A Voice for the Voiceless :: A Call to Action

As the news of legislation expanding the parameters of abortion in the state of New York (Jan 22, 2019), a cry of grief and disgust of many is heard, and rightfully so. But friends, let’s not get stuck in a place of grief and disgust! Being a voice for the voiceless is more than expressing our disapproval on social media and showing up to a protest. We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities. Wisdom from above is foolishness to earthly philosophy. (1 Corinthians 3:19) Hearts are changed by God. We need to be praying and fasting for a release of God’s love, His strategy, His creativity, and His justice. 

We should be asking, “what is MY call to action?” I’m going to give you a little warning, it may quite possibly be outside your comfort zone. It might be costly. If we earnestly seek Him, He will show us, but we need to be willing to hear things we don’t want to hear, and be willing to be obedient anyway.

If you don’t have a practice of praying and fasting, I suggest you seek God on a place to start. He will show you. There are some great resources out there with practical instruction and guidance (The Celebration of Discipline is one of my favorite) but none parallels the wisdom God will give you when you seek Him. I don’t like fasting, but it gets me to a place of humility and tenderness towards God’s heart that I so sorely need! 

Our first call might be to our own healing. How can we bring the Love and Light of God if our own brokenness has filled us with anger, hatred, criticism, and shame? This may be a long and hard and pain-filled process. Lean in.  He is a good Father, He is faithful and loves us way too much to leave us in our brokenness. But, He is also a gentleman. He won’t force healing on us, we need to come to Him. We don’t want to come to the time that God is calling us to action only to find we are in disrepair and unable. It is easier to focus on the brokenness outside us instead of the brokenness within us. Let’s be willing to do the hard work and go to the uncomfortable places to be in a place of readiness. 

Maybe God has broken your heart for these voiceless children, but He is calling you into your personal healing first. Trust Him. We need discernment to know what battles we are called to engage in, and which we are to wait on. King David inquired of God if he should chase after the raiders that pillaged his home. He WAITED until he got the go ahead, and God have him the victory (1 Samuel 30:1-8). Be sure you are equipped and called to the battle before rushing in. Deuteronomy 20:5-9 gives instruction on who should not go into battle. In verse 8 it says, ”’Is there any man who is fearful and fainthearted? Let him go back to his house, lest he make the heart of his fellows melt like his own.’” (ESV) 

God will give us His wisdom, His boldness, and His strategy, through the Holy Spirit. Yes, we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but we should be seeking and listening to the Holy Spirit as to what actions He has for us in the practical. Being a voice for the voiceless may mean getting over your squeamishness in talking to your kids about sex and sexuality in a biblical and redeemed way. It may mean having repeated verbal conversations, pointing out right behavior and error, showing our young people they are valued apart from sexuality, and that it doesn’t define them, and modeling in our own words and actions! 

It might include talk about celibate sexuality; how we can express and cultivate our connection to God and others through creativity, and community, and compassion. How many people know that the ONLY foolproof way of avoiding unwanted pregnancy is abstinence? Yet, it’s not presented as a reasonable option because we have been conditioned to believe we are slaves to our appetites. (Another benefit of fasting, is FEELING hungry, and not acting on it. This is a potent lesson that we don’t need to be ruled by our appetites of both food and other desires.) I pray God will release and lead me to write more on this topic in the future because there is such a void in this area. As a single woman in my mid 30’s, “wait until marriage to have sex” sounds like a call to white knuckle it for an undetermined amount of time. No wonder no one wants to talk about it as a legitimate option! That sounds awful. And it IS an awful place to be without a better dialog. Choosing to not engage in sexual relationships does not mean I cease being a sexual being. Part of the better dialog is discovering and pouring in to the aspects of connection, community, creativity, and compassion that God is calling me to. These are uncomfortable topics to write about and reveal for others to read, even as I wrestle through on my own journey, but it’s needed. 

May God release strategy for ways to extricate the roots, and not allow us to get so caught up and distracted with the fruit. We can easily weary ourselves trying to manage the fruit of the issue instead of bringing the ax of His strategy to the root of the problem. Lord help us. 

I Like You and I Love You

I have a dear friend who would periodically tell me that she likes me and she loves me. I adored her differentiation between the two. Because they ARE different. Sometimes people hurt us or behave in certain ways that we don’t understand or like, but we still LOVE them. Sometimes we choose to love people we don’t really like!  We keep on acting lovingly towards them. Another wise friend tells me, “Sometimes loving someone well looks like having really good boundaries.” YES!! Love is not always permissive, letting someone get their way or making excuses for their toxic or hurtful behavior. These kinds of good boundaries can help guard against letting dysfunctional elements into relationships.

What about your relationship to yourself? Perhaps there are aspects that you don’t like about yourself. Can you choose to LOVE yourself anyway? Maybe you are struggling with negativity, or anger, or criticism. You catch yourself after the fact. Perhaps it’s okay and even right to not LIKE the behavior. But how can you be loving towards yourself? The next step might be some tough love for yourself. It might mean foregoing defending your behavior and taking a sober look at why. It may even mean inviting someone into that place to see you where you are, and walking alongside you with compassionate accountability.

