Will We Have Enough Food?

"Therefore, I tell you, Don't worry about your life, & what you will eat or drink; or about your body, & what you will wear. Isn't life more than food, & the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not: sow; reap; or store away in barns, & [still] your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren't you much more valuable than they? Can anyone of you add a single hour to your life by worrying? And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. [Still,] I tell you that not even Solomon, in all his splendor, was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, & tomorrow is thrown into the fire, won't He much more clothe you-you of little faith? So don't worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, & your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But first seek His Kingdom, & His Righteousness, & all these things will be given to you, as well."   Matthew 6:25-33 NIV Bible [adapted]  

Years ago, before the Lord God [allowed] this great weight loss of 80+ pounds, I used to worry about my finances all the time, and about having enough money to pay the bills. I used to buy powdered milk, because we quite often didn't have enough milk for the kids to last until the end of the month.

I spend a great portion of my days calculating, and recalculating my budget, trying to think of strategies that would make the money go further. All this worrying didn't get us very far. I may have saved a few cents here, and a few cents there, but it didn't make a dramatic difference in our finances. Then, I read this Bible verse, after having read it so many times, it finally clicked. Through this passage, the Lord God was telling me that He would take care of what we need to eat, if I would only listen and turn to Him, rather than turning to excess food for comfort from my financial worries. 

And once I started listening to what He said to me through this passage, it made an immense difference in my finances, in our ability to buy the food we needed, and in my weight loss, because He showed me that I could turn that over into His very gracious hands, and He would take care of that, as well. And He has kept the majority of that weight off for over 40 years!

In the Deep Darkness

 You [have] laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps,[a.k.a. deep waters.] Psalm 88:6 KJV 

Sometimes, it's so easy to look at all the gloom and doom in the world, and feel like our future is bleak, like the darkness in this passage. But I have to remind myself periodically, that the Lord God is loving, and if I continue to focus on Him and His love for us, He will get me through whatever lies ahead.

I used to think I was heavy, and I could only imagine being thinner, but the Lord God made it a reality, after living most of my life trying to hide my feelings in layers of fat. It was amazing when He showed me that's what I was doing. Instead of dealing with my feelings, I was turning my stress and worries over to food to comfort me. He showed me that food had not only become a crutch in my life, but a false god, because I turned to food instead of to Him. Once, I started putting my food, body, eating, and fears in the Lord God's gracious hands, my whole life changed.

It's not like I wasn't a Christian, and then I became one. I had been a Christian from early in my life. It's more that as a Christian, I was the one who hid my feelings, and emotions in the deep pit and felt like I was in the darkness. The Lord God didn't do that, and once I started turning all my worries, etc, over to Him, I didn't have to worry. I didn't have to rely on food anymore for comfort, I just needed to rely on the Lord God. So, whatever happens ahead, the Lord God will be by my side, even when all feels bleak!