Honoring God

How do we honor God with our health, nutrition, and temple?God is the giver of all things, everything we have is a gift from Him. Our bodies are included. Most of us look at our time, money, jobs as a gift from God. Stewardship is more than that though. God wants us to manage every part of our lives in a way that will maximize our influence for his kingdom. That includes how we take care of our bodies. The Bible tells us, “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 NIV).

“Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, because of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.”

Romans 12:1 NIV

Worship is a lifestyle that brings glory and honor to God, that makes him look good.

How do we honor God with our health, nutrition, and temple?

-Temple

-Training

-Nutrition

-Discipline

-Fruit of our habits/Fruit of the spirit

-Balancing Act

-Gratitude 

TAKING CARE OF OUR BODY/TEMPLE

Don’t you know your body is a temple for the Holy Spirit? Therefore honor God with your bodies. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20

• Imagine how well the people used to take care of the temple, the most holy dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, it was probably so well taken care of, pristine, immaculate, every little detail was impeccable. We should do the same for our bodies through physical training and nutrition. 

EXERCISE

For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value in all things. 1 Timothy 4:8

• Physical training is of value. Your goal of health and fitness can’t just be about you though. It’s not wrong to want to look good, feel good, or live longer. However, our training and fitness should be about more. I call this being fit for more and strong to serve. 
• God gave us a body so we can’t say that our bodies do not matter. They do. The fact that they are God’s creation that he has gifted us with says enough. We should be a good steward of our bodies and honor God with it by exercising.
• Let us not forget the importance of moving and that Jesus walked everywhere! 

NUTRITION

Dietary moderation and food for life

• Self-discipline in food consumption
• Food that is alive gives us life

Self-discipline in eating, choosing nutrient-rich minimally processed whole foods because they will provide our body with energy and nutrients it needs to feel and function best. Practicing moderation and discipline because not all things are beneficial for us like eating more than our daily bread, and eating processed, nutrient-poor foods. 

“Therefore I tell you: Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing?”

Matthew 6:25 CSB

“So Daniel said to the guard whom the chief eunuch had assigned to Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, “Please test your servants for ten days. Let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink. Then examine our appearance and the appearance of the young men who are eating the king’s food, and deal with your servants based on what you see.” He agreed with them about this and tested them for ten days. At the end of ten days, they looked better and healthier than all the young men who were eating the king’s food. So the guard continued to remove their food and the wine they were to drink and gave them vegetables.”

Daniel 1:11-16 CSB

“and put a knife to your throat if you are given to gluttony. Do not crave his delicacies, for that food is deceptive.”

Proverbs 23:2-3 NIV

DISCIPLINE

We are to have self discipline in all things 

• In our physical health
• In our nutrition
• We practice the disciplines of prayer, spending time alone with God, reading the Bible, we should also practice self-discipline in our daily eating habits and health habits of exercising. 

“I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I might be disqualified.”

1 Corinthians 9:27 NLT

“Now everyone who competes exercises self-control in everything. They do it to receive a perishable crown, but we an imperishable crown.”

1 Corinthians 9:25 CSB

FRUIT OF OUR HABITS/FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT

As we are growing in our walk with the Lord we will produce fruits of the Holy Spirit. God wants our lives to be evident in our walk with him by the fruit they produce. It will show through our character, we will exude love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. 

I believe that our level of health and wellness can be witness to other Christians and non-believers. The fruit of healthy habits will show on the outside. We discipline ourselves to build spiritual health, and to produce good fruit and witness to others but do we discipline ourselves in our physical health to bring glory and honor to God? How is our level of health witnessing to others?

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things, there is no law.”

Galatians 5:22-23 NIV

BALANCING ACT

Physical fitness is a balancing act because we are to take care of our bodies to bring honor to him without becoming narcissistic or self-consumed. However, our health and fitness can be used to bring honor to God, we can be role models to others in how we take care of our temples.

As Becky Conzelman once said “Fitness is not a great God and it will fail you”

“I’m thankful for fitness, but it’s not a great god! And it will fail you. But our God, my Abba Father, that I came to know through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ- He will never fail me!”

GRATITUDE

Our bodies are a GIFT from God, and our HEALTH is a gift from God. Give God THANKS that we are healthy, have a body, a temple he has given us, and gifted us with. Give him thanks that we have life, that we GET to take care of our temple, our body, we GET to train, we GET to move, we GET to eat healthy. We are very blessed, some people don’t have the level of health that we have, some people don’t have the level of mobility that we have, people who can’t walk, some people don’t have access to healthy food. GRATITUDE for our health and our bodies, gratitude for being able to train and eat healthy brings glory to God, AND gratitude is a healthy attitude that contributes to our overall health. 

Final thoughts:

We are more effective in His kingdom, in our families, in our work, when we are healthy. 

“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”

1 Corinthians 10:31 NIV

However, Our goal is not how good we look, not how much we squat, bench, clean, snatch. Our goal is not to be on the top of the leader board. Our goal is not PR. Our goal is not dominance. 

Our goal is Him. To know Him and be known by Him. Our goal is to know His love and to be in Him. Our goal is to love Him and love our neighbor. 

“My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to His death.” Philippians 3:10

“I pursue as my goal the prize promised by God’s heavenly call in Christ Jesus.”

Philippians 3:14 CSB

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us”

2 Corinthians 4:7-9 NIV

-Charissa

Charissa is a Performance Coach, Certified Nutrition Coach, Certified Fitness Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer, and holds a B.S. in Kinesiology. She also holds an M.A. in Higher Education Administration. She is a follower of Jesus, passionate about faith, fitness, nutrition, a lifestyle of total health, meditating, learning and growing!