Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you.” Matthew 6:33 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Be faithful and trust God”

In yesterday’s devotional I made the statement that the most important step any of us can take in order to handle our finances better is to put God first on your prioritized budget list. Make tithing and generous giving your number one budget priority and then trust God for the rest. The way that God has chosen to finance His work in this world is through the faithful and generous giving of His people. And if you will be one of those people, He has promised to care for you in return.

This is a subject I personally struggled with for many years, first as a new Christian, and then when my family and I answered the call to full-time ministry. As new Christians, we didn’t have much room in our budget for tithing and sacrificial giving. It was something we had to work at and continue to increase over time as we cleaned up our finances and learned to put God at the top of the list. And then, when I accepted the call to full-time Christian ministry, it was with the understanding that for the rest of my life I would be earning significantly less than I could have in some other, higher paying profession. I struggled with that for a while.

But Linda was much better with it. She adopted Matthew 6:25-34 as a promise from God to her. That is what we call the “Do not worry” passage of the New Testament. It’s where God tells us to simply honor Him with our finances and with our lives, and then to trust Him for the rest. I can’t count the number of times over the years that she reminded me of this passage. And lo and behold, it has always proven to be true. We’ve never been rolling in the dough, but we’ve never been homeless or hungry either. Our needs were always met and we were always comfortable. God provides.

But please understand, when it comes to “God providing”, it’s true that God will always do His part, but it’s also true that we have to do our part. We have a responsibility to handle our finances well. We are to give generously; we are not to be frivolous or extravagant with our spending; we are not to create lots of debt in order to get things we don’t really need; and we cannot expect God to step-in and magically clean-up the messes we have irresponsibly created. God will do His part but we have to do our parts too, and that requires personal discipline, smart decisions, and often, sacrifice.

One of the best resources available today to help Christians establish and maintain good money management skills is “The Total Money Makeover” by Dave Ramsey. The strategies Dave teaches in that book are proven methods for getting and staying financially sound. If your money management skills could use some improvement, I encourage you to consider making “The Total Money Makeover” one of your goals for 2020.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “No one can serve two masters, since either he will hate one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” Matthew 6:24 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Let’s do a better job of managing our money.”

When it comes to making New Year’s resolutions in an effort to improve some aspect of our lives, there will be more resolutions made about diet and exercise than any other subject. That’s the number one subject for New Year’s resolutions. But the second most common resolution is usually about money. People resolve to be better money managers, to pay off bills, to increase savings, to reduce expenses by downsizing, and much more. This tends to be the case because by and large, the average American is not a good money manager.

Although we live in the most affluent society on earth, and although middle-class Americans have the highest standard of living of any middle-class in the world, most of us are not satisfied with what we have and we’re constantly yearning to have something more, something bigger, something better. And as a result, we live beyond our means. We spend too much, we buy things we don’t have the money for, and we end up getting ourselves into deep debt.

What we’re supposed to do is live below our means. In other words, whatever your current income is, structure your lifestyle so that your living expenses are comfortably less than your income. That means the home you live in, the car you drive, the luxuries you treat yourself to, all add up to less than your income. That way each month you always have a little bit more than you need. And, don’t buy things you don’t actually have the money for. Instead, save for what you want and buy the thing when you have the cash to pay for it. But, that’s not how most Americans live. Instead, the average American spends more than they earn and they live in deep debt.

The Bible teaches that money is neutral. It’s just a tool that’s necessary for living, and it comes to us as a gift from God. But like every other gift we receive from God, we are to use it wisely and we are to be good stewards of it. Interestingly, there are few subjects the Bible teaches more about than money and possessions:

• Nearly half of the parables Jesus taught had to do with money and possessions.
• Almost 25% of all the words Jesus spoke had to do with some form of stewardship.
• 1 out of 10 verses in the Gospels deal with money.
• And although I haven’t counted them myself, I have heard and read numerous times that more than 2,000 Bible verses pertain in some manner to tithing, money, or possessions – more than twice as many as prayer and faith combined.

