Why God Wants You To Take Care Of Yourself

I'm currently watching Joyce Meyer's Battlefield of the Mind. At one point she goes on a slight tangent about taking care of ourselves -and why we DON'T that really hit home with me:

You only get one body… You can’t go somewhere and order another one…You destroy this one, you’re out!

God wants to work through you; and if you destroy your health and you destroy your body, then He can’t do anything through you either. So you’re cheating yourself, you’re cheating Him, you’re cheating the people around you that God wants to use you to bless.

I think a lot of people don’t take good care of themselves b/c they got a bad attitude toward themselves they don’t think they’re worthy of doing the things they need to do to take care of themselves properly.

Some of you think that all you’re good for is work, work, work, work, all the time you grew up in an atmosphere where the only time people were happy with you was when you were working and producing. And the devil’s got you convinced that to enjoy your life is carnal and a sin. READ John 10:10

WOW! Jesus came that we might have life and that more abundantly!!!

But, especially for those of us with social impairment, we have found that people only "liked" us when we were working hard to please them or make them look good or doing something for them. And so we run ourselves into the ground trying to prove our worth for other PEOPLE, instead of guarding ourselves, and protecting ourselves, so we have enough energy to be used by HIM.

If you are interested in watching her video or reading it's accompanying book, here's the links:

Hating Yourself Will NOT Solve the Problem

I will expound on this more when I get home from work, but right now I have been constantly re-playing the following conversation in my mind:

Thought #1: Argh! I can't believe I am so stupid (fat, ugly, insert whatever). I HATE myself!

Thought #2: Wait now, hating myself will not solve the problem. I've been working out, taking better care of my grooming, trying to get more organized (etc). These things are solving the problem. But hating myself will not solve the problem.

I feel a small sense of victory, because a couple weeks ago, thought #2 wouldn't have entered into my process. It was just a constant string of, "I hate myself," mostly in reaction to some bad news I received two months ago. I guess the moral of the story is, if you know anyone who is really hating themselves right now, encourage them to look at what they can actively do to make their lives better. This will help them combat the depression that comes with self-hatred. At least, it's helping me.