Body image and weight issues are two of the most overwhelming issues a person deals with on a daily basis. We have a constant reminder on billboards, radio, TV and in the news that obesity is an epidemic in the United States.

For those struggling with weight problems, much of this information just adds to the hopeless feeling they have.

Information shows us the need for change, but transformation gives us a desire to change. In my years of struggling with my weight, I did not realize that I was actually becoming addicted to food because of the food choices that I made. I did not realize that I was playing into the hands of the world that is under the god of this world (2 Cor. 4:4) that was setting me up to steal, kill and destroy my health and eventually my life.

When I saw a sign that said, “The devil wants you fat!” it was a jolt to my mind. It became very real in that moment what was going on in my life. I hate the devil, and the last thing I wanted was to please him.

In that moment, I had a desire to change. This was a God moment. It was not just information, but it was a transforming thought placing a burning desire in my heart to change. It was a moment that brought repentance and an awareness that I was responsible and accountable for the way I had cared for my body.

Talk about getting my attention. I cried out to the Lord for help. I asked Him to give me a word for this situation in my life. Daniel 10:19 says, “So when he spoke to me I was strengthened, and said, ‘Let my lord speak, for you have strengthened me.'” At that moment I needed strength.

Soon after this jolting moment in my life during my devotion time, the Lord spoke clearly in my spirit: “Break the habit.” Break the habit? That’s it? How easy is that? Well, I soon found out it was not easy. This was not just a food problem; it was a spiritual problem that had to be dealt with by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit led me to study nutrition. I became aware how certain foods affected my body. I’m not an expert, and I strongly urge you, if you are interested in losing weight and taking care of your body, to start at this point.

As I studied how chemicals have been added to our food to stimulate our taste buds, stripping the nutritional value and creating cravings that demand these foods, I understood how I had become addicted to certain foods through ignorance. Hosea 4:6 tells us, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”

Once I surrendered my food addiction to the Lord, He gave me a battle plan that worked from the inside out and took 88 pounds from my body. During this time, I never had one thought about how much weight I wanted to lose. I wanted to honor God in my body and spirit, as I am told to do in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. I constantly meditated on God’s love for me as a woman of God made in His image.

I had to walk in forgiveness toward those who had said very hurtful things to me, toward those who had criticized me and rejected me because of my outward appearance—yes, toward those in Christian circles. I had to take responsibility for my actions and guard my heart.

It is possible to get off the roller coaster, fighting the battle of the bulge, when you understand there is a power greater than your taste buds. “Understanding is a wellspring of life to him who has it” (Prov. 16:22).

We can gain information from the world, but the power to change comes from the One who created us.

Joyce Tilney, founder of Women of God Ministries, teaching women today from women of yesterday, is the author of Why Diets Don’t Work: Food Is Not The Problem. To learn more visit her websites at  and .

Several months ago she showed me a picture of teacups, so we started gathering these for the wedding.

I pulled out my grandma’s teacups from the basement; cousin Kayla filled a few boxes from the thrift shop; and my mom got on a stepladder to pull hers down from the top cabinet. Into the dishwasher they all went, on the China setting. After that my preacher man, the investigator, turned them all over to see where they were made.

A cousin took this sweet picture of the teacup she sipped from at the wedding, and it just so happened, out of all that porcelain, she chose this set.

That’s my great grandma’s teacup, my mom said, breathless.

There were little touches of family all through the wedding –the earrings Earl gave to my mother-in-law years ago, a borrowed necklace from Aunt Karyn, and that yellow flower pattern on cup and saucer.

A legacy of family is here, I told my momma.

More than jewels and dishes, there was a set of grandparents teaching Jesus to their kids decades ago. My mom and dad teaching Jesus to us. Me and that preacher man teaching Jesus to our kids.

And then my daughter stood at the altar, and I held it together during a heart squeezing moment in the ceremony (I will not cry, I will not cry) when that young man walked our girl to the Lord’s supper table, tenderly put his left arm around her waist, and opened his Bible with his right hand. We couldn’t hear him, but we could see.

