My Race

I was mediating on a point Joyce Meyer was making on her internet/tv broadcast that showed this week. I can't really remember now all she was talking about but there was one image that stuck in my head. She got down on the floor and was laying on her back. She showed us that when we are on our backs and laying down, we can't go anywhere. No matter how fast you kick your legs like you are running, you don't go no where. She started talking about how there are so many Christian's living their life like that. Stuck laying down and not going anywhere.

I kept that image in my head and it came to me when I was tempted. I related giving into that temptation and how it would result in knocking me down and how I wouldn't be able to run my race. The last couple of days it did help me resist the temptation but today I decided to binge anyway. Tonight I was thinking again about that image and how it relates to my life now, the season I'm in, and what it feels like i'm going through. I then took that image and added how the rest of my story would relate to image. This is how I would discribe my race.

Here is this girl who ran most of her race (life) in the dark, following the wide path. She knew about the Light on narrow path, but choose to follow the wide path even though it was full of darkness. There came a time on University Lane when this girl became hopeless and depressed and heart broken because traveling along that dark path was slowing killing her. She cryed out in despair and was sick and tired of traveling in the dark and she started seeking the Light. She deligently and passionately sought out the Light and was led to the straight and narrow path. She loved that path. She felt alive, joyful and full of peace on that trail. She believed that path was beautiful and couldn't understand how other people who once deligently trailed on the lighted, narrow path now choose to follow the wide, ugly, dark, depressing trail. How could they do that and why she thought. A little Peter spoke inside her saying i'm not going to be one of those people who turns their back on Jesus and backs slides, choosing the worldly ways over His ways.

A little ways after she trailed along the narrow path, she saw signs of temptations. Because those signs were on the dark trails, the darkness distorted the images. She remembered her past trip and knew that those signs were not the way to go. But during her trip, she tryed to push forward without properly feeding herself spiritually and became weak. Those signs of temptation now inticed her. She became so weak that she choose to take a wrong turn which led to a long drawn out trip through the wilderness. There was several detours that led back to the narrow path and sometimes she would try to take those trails but she would lose her focus and would gradually chose to go back and continue forward in the wilderness.

She is currently stuck in an area in that wilderness where she is not moving. Seeking after her drug of choice (binging) has made her heart not function correctly and she has stumbled and fallen down. She can't see because she's in the dark and the lack of oxygen on that path is sufficating her and the pain just gets worse where she just wants to quit and ly down forever. She's trying to run her race (in her own power) but when you have fallen, you aren't moving. Even though she has her own race to run and she is not competing against others, just one day not moving puts her way behind in her race. It wastes times. It wastes her potential. It deminishes all that she can be in her life time.

Along her journey, the path that she is traveling along crosses many others who are also traveling along their path. But when she in trailing along the dark path, she is full of shame and guilt and hides herself. Because she hates herself and hides herself, her light doesn't shine and she isn't able to help others along their paths, both wide and narrow. She isn't strong enough to pick someone else off the dark path and carry them to the Lighted path and she's not able to love those traveling aroung her. Plus, others see that here is the girl who proclaims she is walking on the straight and narrow path with the Light but is stumbling and weak along the dark path. Why would they try and seek Light when it doesn't look like the Light is helping her in the darkness?

Having this image in mind helps me became more aware of just how valueable one day is and how important it is for make the right decisions to get well so i'm able to help others. Just think about any race. If you took a day off during the race, just think of the imact it would do. It would set you back tremendously. Just think if you took a couple days off. A year off.... Just think of all the missed opportunites to help others and to make a difference in this world.

All the times that I have gotten up and started traveling my race again was because I got my eyes off selfish self and focused them on God and what I could do for Him. Not what I could do for myself. This life isn't for me. It's for His glory. It's allowing Him to work through me to accomplish His will.


Exodus 15: 26 (NLT) - He said, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his sight, obeying his commands and keeping all his decrees, then I will not make you suffer any of the diseases I sent on the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.”

Psalm 34:18 (The Message) - If your heart is broken, you'll find God right there; if you're kicked in the gut, he'll help you catch your breath.

Hebrews 4:15-16 (NLT) - This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

2 Chronicles 7:14 (NLT) - Then if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and restore their land.

The ugly pit

I haven't written here in a long time. Felt led to write today so here is goes.

I've kinda got myself back in the pit again lately. Oh, how I hate the pit. You know, that place that you have been at many times before but you told yourself you are never going to go back there again... Satan used the same lie that he has told me over and over again and used the same bait that he has used on me over and over to tempt me to sin. He's not that creative. Just the same old tricks. So when is the day that I will learn from my mistakes and my past and completely finish this journey through the wilderness? That day is soon, and I can feel it. It just sucks because I feeling the pain of my bad choices now and this pain should have been done and over with a long time ago. It's ok though. I believe it's part of my season of preparation that i have to go through. Even though it's not good that I have been making bad choices and I have lost my focus. God is dealing with me about that but I believe God will use this pain and this season for His good.

I can't be too hard on myself. I have to remember where I came from. For a perfectionist like myself, it's hard not to be so hard on myself. To remember where I was last year, and then the year before, alot has changed and i have learned alot and I feel that my stuggle with my eating disorder has gotten better. When I become a new Christian, everything dramatically changed and life was great. I was on fire for God, I had faith and hope for a great future and I liked myself for who I really was for the first time in my life. But then, the more I read of the Word and let that Word mirror my image, and the more I lost focus of God, the more I realized how screwed up I am. That's a good thing in a way if you realized that you are nothing without God and you despirately need His help in EVERY aspect of your life. But sometimes when I get the realization that I am just totally screwed up, it can bring me down when i lose my focus on God, and it starts that self-hate cycle that i'm trying to overcome.

I just want to enjoy life and the journey. The last couple of years have been painful and I'm ready for a new season. But I have to go through this season first. God's not going to let me give up and He's not going to take the hard things away in life that I have to deal with. I just have to stay super focused and keep my eyes on God and go through.

The most important lesson that I learned through this long journey is that your strength is directly connected to the relationship and oneness with God. If you lose your focus and stop seeking Him, you lose your strength. Make sure you seek Him daily and you keep your eyes focused on Him and His will for your life. The times that I lost that focus, I choose to sin.

Another lesson that I learned is seeking things or food will never make you happy. Only the joy of the Lord will make us happy. How many times have we been tempted by our flesh telling us that if you eat that certain thing, it will make us satisfied, happy, content, etc..... Never happens. And then for some reason, we are still tempted to think that if we eat more of that item because that first initial portion didn't satisfy us, that more of it will.

I'm tired of being a screwed up mess. I know that I need to give me mess to God and let Him fight my battles for me. Just why is that so hard for my prideful self to do? Or, after I let the Lord fight a battle for me, I slowly take it back because now I think I can handle it on my own. It's like, ok thanks God, but now I can take care of it from here... And then you get yourself back into the same hole that you came from. And that same hole is where i'm at now...