The light bulb goes on and more fat machinery

Last week I had a personal epiphany when I was reading Day 9 from TW. on page 89 it says:

"He holds your future and longs to give you His hope."

I began meditating on this sentence. He absolutely and eternally holds my future. What does that mean? I know I'll never be perfect in this body, but I know that I will be totally free from sin in heaven. That is my future. That is my hope/assurance. I quote that "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength" and that I am "more than a conqueror" in Christ, but do I believe it? If I did I would live like a person who knows that my future is free from gluttony. It would be like if an athlete were told, "You'll win gold at the Olympics. It is fore sure. You just have to train now to become that person." The Lord has told me that I'll be free (maybe not until heaven) so I should start living like that free person.

I can't say enough how this is changing my outlook. The other day I wanted a snack that I wasn't hungry for. Rather than whining on the inside "Oh poor me! I have to give up so much!" I said to myself, "The Yvonne of the future, the one freed up from gluttony, doesn't eat like this," and it's easier to walk away.

All that from one little sentence.

I did the Day 10 reading on Saturday. I love the eagle in the chicken yard story. My Sunday school teacher has been using that for years as an illustration of how the right thinking makes all the difference. His famous (well, to those who know him) quote is:

Belief causes behavior.

This weekend was our Sunday school class'/community group's annual retreat. We get out of the heat and head north to the mountains. It's beautiful and serene. We studied Ephesians this weekend and had a lot of fun. I knew going into it that I would face some fat machinery. We always have a ton of food and there is a tradition of having an additional snack table. There is a tendency to eat so many snacks that we're not really hungry for meals. I made a decision before we went that I was not going to spend my weekend living off of the snack table. That doesn't mean that I was going to make the table a taboo (it's not about the snack table), but that I would consciously wait until I was hungry and wait for meals. I'm not going to die or pass out if I don't eat at the exact moment when I get hungry. As it turned out, it was a pretty good weekend for me in the realm of food and I wasn't complaining of being too full like usual. Praise the Lord. This was a huge step for me.