What’s Keeping You From Making Time to Be Healthy?

Who is in Your Peanut Gallery?

I used to work as a wellness coach for a Christian organization which, among other things, actively promoted the health and well-being of its members. In a department meeting one day, my boss asked us these questions: Does it matter to God whether we are healthy or not? And why do we, as health educators, focus so much on nutrition and exercise when health and wellness actually encompass so much more than that?

Christians are well-acquainted with the concept of our bodies as a temple in which the Holy Spirit dwells. (1 Corinthians 6:19, 20) Beyond a moral obligation to health, a well-nourished and fit body allows you to “do” the rest of life much more effectively.

Good nutrition and physical fitness lay the foundation for health and wellness. Rather than being clouded by pain and discomfort, the mind of a fit and healthy person is clear and can pursue other things—such as listening for God’s voice and discovering the individual purpose to which God calls each one of us. Moreover, healthy people live longer! And they experience a higher quality of life in their later years. That means a healthy person will be around longer to accomplish his individual God-given purpose. Additionally, statistics show that healthy employees miss fewer days of work and are significantly more productive on the job. That means a healthy person can accomplish more of her individual God-given purpose!

Now, if in fact your health matters to God, then doesn’t that make being healthy in and of itself a part of His purpose for your life?

As a wellness coach, I frequently hear the “too busy” excuse for not exercising or not eating well. In all honesty, I’ve used the excuse myself! As if what I have on my to-do list is so much more important than what God asks me to do! In that staff meeting, my former boss made another significant point: God will never ask you to accomplish more than is humanly possible in the amount of time He gives you. In other words, there is always enough time to do what God asks you to do. He not only calls you to an individual purpose, but He provides you with the resources necessary to accomplish that purpose: time, energy, talents, money, and the support of family, friends and other believers. We each get 24 hours a day; if He wants us to be healthy, then there is no such thing as not having time to exercise and eat healthy—unless we are focused on the wrong things.

That begs the question: If I am consistently unable to find time to exercise and eat healthy, what is filling my time that might be outside of God’s will, and why? What keeps us from exercising and eating healthy when we know it’s so essential to living well, and may even be part of God’s purpose for our lives?

For one thing, Satan’s oldest, most common (and effective!) ploy is to keep us so busy doing “good” things that we neglect the “best” things. We become “humans doing” rather than human beings.

We all have what you might call a peanut gallery of people watching our lives, whose expectations we try to fill. Who is in your gallery? It may be your dead grandmother, your spouse, your boss, your parents, your children, your neighbors… How much are these people’s expectations, spoken or unspoken, shaping your life? What things are you trying to accomplish that you might be able to let go of and still be doing what God asks you to do?

A good friend and former professor of mine explained once that she begins her day by making a to-do list of the things she wants to accomplish that day. Pausing a moment before rushing out to attack the list, she prays over it. “God, please help me to accomplish what you want me to accomplish today. Help me to let go of what’s on this list that is not important to You, and be open to the new things that present themselves that are important to You.”

“Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:1, 2

Consider whose expectations are influencing your daily decisions, what you’re trying to accomplish that may be “good” but not “best”, and how you might arrange your life to better accomplish God’s purpose for you—and be sure to make time to build a healthy foundation!