Since how we handle our money is obviously important to God; and since it is the second most common category of New Year’s resolutions; and since it’s an area of life where most of us need to be doing a better job; we will spend the next few days considering it.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “Instead, I discipline my body and bring it under strict control, so that after preaching to others, I myself will not be disqualified.” 1 Corinthians 9:27 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Exercise your body”

I have a friend who is a medical doctor. He’s a good doctor but he has a little bit of a sly and even warped sense of humor. I was in his office one time and noticed that taped to the wall was a cartoon he had cut out of the newspaper. It showed a very old man sitting on the exam table in his doctor’s office. He was shirtless, hunched over, wrinkled, shriveled, obviously arthritic, and he gave the impression of being weak and very tired. The doctor said to him, “Do you remember those ten extra years of life you were hoping to get from all that exercising and nutritious eating? These are them!”

That’s funny, but it’s also similar to what we hear said by many people who don’t exercise or take care of themselves. They say things like, “It doesn’t matter how much you exercise or how good your diet is, you’re going to die eventually anyway!”. True enough. But that’s no reason to neglect your health. Not only do I want to live as long as I can, but I want to be as healthy as I can for as long as I can. Regardless of my age, whether it be forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, or eighty, I want to be as healthy as I can be at that age, enjoying life and living it fully. Bad health makes it harder to really enjoy life and to do the things you would like to be able to do.

In 1 Corinthians 9:27 the Apostle Paul wrote about the efforts he made to discipline his body. In his writing he frequently used military and athletic metaphors to describe the disciplined lifestyle he urges all of us to adopt. I believe he was writing first and foremost about disciplining the body for holy living, but as we have already learned, we also have a stewardship responsibility to take care of ourselves physically.

As I noted yesterday, good nutrition is two-thirds of the health and physical fitness equation and exercise is one-third. We need to eat right, but we also need to exercise our body. The more you move your body, the healthier it is going to be. The more sedate you are, the weaker and less healthy your body will be.

I urge you to have a regular daily exercise routine. Many people find it helpful to join a local gym. There you can find all the right equipment, there are also trainers to guide you and give you advice, and there are other people to work out with and who will help to keep you motivated. If you want to workout at home, there are many video programs available to guide you. The website http://www.beachbody.com has an entire series of them for all ages and fitness levels.

Although ideally your workout routine should include a mix of cardiovascular and strength training, even a brisk and vigorous 30-45 minute walk each day will go a long way towards improving your overall health and fitness.

Activity is a sign of life. A lack of activity closely resembles being dead. In my opinion, the more active you are the more alive you are, and the less active you are the closer to being dead you are. I encourage you to move that body! Plan to incorporate a good daily exercise program into your new healthy lifestyle in 2020.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, a New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “God also said, ‘Look, I have given you every seed-bearing plant on the surface of the entire earth and every tree whose fruit contains seed. This will be food for you …” Genesis 1:29 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Avoid the bad food”

Good nutrition is two-thirds of the health and fitness equation. Exercise is the other third. If you have a good diet you will maintain a healthy body weight and your blood chemistry numbers will probably be within the proper parameters. Exercise then, will help burn additional calories, it will improve cardiovascular function, and it will strengthen muscles and improve muscle tone. But having a good diet is the most important factor when it comes to getting and staying healthy.

The fast and simple rule of thumb for having a good diet is “Just eat moderate amounts of reasonably healthy food.” That’s it. Just eat foods that are good for you, and in the proper proportions. Simple, right? No. Not so simple. Since we have to contend with the conditioning and chemistry issues that we thought about in the previous two devotionals, maintaining a good diet is not easy or simple. We need help.

I have already noted in a previous devotional in this series that prepackaged meals like Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, and Weight Watchers can provide a helpful kick-start to getting us back on track with respect to good eating habits. They provide complete nutritious meals in the right proportions. It’s easy and it takes all the guesswork out of it, and you don’t have to stay on those diets long-term. You can use them for a shorter period simply to get the weight off and to reestablish proper eating habits, then you can transition to one of the other eating guides I will list below.

