5 Things Christian Weight Loss Is NOT
Is weight loss always about vanity and fitting into this world? Those lines get blurry but here are 5 things Christian weight loss is NOT.
I stumbled across a blog post on Pinterest that really disturbed me.
“You see, faith-based weight loss plans are not about honoring God. They’re about vanity. They’re about diet culture. They’re about fitting in with this world. And, quite frankly, I’m not about that. “
This was written by another Christian woman. I’m sure her intentions are pure. She is obviously passionate about breaking diet culture and wanting Christian women to focus on honoring God.
I actually reached out to her on Instagram (she had comments turned off on that particular blog post) to start a dialogue about this, but she stuck to her guns. She believes weight loss should never be the goal of a Christian because it is always pursuing vanity.
The quote above is just a small snippet from her post, but, as someone who ran a Christian weight loss program for about a decade that was not at all about pursuing vanity and all about pursuing Christ, I vehemently disagree with her.
See, I didn’t get into Christian weight loss because I wanted to make sure church pews were full of skinny people.
I consider it a calling to share my story, my experience, my knowledge, and my gifts to encourage, equip, and empower Christian women to break the chains in their lives.
Because of my 100-pound weight loss journey, I believe I am uniquely equipped to do just that (though I did go on to pursue more formal training to become an ACE-certified health coach, as well).
I know how much my weight held me back from living boldly for Christ. I experienced firsthand how closely my weight and my emotional eating were tied to deep-rooted shame.
My weight loss journey was not about getting skinny. It was about developing the fruit of the Spirit, overcoming insecurities, learning to run to God before food, and finding freedom in Christ.
Losing weight helped me to improve every area of my health – physical, mental, and spiritual.
So, here are a few things Christian weight loss is NOT in my book.
Christian Weight Loss Is NOT…
1. Using your weight to measure your faith.
Never listen to anyone claiming that because you are overweight, your faith isn’t strong enough.
You are not a better Christian if you weigh less. You are not a worse Christian if you weigh more.
Your Christianity is based on your relationship with Christ – nothing more, nothing less.
“Skinny” is not your ticket into heaven. Jesus is.
You are a child of God and He cannot love you any more than He already does (which is a whole heck of a lot…far more than we can fathom!).
2. Using your weight to measure your worth.
Just like your weight does not measure the strength of your Christian faith, it also does not measure your worth.
Your identity is in Christ and cannot be shaken, no matter what your physical body looks like.
The number on the scale is not a measure of how worthy you are of love.
Need more proof? Check out these Bible verses on body image to see what God has to say about your appearance.
3. About using shame as motivation for healthy living.
In my experience, most women experience a lot of guilt and shame after binging or overeating (I sure used to myself!) but I encourage women to trade their shame for God’s grace.
Now, I do believe that regularly overeating is a sin.
The definition of gluttony is “habitual greed or excess in eating” and I believe God wants you to eat in a way that takes care of the body He gifted just for you.
But we serve a God who meets us in our sin.
If we can admit our sin and ask for forgiveness, we are rewarded with grace upon grace from our loving Heavenly Father.
I believe you can glorify God in your eating and make exercise an act of worship.
I don’t believe God uses shame to motivate us to make better choices.
I believe He uses unconditional love instead, not to justify or claim that our sinful choices are okay, but to meet us where we are and show us a better way.
4. Twisting Scripture to claim a specific “Biblical diet.”
There are diets out there, like The Bible Diet and The Daniel Plan that pull the foods specifically mentioned in the Bible into a biblical diet plan. From the information we have, Jesus most likely ate a mostly plant-based, clean diet, similar to the Mediterranean diet we have today.
They didn’t have readily available fast food, family-size bags of Cheetos, and king-sized candy bars back then, so the Bible doesn’t specifically speak of those by name, but I do believe it gives us the guidelines for how to handle them in our diet today.
Does God care what you eat? I fully believe the answer is YES.
But I prefer to let God’s Word speak for itself. Here are 5 Bible verses on healthy eating.
5. Making the primary goal to change your appearance.
This was her main point in claiming that weight loss is always vanity and it’s just not.
Just like C.S. Lewis states that humility is “not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less,” I believe the same is true for our appearance.
We shouldn’t talk down to ourselves about the way we look, we should just care less about our appearance in general.
When the women in our program lose weight, we never hear them claim, “Gosh, I just love the way I look now!”
