Believe

My two oldest granddaughters spent this past weekend with me, so there were lots of snuggles and giggles over the past few days, along with the requisite Disney movie. We spent part of Sunday afternoon curled up in my bed watching "Lion King," a movie I hadn't seen in a long time.

Once scene really caught my attention, when Simba (main character) was challenged to be the king he was born to be. His departed father told him, "Simba, you forgot who you were." It made me wonder about how often we've forgotten who we were, or perhaps we've stopped believing we could ever be any different than the way we are right now.

As strange as it sounds, the story of Simba reminded me of another story, only this one is found in the Old Testament and is about a man named Gideon. Gideon thought of himself as the weakest person in his family, which was the weakest family in his clan - he was the self-proclaimed weakest of the weak. His city was surrounded by a feared enemy and he ended up hiding in a winepress, where he was threshing wheat for his family. He was a weak man in hiding, and he couldn't see himself any other way. What is amazing to me is that when the Lord approached this weak man who was hiding in a winepress, God referred to him as a mighty warrior. God asked Gideon to lead a group that would end up freeing his city from the enemy, but God didn't wait until after the city was liberated to refer to Gideon as a mighty warrior - He called him that before Gideon had done a thing.

There is so much potential in each one of us, potential we often don't realize. God created each one of us with the potential to do great things, but sometimes we get so bogged down with our "stuff" that we stop believing that things can ever be different than they are right now. We may feel a lot like Gideon, just trying to survive, so if someone referred to us as a "mighty warrior," we'd be looking around to see who else was there. But God sees beyond where we are - He sees what we can be.

The question for us is, do we believe it? Right now, most of you are on a journey that you hope will end with you at a healthy weight. Do you believe you'll get there? Do you believe that your life will change in all kinds of wonderful ways? I'm not saying that all of your problems will be over when you reach your goal, because they won't. What I am saying, however, is that the journey to get to your goal will change YOU in a lot of wonderful ways. Learning to change old habits and to relate to food in a new, healthy way will change you. Learning how to deal with stress and the stuff of life in healthier ways (instead of reaching for food) will cause you to stretch and grow in ways you can't imagine. You just might find out that you really ARE a mighty warrior :-).

So be encouraged! So many wonderful changes are just ahead, and you'll get there one meal and one on-plan day at a time. Believe it!