We could see him there, teaching Jesus to her and setting the table for one more generation to know the love of God. Someday my grandkids?

(Lord, have mercy. At least let me get the linens washed and returned to the church first.)

So I ask you, if one fragile teacup can last from one woman to another to another to another, how much more our love for God? 

Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands.  (Deuteronomy 7:9)

There’s something you can do this very day that will endure.

Fear God. Love him.

And someday your great, great, great granddaughter will enjoy the beauty of what you have left for her.

Christy Fitzwater is the author of ‘A Study of Psalm 25: Seven Actions to Take When Life Gets Hard.’ She is a blogger, pastor’s wife and mom of two teenagers and resides in Montana. Visit for more information about her ministry.

Denzel Washington recently told a group of young actors that a good way to make sure you pray every morning is to put your shoes “way under the bed at night” so you “gotta get on your knees in the morning.”

The Academy Award-winning actor was seen speaking to the young people in a video R&B singer and actor Tyrese Gibson posted on Facebook Sunday. He encouraged the group of seemingly aspiring actors to use their talent for good and always remember to pray.

“I pray that you all put your shoes way under the bed at night so that you gotta get on your knees in the morning to find them. And while you’re down there, thank God for grace and mercy and understanding. We all fall short of the glory. We all got plenty,” he said.

“If you just start thinking of all the things you’ve got to say thank you for, that’s a day. That’s easily a day,” he added.

The actor, who is currently starring in a Broadway adaption of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, told the young actors that before every show he and the cast gather for prayer led by a young boy, Bryce Clyde Jenkins, an actor in the show.

“We have a little boy in our show—we’re doing Raisin in the Sun—and we have a circle. We pray every day,” Washington noted. “And his prayer—this boy is prayed up. He just prays that we go out and touch someone tonight. He says, ‘God, somebody out there needs us tonight.'”

Washington also encouraged the group to realize that while it is good to have money, they should not abuse their gifts for material gain.

“And we all have that unique gift to go out and touch people to affect people. Understand that gift, protect that gift, appreciate that gift, utilize that gift. Don’t abuse that gift,” he told the actors.

“You’ll never see a U-Haul behind a hearse. … Now, I’ve been blessed to make hundreds of millions of dollars in my life. I can’t take it with me, and neither can you. It’s not how much you have but what you do with what you have,” Washington said.

Watch the video below.

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“This is my last video. It all has to come to this. Tomorrow is the day of retribution, the day in which I will have my revenge against humanity—against all of you. I’ll be a god exacting my retribution on all those who deserve it. Just for the crime of living a better life than me.”

Those were among the last words of Elliot Rodger, the 22-year-old gunman police say killed six people in a drive-by shooting after stabbing three others to death in his apartment last weekend. Ultimately, he also committed suicide. His agony was on display in a disturbing YouTube video that also recorded the disgruntled virgin youth saying, “You girls have never been attracted to me.”

“I don’t know why you girls aren’t attracted to me. But I will punish you all for it,” said Roger, the son of The Hunger Games assistant director Peter Rodger, followed by crazed laughter. “It’s an injustice, a crime. Because I don’t know what you don’t see in me. I’m the perfect guy. And yet you throw yourselves at all these obnoxious men, instead of me, the supreme gentleman. I will punish you all for it.”

Rodger’s beef wasn’t just rejection from women. Female spurning actually led him into hatred for all mankind. In his YouTube rant, he continued, “I hate all of you. Humanity is a disgusting, wretched, depraved species. If I had it in my power, I would stop at nothing to reduce every single one of you into mountains of skulls and rivers of blood.”

Mass Murder Rising

Startling words. Of course, Rodger is not the only troubled man to go down in mass murder history in recent years with startling words and acts of pent-up rage. For clarity’s sake, the FBI defines mass murder as “four or more murders occurring in the same incident, with no distinctive time period between the murders. These events typically involve a single location, where the killer murdered a number of victims in an ongoing incident.”