Instead, we hear about women:
- dropping their A1C numbers
- getting off of diabetes medications
- being able to get on and off the floor to play with their grandkids
- having so much more energy
- feeling their worth in Christ
- being able to wear their wedding rings again
- falling in love with cooking
- growing in self-control
- breaking the cycle of binge eating
- …and so much more.
Those victories are not about becoming the thinnest, skinniest, prettiest women around.
They are about finding freedom, choosing to live within the healthy boundaries for their specific bodies, and living purposely for Christ.
Of course, you always have the choice to lose weight for your appearance. You can choose vanity to be your goal in healthy and unhealthy choices.
But you also having the choice to use your weight loss as a way to offer yourself as a living sacrifice to Christ.
So, no, I absolutely do not believe that Christian weight loss is vanity.
Christian weight loss can be the most Christ-honoring, beautiful transformation of your body, heart, and mind. It sure was for me.
I am a grateful member of Robertson Wesley United Church in Edmonton Alberta, Canada.
I strongly object to your calling over eating a sin. I know like alcoholism, overeating is a compulsion and an illness not to be condemned in such a negative way as calling it sin.
I love God. And I commit to a calorie counting daily intake of food until I lose all the weight I need to for a healthy body.
And yes, I definitely want to feel well and look as attractive as I can for myself and for God.
Please treat your female followers with compassion and with love.
Do not condemn their overeating as sin. Christ loves us and does want us to be healthy with healthy weight loss. But I don’t believe that God is saying you are filled with sin because you are over eating. Again I must stress that this is an illness.
Hi Charmaine,
Thank you so much for starting this discussion. It’s such a worthy one to have!
I’m so sorry you felt condemned when I said overeating is a sin in this post. I’ve talked about that idea in a little bit more detail in other posts, but I didn’t go into it much here and, of course, this is general information and may not apply in the same way to every single person reading.
Just as I described in my post, condemnation and shame are the opposite of my goal here at So Very Blessed. I believe the enemy runs on shame and condemnation but God confronts our sins with conviction out of a place of love for the purpose of growth and that is always my goal in sharing anything on my website – to encourage, empower, equip, and help you recognize anything getting in the way of your relationship with God.
That’s what overeating can be for so many women (it sure was for me). I had unintentionally made food an idol in my life. I was turning to food for problems only God can fix. It was an area where I lacked self-control. I was treating my body poorly and regularly giving in to temptation.
Was it an illness in my own life? I can’t confidently claim that it was or wasn’t and I certainly won’t claim that in anyone else’s life.
I just know that from what I’ve learned in my Bible studies on gluttony, in my own experience, and in the experiences of thousands of women I’ve worked with, overeating is not just a food issue. It’s a sin issue that’s rooted deep in our/their hearts and that’s why I believe God speaks so harshly about gluttony in the Bible – because it’s getting in the way of our relationship with Him.
I have a post that dives deeper into the Bible verses on gluttony/overeating here if you’re interested – https://soveryblessed.com/bible-verses-on-gluttony-overeating/
I am so sorry my heart of compassion and love didn’t spill over into my words here as you read them. My passion for Christian weight loss stems from my heart for women, wanting them to partner with God to destroy any strongholds in their lives and experience more and more intimacy with Jesus.
I’m also always open to discussions and growth. As I said, I sure don’t know everything! God is teaching me more and more every day. I’ve brought your comment before Him in prayer and will continue to dive into His Word for guidance here.
I so appreciate you sharing this with me and I’m so encouraged by your love for God and your commitment to taking care of your body.
Blessings,
Becky
I look forward to reading more up on your page. I have attempted to loose weight many times successfully but never have kept it off. This time I’m trying to do it with God. I need to loose the weight for my health I will be 40 this year I have diabetes and high blood pressure. And I have a 6 year old girl I’d like to be around for years to come. Finding some faith based sights are great.
I so needed to hear this at this stage of my journey. I have been struggling to keep the focus on obedience to Christ, but I also want to feel good, be able to move freely, be a good testimony, feel better about myself, and get off any and all meds as well as getting my A1C to a non-diabetic level. I’ve struggled with the balance and have felt guilty that I was looking at reasons other than just obedience for wanting to lose the weight; this post helps put it into perspective. With 30 pounds gone and about 150 to go, I needed the renewed motivation. Thank you for your honesty, transparency and obedience to Christ!!
