10 BIBLE VERSES ABOUT FOOD, HEALTH, & DIETS
10 Bible Verses About Food, Health, & Diets
As Women, one of the topics that is constantly on our minds is food. This could be when we are starting a new diet or trying to get healthier, planning meals to cook for our families, or when thinking about the condition of our current health…it all comes back to food!
We live in a world with constant access to social medias that are filling our minds with unrealistic body image expectations surrounding food. The contradicting views on diets, body image, and food can be detrimental for our confidence, stress levels, relationships, and all over health.
So, how do we find the TRUTH in a noisy world with unrealistic standards to food, health, and diets?
Well…by filling our minds with God’s truth. Once we have a firm foundation about what God says then it makes living it His truth on a daily basis much easier.
These are 10 Bible verses to help you get a better understand on God’s truth about food, health, and diets.
Ecclesiastes 8:14
“Go, eat your food with gladness and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for God has already approved what you do.”
When our hearts are troubled and we aren’t joyful it can cause us to use food as a source of comfort. It’s easy to be tempted after a long stressful day to decompress with a tub of ice cream or a bottle of wine, but the problem with this is it can turn into a negative habit that really doesn’t make our troubled hearts feel comforted in the end anyways. Most of the time it can actually lead to us feeling worse.
Each time we feel stressed or over whelmed we should start running towards God instead of food.
God wants each of us to bring our troubles, no matter how big or small, and lay them at his feet. By doing this he will begin to heal our hearts and the situations. Allowing God to be our source of comfort will give us our joyful hearts back so food can be a source of nourishment for our bodies instead of false comfort for our troubled hearts.
2. Isiah 1:19-20
“If you are willing and obedient, you will eat good things of the land; but if you resist and rebel you will devoured by the sword.”
Obedience is defined as submission to another’s authority. So, when we fully submit our lives to Jesus and trust he will take care of us, we get an overwhelming peace knowing He is working out His perfect plan for our lives.
The bible says the word of God is sharper then any two edged sword ( Hebrews 4:12 ). So, if I am in a season of true submission to Jesus, then that means I am believing in ALL the positive truths He says about my life instead of the lies the enemy tries to make me believe.
No matter how long the negative tape has been playing in your head that you aren’t good enough, you will always be over weight, you are a disappointment, etc the word of God (sword) can break those chains once and for all!
When we feel good about ourselves and are believing in the positive truths God has spoken over our lives then we are more willing to fill our temples (bodies) with the good foods of the land in obedience, just like it says in the scripture above.
3. 1 Corinthians 10:31
“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”
Have you ever started a new diet right before a vacation, to fit into a bridesmaid dress, or any other event? I know I have in the past and it’s not ungodly to get healthier or loose weight before an event unless the real motive behind the change is ungodly.
For example, when choosing to loose weight before a vacation with the intentions to feel better about yourself in a bathing suit so you can swim with your children and make lasting family memories. Then that wouldn’t be going on a diet with ungodly intentions, but if your intentions were secretly to look better then other Mom who was joining your family on vacation then that would be ungodly intentions for starting a diet.
Our motives or intentions either glorify God or they disgrace God. It’s important to pray to God about our true motives and allow him to reveal things to us that we might not even realize we are feeling. Our human nature can easily get caught up in comparing ourselves with others, especially when it comes to body image, but prayerfully allowing God to shine a light on some of our fleshly darkness can help us bring true glory to Him with all of our decisions about our health and dieting.
4. Proverbs 27:7
“One who is full loaths honey from a comb, but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet.”
For many years anxiety had a strong hold over my life. I was ignorant to the realization of how bad it really was at times. I would try and control it on my own with little success. When my kids were little and needed so much of my attention daily is when I really came face to face with how much of a hold anxiety had on my life.
When I was trying to “fix” my anxiety issues myself I would find myself constantly eating…mainly sweets! Most days I didn’t even realize how bad it was because it was becoming a habit. The late night emotional decompression or beige eating after everyone went to bed was the worst. I thought I was just trying to blow off some steam, but really I was trying to fix my anxiety with food instead of God.
Eventually a good friend introduced me to a positive morning routine. This included getting up at least an hour before the kids work up to have time for 3 things…faith, food, and fitness. Making the choice to fill myself with God’s word first thing would give me the inner peace I needed to combat my anxiety throughout the day. Situations that would normally cause me to emotional eat during the day weren’t anymore. I was full of God’s peace first thing each day, so I wasn’t using food to fight my anxiety battles.
Until we have God’s peace we will always be “hungry” without ever getting full, no matter what we are trying to fill the void with it will never be enough!
5. 1 Timothy 4:8
“For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”
God does put value in physical training or exercise because he intricately created our bodies and knows we need to use exercise to keep our bodies strong and healthy. When we work out, the act of physically moving our bodies is stress relieving and our brains naturally release endorphins, also.
Endorphins, which are structurally similar to the drug morphine, are considered natural painkillers because they activate opioid receptors in the brain that help minimize discomfort. They can also help bring about feelings of euphoria and general well-being. Studies have linked low levels of serotonin and norepinephrine to depression. It's not just that exercise leads to an increase in serotonin and norepinephrine which may, in turn, reduce depression and stress. Exercise may actually help ward off depression and anxiety by enhancing the body's ability to respond to stressors.
I believe that God wove this into our beings for a specific reason to show the importance of taking care of our bodies, choosing to carve our time for ourselves (exercise), but he still wants us to understand that physical training alone won’t be enough! We still have to lay our stress and burdens at his feet for healing through prayer. He is the one to ultimately lift us out of any hole we might be stuck in because of depression.
6. Revelation 14:12
“ This calls for patient endurance on the part of the people of God who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus.”
