Do you ever get on a health kick? You know, when you must
honestly admit that you’ve had one too many French Fries lately, that diet cola
really isn’t a great choice compared to the sugared stuff, or that you’ve had a
small mountain of those shiny foil-wrapped chocolates for the endorphins (Even
if they are dark chocolate, you know it doesn’t justify the extravagance. Oh, please, I’ve claimed endorphins, too).
What do
I do? I go to the store and load up on all that beautiful produce with lofty
ideas of magnificent smorgasbords of health prepared for each meal. Lettuce for
salads, of course. Salads are the epitome of healthiness. If you’re stocking
up, get that big tub of lettuce. Smorgasbords need the big size of everything.
Before you know it, that tub’s in my cart. Do you do that, too? Or am I alone
in this quest for balance between fries and optimal health?
Right
from the beginning let me be clear. There are no smorgasbords at our house.
That’s fantasy. But we do have a couple good salads until demands shove other
salads and some of the veggies out of the way. Then when I find the that big
tub of lettuce, I discover something, and not for the first time. The lettuce
around the sides of that tub look good, but there are some slimy leaves in the
center. From there is a race to see which takes over faster: the slime or my
disinterest in sorting through the lettuce to separate the good from the bad.
What I eventually do is give up on the tub and lettuce in general for a while.
Recently
I spoke with someone about clothes shopping. She said to me, “Did you ever buy
something that really didn’t fit that well, or you didn’t like that much, but
you just wanted to buy something?”
Ouch!
Yes. Instantly my green shirt came to mind. I was feeling old and rather insecure
that shopping day. And I was sure those new shirts (it wasn’t just the green
one that I bought) were going to make me look younger and, therefore, make me
feel more secure. Wrong!
When I
got home, I realized the green shirt didn’t even fit me that well. It was too
big. It’s now reserved for sloppy days
at home. I got some compliments on the others that I wore and still wear, but
they didn’t take a single year off my life or make me feel any more secure.
By now
you’re probably asking: “What does that slimy tub of lettuce have to do with
your clothes shopping?” Both are about an internal problem. That tub of lettuce
looked great on the outside—I checked—and I had a heart problem the day I
shopped for clothes.
Now,
slimy lettuce is just slimy lettuce, and I don’t have a lot of suggestions for
it except compost. But my heart
needed a solution that day, and for my heart there was and is one. Jesus and
the truth he teaches me about who I am fill that hole every time. Whenever I’m
off balance and not living up to who I was made to be, I have a heart problem
that’s only solved in returning to him for my identity. The knowledge that he
loves me however old I am and even if I’m wearing a gunnysack was truth I
neglected the day I shopped to fill in the hole in my heart. And no amount of
clothing I stuffed in a bag was enough to fill the hole in my heart.
What’s
your hole? Is it being filled by Jesus? Whatever it is, he can take care of it.
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