Thank YOU for sharing your story with me and for your kind words, Diane!
@Diane Nickerson, Yea for 30 lbs gone!! I have dropped off 11 lbs on a 70-90 lb reduction journey. I believe in slow loss because I put it on slow and stable. I want to take it off slow and stable. Learning to make new choices along the way that I will be forever willing to live by.
Hi Becky! I agree totally with you!
Thanks so much, Dawn!
I totally agree with you Becky ! I have always tried to lose weight for the wrong reasons. What you are doing is super helpful ! Thank you for courage to stand up for your beliefs!
Thank you so much, Emily! I definitely started my weight loss journey for all of the wrong reasons, but it sure is amazing how the Lord transformed my heart along the way!
I love this post, Becky! I agree with you 100%.
Thanks, Teresa!
I wonder… maybe these other people have never experienced the hopelessness and bondage of food addiction. I have been clean & sober from alcohol & drugs for 16 years but I struggle with food every day.
Thank you for your ministry & sharing that hope & freedom through the power of the living Word of God is possible!
Beth, that’s such a good insight. You’re right. If someone has never struggled with a certain problem, it sure is hard to fully emphasize with their path.
Thanks for your encouraging words!
I agree with you, Becky. I don’t think it has to be about vanity. It can be. But I think that our Christian witness is affected by our appearance. How people view us is affected.
Getting victory over food can be an exercise in Christian obedience and discipleship, and overcoming the flesh. Overcoming selfishness: all of that business of “I want what I want.” And it’s a lifelong struggle, too. Just like Christian discipleship is a lifelong engagement.
It is TRUE that we can focus on weight loss for the wrong reasons. This is actually something I’ve been thinking about a lot, recently. And for myself, I want to make it more about obedience than any other reason. Weight loss is actually a complex problem, very complex, involving body, soul and spirit. And each situation is unique.
I completely agree, Cynthia! It’s so important for us all to be on guard against doing good things for the wrong reasons.
Thank you so much for this! You have really nailed the reasons for Christian weight loss. In all my experiences in weight loss over many years, putting Christ as the center of my journey keeps everything in perspective. Keep on doing what you are doing as it truly is a blessing.
Yes to putting Christ as the center! He puts everything into proper perspective. <3 Thank you for your kind words, Janis!
I couldn’t agree with you more! I know my mind is in a much better place when I am eating healthy and I feel like I am in control of food instead of binge eating. I feel so ashamed of myself when I binge eat. I decline doing things and I even don’t feel as comfort at church when I am heavier. Eating right is not being about skinny, it is about being healthy. I love that God is on this journey with me. He wants me to be my best self and he knows that I am better when I am a healthy weight. I am a better mother, wife and I am even more active in our parish. I feel better and I am able to move much easier which puts a smile on my face. When you see someone happy and with a smile on their face then it can become contagious. I am also more open minded to hear new views, try new things and just enjoy life. Thank you for you emails and your blog. I really appreciate all that you do!!
Absolutely, yes to everything you said! It’s not just about weight but your weight sure does affect every aspect of your life! Thanks so much for your encouraging words! <3
Amen! My weight loss is about having a healthy body so I can serve the Lord beyond my expectations. Often times, my heart used to break because I just physically could not do things to honor Jesus. I just sense that this dear sister has been hurt or shamed because she didn’t look right by the world’s definition.
I don’t want to look like a model; I just want to look and feel healthy and be all that God had created me to be.
Kathleen, I had the same feeling about her. I tried to affirm parts of her perspective and connect in an encouraging yet firm way, but she was just dead set on her position and didn’t seem open to my perspective. I’m always saddened when Christians can’t come together and be open to iron sharpening iron in that way. I’m always open to learning more but the conversation definitely needs to go both ways!
Hey Becky,
Stay the course. You and Sara have a wonderful perspective. Thank you.
Thanks so much, Rebecca! It’s been such a wonderful blessing to be able to team up with Sara.
I love that you are encouraging everyone to lose weight to be healthy, not to compete with skinny people or to have attention drawn to yourself. THIS MAKES SENSE!!! Thank you for this blog!
Thank you so much, Donna!
Beautifully said, Becky! Thanks for standing up for what you know and believe to be true. May God be glorified as you serve Him…and us. So grateful for your teaching.
Thank you so much, Mary! I’m so grateful for YOU. Thanks for your encouragement and sharing pieces of your life with me. <3