit, that has me wanting to treat myself with kindness and gentleness. I want to nourish my body now, not only with good food, but with the word of God and with love for others as well.

Miracles are happening here.