Adam Lanza fatally shot 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012. Andrew Engeldinger shot five dead at Accent Signage Systems in Minneapolis before killing himself in September 2012. Army veteran Wade Michael Page opened fire on six Sikh temple members in August 2012. James Eagan Holmes killed 12 people and wounded 58 at the midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises in July 2012. Ian Stawicki opened fire on Café Racer Espresso in Seattle, killing five, in May 2012. Jake England and Alvin Watts shot five black men in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in April 2012. The deadly list of mass murders goes on and on and on.

According to a New York Times investigation published in July 2012, there were only one or two mass murders each decade until 1980. From there, we see a dramatic spike. There were nine mass murders in the ’80s and 11 in the 1990s. The Times recorded 26 since the year 2000—before several of the high-profile mass murders listed above occurred.

The Earthly, Demonic Root

What’s going on here? Why are mass murders really rising? Can we blame mental illness? Lack of gun control? Media hype? There may be many contributing factors to the rise of mass murder, but the root is earthly and demonic—it’s the condition of man’s heart. Jeremiah 17:9 reveals this reality: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?”

And Jesus confirmed the issue: “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Matt. 15:19).

This has always been true, but just as we see the rapid rise of sexual immorality, we’re seeing the rapid rise of other last days signs, like false Christs, false prophets, wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, famines and Christian persecution (Matt. 24). Saints, we’re in the last days.

Paul explained, “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!” (2 Tim. 3:1-5).

Do you see this evidence all around you? Consider the atheist agenda and secular humanists that mock God, failing to realize that He will soon return and longs for them to accept His Son and enter His kingdom. Peter prophesied about such mockers and slanderers: “Knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, ‘Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Pet. 3:3-4). And the book of Revelation makes it clear that in the last days, unrepentant mankind will be guilty of four major sins: murder, sexual immorality, thievery and sorceries, which is drug use and experimentation with the occult (Rev. 9:21).

What’s the Answer?

So, we can blame the rise of mass murders on mental illness. We can blame the rise of mass murders on a lack of gun control. We can blame the media for coverage of the mass murders that puts the idea in the next troubled person’s head. But, ultimately, we have to remember this: Satan was a murderer from the beginning (John 8:44) and inspires these acts in the hearts of those who are slaves to sin.

Much like pastors who commit suicide, it all starts with a thought—and God doesn’t put harmful, destructive thoughts in our heads. That’s why Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, instructed us to cast down vain imaginations that exalt themselves against God’s truth (2 Cor. 10:5). Of course, the lost soul doesn’t know the Word of God, much less understand how to wield the sword of the Spirit against temptations like murder, sexual immorality, thievery and sorceries.

So what’s the answer? If we want to curb the mass murders—if we want to stop suicides and abortions and drug use and other evils—we need to shine a light on the real problem: the carnal nature of lost man that’s so easily influenced by the devil, one who comes to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10). And we need to get busier preaching the gospel and making disciples so fewer lives are lost in this age and in the age to come.

Jennifer LeClaire is news editor at Charisma. She is also the author of several books, including The Making of a Prophet. You can email Jennifer at @ or visit her website here. You can also join Jennifer on Facebook or follow her on Twitter.

An 18-year-old schoolboy has criticized the culture of casual sex, saying it brings unhappiness rather than satisfaction.

Phin Lyman told his school magazine why he is abstaining from sex and described his concern over the level of peer pressure on young people regarding casual sex.

He rejects the idea that he is missing out: “I really believe I am not. The people sleeping around are the unhappy ones.”

Lyman studies at Wellington College, a co-educational day and boarding school in the United Kingdom’s Berkshire.

He notes, “I would say 90 percent of people are drunk when they lose their virginity.

“It doesn’t make them happy and it upsets me to see it.”

According to The Times, which reported the story, he said, “I believe that sex is an incredibly strong symbol of love between two people.

“Think of it as glue. Once you have sex with someone, you’re connected to them emotionally and physically.

“If you tear that bond the rip leaves open scars where the glue once was.

“That’s why ‘casual sex’ never works in the long term.”

Lyman explains there have been occasions when he struggled to maintain his position on the issue: “There have been times I have been in a position where I could have gone and had sex with someone. I have had to step back and say ‘No, I am going to regret it.'”