“The Daniel Plan” by Rick Warren is instructive and helpful. For me personally, the most insightful lesson taught in that book is that the closer our food is to its natural state, the better it is for us. The more a factory has been involved in the production and processing of that food, the more additives and artificial ingredients it will include and therefore the unhealthier it is likely to be. That’s true whether we’re talking about fruit, vegetables, meat, and certainly, sweets.

The “P90X Nutrition Guide”, available from Beachbody.com, is pretty straight-forward and easy to follow. “Body by God’, by Dr. Ben Lerner is good too.

“Simple Ideas for Healthy Living”, published by Gospel Light, is a neat little book with lots of practical suggestions. Did you know that if you drink an eight-ounce glass of water 15 minutes before your meal it will have the effect of decreasing your appetite and you will therefore eat less? Try it!

Often, especially early-on as we’re trying to correct our eating habits, we need a little help to take the edge off of our appetite. Many people have found a natural appetite suppressant known as “Green Coffee Bean Extract” to be helpful. Of all the appetite suppressants on the market today, this one seems to offer the greatest help with the fewest side-effects. You can Google it to learn more.

Your body is a gift to you from God. We have a stewardship responsibility to take good care of our bodies, and good nutrition is perhaps the most important factor to being healthy. I encourage all of us (me included), to resolve to eat better in 2020.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the wild animals that the Lord God has made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You can’t eat from any tree in the garden’?” Genesis 3:1 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Processed food can be addictive.”

Since the Garden of Eden, Satan has been trying to get people to eat things they shouldn’t eat. Yesterday we considered how manufacturers and marketers of food products condition us to overeat. We’re constantly inundated with advertisements for food; food itself is available everywhere; and portions sizes are far too big. Over time, all of that conditions us to consume much larger portions than our bodies really need.

However, in addition to the marketing strategies and the intentionally large portions, chemistry also plays a role in getting us to eat more. In his ground-breaking book “The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite”, Dr. David Kessler provided substantial researched-based evidence which proves conclusively that the food industry has colluded to intentionally make processed foods addictive in nature. Dr. Kessler is a highly respected medical doctor who has served as the Dean of the medical schools at Yale University and at the University of California San Francisco; and he has served as the Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration under two Presidents. His credentials are impeccable.

In his research, conducted over decades, Dr. Kessler discovered that the food industry learned how to scientifically manipulate certain elements in processed foods in order to make the food addictive. What they did is similar to what the tobacco industry did with nicotine in order to make cigarettes more addictive. His findings have been validated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; by the U.S. Surgeon General; by the Center for Disease Control (CDC); and it has spawned investigations and hearings in the U.S. Congress.

Dr. Kessler’s book is a fascinating (and somewhat infuriating) read. It will inform you, but it will also make you mad. Fortunately, just as in the case with the addictive nature of cigarettes, there are steps we can take and strategies we can employ to combat and pushback against the schemes of the food industry. Dr. Kessler dedicates much space in his book to that subject. I encourage you to read it.

So, when it comes to gaining control over and cleaning up our diet, we will have to be intentional about it and we will have to have help. Conditioning and chemistry can be tough factors to fight back against. Tomorrow, as we conclude the dietary part of our thinking about possible New Year’s resolutions, I will suggest some additional resources that you might find helpful.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “Do not join those who drink too much wine or gorge themselves on meat, for drunkards and gluttons become poor, and drowsiness clothes them in rags.” Proverbs 23:20-21 (NIV)
Our thought for today: “Learn to eat less.”

“Hi, my name is Jim and I’m a glutton.” It’s true. If there was a recovery group called “Gluttons Anonymous” I would be a charter member. I love food. I love it too much. Eating is one of the pleasures of life and I’m very, very good at it. My tendency towards gluttony is something I have had to battle my entire life.

Food is a gift from God and it is meant to be enjoyed. As we learned yesterday, the primary function of food is to provide fuel for our body, but God also made food tasty and He gave us taste buds so that we can enjoy it. But as is true of all of God’s gifts, we are to use food responsibly and in the right proportions. It’s when we abuse and misuse the gift that it becomes a problem. In our day most of us eat too much. Why do we eat too much? It’s complicated. There are many factors that fold into it but the two primary reasons are conditioning and chemistry. We’ll think about conditioning today and chemistry tomorrow.

