How many days out of the year should health matter?
Commitment.
Are you a committed individual? Or just interested? In life. In all things that bring an abundant life.
I received a text message today from Christy Jones, director of UpStreet production at my church… UpStreet being the environment for elementary kids that makes them love church… it is why we decided to make Northpoint our church home years ago… an environment that we truly believed would make our kids love church.
Anyways, she texted me “We had a volunteer asking if you were a Baptist preacher on Sunday. LOL. We said no. He is a passionate chiropractor and loves Jesus.”
Ha! My gig at church is to make the Bible come alive when telling kids about Christ. Perhaps I was a bit excited this past Sunday… it was a good story. But the thing I was really committed to teaching the kids was a promise from God… Joshua 1:8 “… Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
Prosperous and successful at what you might ask? Cash? Stature? Power? I would say sure… maybe…. perhaps… maybe not. But if you surmised, success in life, confidence, peace, joy and rich in faith. You see, these are the things that give us comfort. Fearlessness comes from these things, and a confidence that all things will work out for good. My superpower happens to be this. Faith in the positive outcome.
So I want to take that thought, and back track to the question. “How many days out of the year should health matter?” It is a straightforward question, but the answer is not as straightforward as you might think. I mean, doesn’t it seem like the simple answer is everyday? But do you eat like it is every day? Do you control stress like it matters everyday? Exercise? Sleep? Keep yourself free of toxin? So how could you say everyday if you are wishy washy on these questions?
Which brings the next question. How good is good enough? How good do you have to be, to be good enough? Good enough to survive? Good enough to thrive? And do you even have the ability to influence it at all? Let me give you the rest of that verse, the front of the verse that I left out initially.
“Keep this book of the law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
Suddenly we are left feeling like we have a job to do in order to achieve this prosperous and successful life. This is where grace and works come crashing together in my mind. It would be hard to find an atheist among us who could argue that it would make more sense to live a life in opposition to the ten commandments, than to uphold them. Right? They would argue that they are not of God, but they would surely see the value in most of the ten. Basically a blueprint for loving your neighbor. And though the ten are not even a smidge of the total guidance of the Bible, if we just use those alone, it makes sense to expect a better life if we follow them, than if we do not.
So we go back to the question again. How many days should health matter?
According to the passage, if we want the full and complete blessing of success and prosperity, then we should keep the letter of the law on our lips at all times. It seems to me that we should then, be considerate of keeping the commitments of health on our tongue, and in our minds and our hearts, at all times. Every day.
I want to invite you to watch the Foundations I introductory class on Monday night at 7pm, either live at HealthSprout, or live on Facebook on the 60 Day Turnaround FACEBOOK PAGE.
https://www.facebook.com/60DayTurnaround/
Be well and Be blessed! – Dr. E