One of the big things about living a healthy life is understanding that it is a life long journey, not a short term diet or quick fix. It’s so easy to look at other people who have had an awesome weight loss transformation and think, “Gah…why can’t that be me”! Viewing that person’s journey in reverse from the end to the beginning without truly understanding all the obstacles they had to over come or how they had to practice patient endurance on the days when they felt like they weren’t making any progress at all, can cause us to start this unhealthy “comparison game” with ourselves.
This verse says that as a people of God we are to keep his commands. The 10th commandment he gave Moses says, “You shall not covet your neighbor’s goods”. When we start comparing our health journey to others that have had more success we are coveting their goods or progress in their health journey. Each journey is different and consists of different obstacles, so I want to encourage you to look at someone else’s success as motivation to endure the hard times in your own journey to be able to reach similar success as they have had. Having a new mindset of motivation vs comparison takes aways the sin of coveting their success and causing you to feel negativity about yourself and your journey.
Everything happens in God’s perfect timing! You might just need to endure a little longer before His perfect time has come to pass for YOUR journey. Positive thoughts produce positive action, but negative thoughts produce negative action.
7. Proverbs 16:24
“Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.”
If you took a day and recorded how many negative thoughts and negative words you said out loud about yourself, would the number surprise you? Most people have a negative record that is on auto pilot never shutting off. It could be the words of our past, something we made up about ourselves, or fear of the future. Either way these words are keeping you chained to the disbelief that you aren’t good enough to live a life of health and happiness.
Choosing to give this pain and negativity over to God allows him to heal our pain and changes the song that plays inside us.
He says through him we are beautiful, more then a conqueror, special, worthy, and much more!
Believing these words deep down in our souls breaks the chains of emotional eating, certain food addictions, anorexia, and bulimia. Take a day to really review and analyze the record that is playing daily in your mind telling you who you. If that tape doesn’t speak the truth of who Jesus thinkings you are then it’s time to prayerfully give the pain to Him for healing!
8. Hebrews 10:23
“Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”
Hope is the feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen. When we start eating better foods or decide to start dieting we are hopeful that we will feel better, possibly loose some weight, and have more energy. These are all really great things to be hoping for. God promises in the bible that through his strength we can do all things ( Philippians 4:13 ). So, about day 3 of your new diet or clean eating and you start to loose hope or feel like giving up, remember that Christ will give you the strength to keep going even on the most difficult days.
Having hope is a very important part of life, but if you never saw the things you hoped for come to pass wouldn’t it be hard to stay hopeful in future situations?
This is why consistency is the key component to God’s strength with in us. When we are consistent in prayer, our daily clean eating + fitness routines, and thanksgiving we will eventually see the goals we are hoping for come to pass because the one who promises is ALWAYS faithful!
9. Exodus 20:3
“You shall have no other gods before me.
Have you ever considered worshiping a golden calf or statue like the people of the old testament did? Probably not, right!?! Thousands of years ago “other gods” or idols were gold statues but in today’s society they can look a little different.
I remember when I first started training for a 1/2 marathon. I thought I was never going to be able to get past the 3 mile mark then slowly I was able to do all 3 miles, then 5 miles, and eventually 8+ miles at one time with out stopping during a training session. It was such an awesome feeling to accomplish and crush goals I thought I would never have done before in my life. I became addicted to pushing myself harder and farther each training session and soon found myself focusing most of my time and energy on getting in the best shape I could before the actual race. With out really realizing it I was letting the “self accomplishing goals” of this 1/2 marathon become an idol in my life. I was focusing more thoughts, energy, and time on the training then I was with God.
Running or exercise isn’t a sin, but allowing our lives to become saturated with only focusing on the next bigger fitness goal is a sin.
Understanding limits and knowing when to we have gone to far is important. If you aren’t sure if your current fitness training has become an idol or not, try praying and asking God. He will reveal to you the areas you need to adjust to be back in balance with Him as your ONLY God!
10. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;
20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.
I’ve never actually been to a modern day temple, but the thought of going to my church home and dishonoring it by breaking a window, coloring on the wall, or any other type of vandalism just makes me sick to my stomach. Well, that’s how God feels when we don’t honor our physical temple ( bodies ) that the Holy Spirit dwells in.
Each person has a specific purpose from God planted on their lives. Some of these might be very physically challenging and others mentally challenging purposes, so it’s important to keep our temples in the best shape possible mentally and physically to be able to full fill His purpose over our lives.
I know what your probably thinking…I would never purposely harm myself. Well, harming our temples usually happens a little at a time.
One late night beige eating at time, one bottle of win at a time, one to many anxiety meds at a time, one to many….you fill in the blank… at a time. No matter how we deal with stress or troubles in our lives if it is harming our bodies, causing us to be over weight, or mentally unhealthy then we are not being good stuarts of our temple the way God said we should.
Addiction of any type is very hard to over come, but food addiction is one of the hardest because it’s the most denied forms of addiction. Most people addicted to food are in denial that they really have a problem with food but instead blame their weight issues on other factors. Friend, God is soo much stronger and bigger then ANY type of addiction and He can heal you from the pain and suffering it causes in your life!! You simply have to let him. Opening up to God in prayer allows those bonds to be broken and healing to begin.
I pray these verses give you some direction on your journey to better health and open your heart to the truth that God can heal any addiction, chains, or negative tapes that have been playing in your mind for years!
Sister, YOU were created in God’s image and His image isn’t bondage but instead pure joy! ( Genesis 1:26 )
If you are struggling with anything to do with food, health, diet, or body image and need some supportive prayer. I would love to support you and pray for you. Please feel free to reach out to me @ marleeemuhlbauer.coach@gmail.com
Have a blessed week,
COACH HELP
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