We’re conditioned in our society to consume large quantities of food. It has been a subtle conditioning that has occurred slowly over decades. The average portion of any serving of food or drink is much larger today than it was thirty years ago. This is the result of an intentional strategy by manufacturers and marketers designed to get us to consume more and more of their products. Thirty years ago, the average serving size of a Coca-Cola at McDonalds was 12 ounces, and you got one serving for your money. Today the average serving is 32 ounces and you can have as many free refills as you want. Thirty years ago, the average person consumed a regular sized single cheeseburger and a small order of fries. Today it’s rare for anyone to purchase a burger smaller than a quarter pounder; often it is a half-pounder, and the fries are extra-large.

To maintain a healthy weight the average-sized American adult should consume approximately 2000 calories per day. However, in many sit-down restaurants today a single dinner plate with sides and desert can consist of a full-day’s calorie intake (and often more than that). So, you’re getting your entire calorie intake for the day in that single meal! (When I eat in such places I often ask for a take-home box to be brought with the meal. Then I immediately take half the food off of the plate and put it in the box to take home.)

A simple rule-of-thumb when it comes to maintaining a good diet is to train yourself to eat small portions of reasonably healthy food. However, that’s easier said than done. To help gain control over portion size, and to begin conditioning yourself to eat less, pre-packaged meals can be helpful. Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, Weight Watchers, all produce complete meals in the proper serving sizes, and these can be helpful as we train ourselves to stop overeating. At first you will probably find the smaller portions problematic, in that it won’t seem to be enough food to satisfy you. But that’s only because you’re used to eating so much more. After a couple of weeks your body will begin to adjust to the new portion size, your stomach will begin to shrink back to its normal size, and you will find yourself increasingly satisfied with the smaller, more appropriate portions.

The biggest reason we overeat is because we have been conditioned to do so by manufacturers and marketers. But chemistry is also a factor. We’ll think about that tomorrow.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “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 upon 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.” Daniel 1:12-15 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Improve your diet”

The single most important factor contributing to good health and physical fitness is good nutrition. There’s an old saying that tells us “You are what you eat.” That’s truer than most of us realize. To a large degree your body weight, energy level, blood chemistry, the condition of your internal organs, the quality of your sleep, and your overall feeling of wellness, is determined by the kind of food you put into your body.

Food is the fuel your body runs on. Imagine putting dirty fuel with impure elements into your car. Some of that fuel won’t combust properly and therefore the engine won’t produce the power it should; you will also not get the fuel efficiency you should be getting; and, unburned gunky deposits will build up on the internal parts of your engine and foul it.

That’s what bad food does to your body. That’s why you don’t feel good; it’s why you are tired and overweight; it’s why your blood pressure is high and your arteries are clogged. The kind of fuel we put into our body matters – it matters a lot!

In Daniel 1:12-15 we read of the time Daniel and his three young friends had been drafted into the king’s group of promising young men. They were being trained for a lifetime of service to the king. The group was being fed meals from the royal kitchens, which apparently included lots of rich and unhealthy foods like greasy meats, pies, wines, etc. Daniel and his friends objected to that diet and they asked the supervisor to allow them to eat a healthy diet of vegetables and water. He agreed, and after only a short time the difference in the health and appearance of Daniel and his friends, compared to the other guys on the diet of rich foods, was immediately obvious. Daniel and his friends were much healthier.

The kinds of food we put into our bodies is a critical factor in getting and staying healthy. Most of us (including me) would benefit from making a New Year’s resolution to improve the quality of our diets. Tomorrow I will recommend some resources to do so which you may find helpful.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “Don’t you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Take care of your body”

Without question, the number one New Year’s resolution that will be made in 2020 will have to do with diet and exercise. More Americans will resolve to lose weight and get in better physical condition than anything else. Literally millions of people are unhappy with their current weight or physical conditioning, and they will attempt to do something about it.

