A few Saturdays ago a friend was in town, so he stopped by to visit me. As I walked out of the house he took one look at me and said, “boy you have gotten fat!” He actually continued to talk about how fat I had gotten, and made me promise to lose weight by the time he came to visit again.
My first response to his statement was surprise with some frustration….
but my second response shame
because He was right, I HAD gotten fat!
The truth is I’d known I was heavy for a while (combination of treats from my Christmas barrel, and lack of exercise). But I kept on making excuses about it (I’ll start training tomorrow). The Lord knew I needed someone to confront me about being overweight, which is why He sent my friend.
So last Sunday I began working on getting more exercise
- By walking to places locally instead of driving
- Starting strength training through an app
- And getting started on longer training walks
While starting this exercise program I started to ask myself “how did I get fat?”
In the past people always told me I had the OPPOSITE problem of being TOO SKINNY! When I came home for two-weeks of Christmas in 2018 my mom and dad were shocked at how much weight I lost (it comes from being in a tropical climate, and walking). I can remember friends expressing concern about how skinny I was in 2019, at which time I wore a small shirt!
So did I become fat?
It’s easy……….
I GOT LAZY!!!
It probably began with unhealthy habits that didn’t involve activity developed during 2020 (I stayed at home). After a while that added some weight to my body, and got me out of shape. Shortly afterward the walking done during ministry and visitation that used to be so easy now resulted in being out of breath, and exhausted. So I began to pull back on the activity (it hurt after all) and became even more overweight.
The Lord used last week to remind me that laziness of all kinds creeps into our lives slowly (never overnight). We don’t realize its a problem until the day that short walk fills our lungs and legs with pain. And because laziness didn’t come overnight, it cannot be conquered overnight.
Monday evening I was a bit discouraged while going through the core training with my exercise app
- I couldn’t do the exercises properly
- EVERYTHING HURT
- And I couldn’t do it as long as I was supposed to!
The Lord then reminded me it wasn’t about being pretty or perfect….it was about doing the work
In the same way, we conquer laziness but focusing not on results, but simply showing up
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