This is the time of the year notorious for people being critical of their bodies and behaviors. They follow the criticism with plans and strategies how to do better this year. Some people will commit to abusing their bodies with harsh exercise, or cutting whole food groups out of their diet because they are “bad” and they are “being bad” when they consume them. This doesn’t sound like very loving behavior!

I have also noticed some backlash to this tradition. And I think somewhat rightly so. What concerns me though, is the risk of being overly permissive of hurtful behavior. Sometimes loving ourselves well looks like having really good boundaries! We don’t have to like our bodies to love them. What might this look like in the practical?

It probably means letting go of some really restrictive rules. The problem with cutting out whole food groups and drastic changes in diet, and harsh exercise, is that it is unsustainable. It creates an “on the wagon” vs “off the wagon” mentality. These types of rules can really create a lot of toxic habits, guilt and shame around food, and lead to disordered eating. It is fine and normal and even HEALTHY to have an occasional treat. The key word is occasional. Dessert foods never used to be part of a daily diet. The inception of processed and mass produced foods made these foods so readily accessible that they can be (and often are) eaten daily. Some good and healthy boundaries in this area would be to include treat foods on a few occasions a week, and FULLY enjoy them without guilt! I cringe when people say they are having a “cheat meal” or they are “cheating” on their diet. First, there is no such thing as cheating on a diet. We all bear the outcome of the food we eat, whether it is nutritious or not. By using the word “cheat” we are associating certain foods with being bad. Foods are inanimate. They are not inherently BAD. (I’d actually be more inclined to label a food ‘bad’ if the production of it is actively oppressing people, creating toxic outcomes in the environment, or supporting the abuse of animals—but that tangent is for another post!)

Loving your body well might include getting some good solid education on nutrition and health so you are equipped to make healthy choices. Unfortunately a lot of people are getting a lot of their information from someone promoting a certain diet or product. That is marketing, not education. The truth is: there is no one size fits all diet. We all have different bodies, chemistries, and ancestral heritage—which often affect the way we digest and metabolize different foods. Here is a really good article on why some people thrive on a vegan diet and others develop problematic deficiencies! David Winston, my teacher of clinical herbal medicine would often share this truth, “your body does not care about your philosophy.” I firmly believe that people can and should be able to eat wheat as part of a healthy diet. My body does not agree with this philosophy. I am allergic to gluten and consuming it causes some disastrous results!

Some may need baby steps; small incremental changes that are sustainable. Others might need a lot of accountability, strategy, and education to start! When I was going through treatment for an eating disorder, I was started out on a very rigid meal plan. I had to measure everything I ate. For me, it wasn’t because I was eating too much at meals, but I wasn’t eating enough, and then I was later binging and purging. This structure provided a safe place to learn what healthful meals and portions looked like. I was learning what it meant and felt like to nourish my body consistently throughout the day. AND! I had mandatory 2 desserts a week. I clearly remember “doughnut day” when I ate a doughnut for breakfast. This was part of my meal plan! And then I continued the day eating nourishing food. Sometimes what is needed is full permission to partake and enjoy a treat food. That time on the rigid meal plan was temporary. It was never intended for me to stay in that rigid structure, but serve as training so I could move to keep a food diary and record my meals, and eventually move to “normal eating.”

Sometimes restriction leads to freedom. Right now my diet is restrictive. But it’s not because I am punishing my body for being too large or too weak or too anything else. I choose to restrict my diet out of loving care for my body. Before I became committed to eliminate wheat out of my diet, my LIFE was restricted by the pain and inflammation and unpredictable bowel movements caused by eating gluten. It was a hard choice to make, but sometimes hard choices are required to move into freedom and healing. The difference is the attitude of love towards myself and not punishment. There have been times when I share with someone the food restrictions I have for health reasons, and their response to me is, “lucky you, if I couldn’t eat those foods I’d be thin.” This is both infuriating and heartbreaking all at once. Who wants to be thin so badly that they wish illness on their own body? Too many people unfortunately. I have received these comments on multiple occasions. At first it felt offensive and dismissive of the fact that I am often experience pain. I am often inconvenienced traveling and going out to eat, not to mention it would be nice to have the OPTION to have certain treats.

There are some good principles to follow, but they aren’t hard and fast rules. Louise Hay says, “If it grows, eat it. If it doesn’t grow, don’t eat it.” Even if this principle was followed 50% of the time, a lot of people’s nutritional intake would improve! It would mean a drastic reduction in processed and mass produced food, as these foods are manufactured, not grown.

Maybe you don’t like the body you are in. Maybe it’s not as young and strong as it was. Maybe it’s injured or disabled. Maybe it’s a constant struggle to get to a ‘healthy’ weight. Can you love it anyway? What might that look like? It might start by not calling it names and cursing it for not performing as you wished. When we love our body, we take better care of it. We choose more nutritious foods. We take the time to care for it well and prepare healthful meals, because these bodies of ours are worth the time and effort. Michael Pollan even suggests eating anything you want as long as it’s cooked at home! Take some time and consider what would loving YOUR body well might look like this year.

I bless you to know what loving your body well looks like in 2019!