Good thing too. Americans are amazingly and inexplicably unhealthy. In study after study, when ranking the most developed and richest nations in the world regarding the overall health of their citizens, the USA consistently ranks close to the bottom of the list. People are healthier in Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Japan, Spain, Finland, Portugal, and Austria.

How can that be? The USA has the most advanced healthcare system in the world. We have the highest standard of living of any developed nation. We have more access to wholesome and nutritious food than anyone else. There are more gyms and exercise facilities per capita in the USA than in any other place in the world. And yet, in terms of things like obesity, hypertension, type two diabetes, heart disease, mental illness, substance abuse, suicide, and other health indicators, we are close to the bottom of the list among the developed nations of the world.

In 2016 the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) determined that at least 40% of the adult population in the USA is obese. Not just overweight, but obese. In 2017 the CDC reported that 100 million people (almost 1/3 of the entire population) either already has type 2 diabetes, or is in a pre-diabetes condition.

Clearly, we have a problem. A serious problem. And as Christians we have to take the problem seriously and we have to try to do something about it. Our physical body is a gift from the Lord. And as with everything else God has entrusted us with, we have a stewardship responsibility to take care of our body.

Since diet and exercise is an issue Christians need to pay attention to, and since it will be the number one New Years resolution made, it will be the first one we will consider in this series (after that attitude adjustment we talked about yesterday).

Tomorrow we will consider the important subject of having a good diet.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim

Our theme for this month: “A New Year, A New Beginning”

Our Bible verse for today: “Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in everything; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Don’t stifle the Spirit.” 1 Thessalonians 5:16-19 (CSB)

Our thought for today: “Fix that attitude!”

Some of us need a serious attitude adjustment. You’re not going to fix much of anything else in your life until you fix your attitude. Perhaps you’ve heard that clever old saying that goes, “A bad attitude is like a flat tire – you’re not going to get very far until you change it!”

It’s true. A positive, optimistic attitude is like a turbo-charger for life. It will propel you forward. A negative and pessimistic attitude is like a flat tire that you can’t drive on. Or, shifting metaphors, it’s like an anchor that you drag behind you, it slows you down and holds you back.

My favorite book about approaching life with a good attitude (besides the Bible itself) is “The Traveler’s Gift” by Andy Andrews. It’s a story about a man named David Ponder whose life is a train wreck. His biggest problem is how he thinks about himself and about his circumstances. So, God takes David on a trip through time to have encounters with historical figures, each of whom teaches him a powerful life-lesson about the importance of thinking right and of having an optimistic and positive attitude. You can read the book yourself (and I hope you do), but this morning I’ll offer you a summary of two important life-lessons David learned about having a good attitude:

With respect to being happy: “Happiness is a choice. I can choose to think thoughts and engage in activities that bring me joy. I choose to be happy. I smile at people. People are drawn to me because I have joy in my heart, a smile on my face, and laughter in my voice. Life itself is a privilege. I choose to live it with joy and to the fullest. I do not deny the reality of my situation, but I do deny the finality of it. This too shall pass. I choose to be happy.”

With respect to persistence and perseverance: “I hold fast to my dreams and visions. I stay the course. I do not quit. Fatigue is often a precursor to victory. I will not be one of those who gave up just before the victory would have come. I waste little time worrying about how things are now, and focus instead on how they are going to be. In the game of life nothing is less important than the score at halftime. Trying times produce great men. I will persist and persevere.”

If you read that book, all throughout it you will hear the words of the Apostle Paul in the lessons learned by David Ponder: “Rejoice always. Pray constantly. Give thanks in everything.” And, (this is important), “Don’t stifle the Spirit.”  The implication is that if you are negative, pessimistic, prayerless, and ungrateful you are hindering the work the Holy Spirit wants to do in your life.

Wow, you better fix that attitude!

As you go forward into 2020, a positive and optimistic attitude will be essential to helping you accomplish your goals for the New Year. So first and foremost, I encourage you to work on that attitude.

God Bless,
Pastor Jim