The Advantages of Christian Weight Loss

Christian weight loss programs offer powerful advantages over traditional weight loss programs. I know: I was once 240 and a size 22. I tried many of the popular diets and would lose the weight, but it always came back – plus more. Now that I’ve lost the excess weight and have kept it off for several years, I realize that the only difference between failure and ultimate success was my faith.

I’m convinced that Christian weight loss principles hold the key to success because they hit at the core of needs that we all have:

1. The need for unconditional love
2. The need for a sense of self worth
3. The need for significance

These needs can only be fulfilled through a strong relationship with the Lord. Many people indulge in addictions to fill an emptiness inside. I myself struggled with food addiction, even eating entire cakes to deal with stress and frustration. However, once I made a decision to turn my addiction over to God and allow Him to heal me, then everything changed.

Here are some of the ways that I benefited from practicing Christian weight loss principles in my own life:

• I learned to love and accept myself. Even before I lost a pound, I decided to anchor myself in God’s love through regular prayer, praise, worship, and study of God’s Word. As I grounded myself and experienced God’s love personally and claimed my identity as God’s child and His special creation, I then gave myself permission to love and accept myself as I was. This served as the basis my decision to take care of myself through healthy eating and exercise.

Before, the diets were a reaction to my idea that something was wrong with me and needed to be fixed – a negative place to start with! But the time I succeeded, my desire to lose the weight came from a positive place because I knew that the best way to demonstrate my self love was through practicing positive health habits.

• I developed a sense of self worth. During my prayer time and through my bible reading, I became convinced that I was precious to God. My body is His temple and as such has value. I become convinced that I was created for a purpose and the only way I was going to be able to fulfill that purpose was to do the things to become healthy, energetic and vibrant.

• I discovered my significance. Through deepening my relationship with God, I found that I had a purpose in life. My life mattered. Because my life mattered, then I was no longer content to live a stressed out life of constantly running but not getting anywhere. I slowed down and savored the moments in life. I stopped smothering my feelings with food and trusted God to help me deal with the more painful ones. And as He healed me, I began to look for ways to use my talents to help others. Because that is what life is all about – using your gifts to make a difference.

The benefits extend far beyond a diet. See, losing weight is not about living a diet. It is about living your life and structuring it in such a way that it supports health. Your health is like a well. Many of us draw from it but don’t put anything back into it. I did that for years! But sooner of later, the well empties and you experience illness and disease. But choosing a more balanced approach to health and weight loss, as Christian weight loss principles provide, help you to not only lose weight more effectively, but enjoy yourself on the way down.