He comments, “One of the reasons I decided to go public is I am at the top of the school now and I can look down and see there is so much pressure on younger pupils to have sex.”

He also remarks that many boys are educated about sex through online pornography.

American author and poet Maya Angelou, who is best known for her groundbreaking autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, has died at age 86 in North Carolina, her publisher confirmed on Wednesday.

The prolific African-American writer penned more than 30 books, won numerous awards, and was honored last year by the National Book Awards for her service to the literary community.

“Dr. Angelou has passed in Winston-Salem,” said Sally Marvin, of Random House.

No other details were immediately available.

Angelou provided eloquent commentary on race, gender and living life to its fullest in poems and memoirs. Her latest work, Mom & Me & Mom, about her mother and grandmother and what they taught her, was released last year.

“She was beyond simply being a writer of autobiography and poetry. I think she transcended the idea of writing and using writing as a transcendence medium to further the individual,” Harold Augenbraum, the executive director of the National Book Foundation, told Reuters.

“She was an extraordinary symbol in the United States of what can accomplished using the arts,” he added.

Wake Forest University also mourned the loss of Angelou.

“Dr. Angelou was a national treasure whose life and teachings inspired millions around the world, including countless students, faculty, and staff at Wake Forest, where she served as Reynolds Professor of American Studies since 1982,” the university said in a statement.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with Dr. Angelou’s family and friends during this difficult time.”

It added that details about a campus memorial service will be announced at a later date.

I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings, a coming-of-age story in a hostile society in the American South in the 1930s and ’40s that deals with racism and rape, is considered an American classic.

In addition to her many books, she was a Grammy winner for three spoken-word albums. She had a home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where she was a professor of American studies at Wake Forest University.

Reporting by Colleen Jenkins; Addtional reporting by Patricia Reaney in New York and Bill Trott in Washington, DC; Editing by Scott Malone and James Dalgleish

© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved.

On average, fathers spend 6.5 hours per week caring for their children. That’s good news for kids because researchers and parenting experts say any time a father spends with his children is time well spent.

“Children feel most safe and secure when they have the love and acceptance of both parents,” says Michelle LaRowe, author of the book A Mom’s Ultimate Book of Lists: 100+ Lists to Save You Time, Money and Sanity. “And children who have active and involved fathers tend to do better socially and academically and have less behavioral issues than those who don’t.”

Donnelle Johnson, 44, can attest to that.

Her father, Donald Painter, worked long hours, and his work took him away from the family’s rural Oklahoma home for days at a time. But, Johnson says, that didn’t keep her father from being a dad who spent quality time with his children.

“He would find ways to involve us in his life,” says Johnson who attends Parker Christian Center, an Assemblies of God church in suburban Denver. “Sometimes he would even take us on his business trips.”

Painter also instilled in his children a love for the great outdoors by annually taking them to Colorado. The vacations were cherished times, Johnson says, but the little things her father did at home to share his faith with his children had the greatest impact.

“If the church doors were open, we were there,” she says. “Growing up, we always read the Bible and prayed together, too.”

Aaron Cole, pastor of Life Church, an AG congregation in Germantown, Wisconsin, says one of the best ways for a father to pass his morals, values and faith on to his children is through actions.

“As a father, a man can’t have the God experiences for his children, but he can—through his life—lead them to theirs,” says Cole, 38. “That’s the role of a father: to enable and encourage his children to experience God for themselves.”

That’s a sentiment shared by Ted Cunningham, co-author of As Long As We Both Shall Live. He says fathers should be “intentional about the messages they are writing on their child’s heart.”

Johnson says the spiritual life lessons her father passed on to her siblings and to her were intentional and had staying power. Today, Johnson leads worship at the church she attends, and her siblings are both involved in ministry where they worship.

The role fathers play in their children’s lives is absolutely critical not only spiritually, but also emotionally, socially and academically, according to parenting experts.

As is the case with many fathers, 37-year-old John Kudrick leads a busy life. He balances his work as a book editor with family activities, helping care for his three children and church activities. Being intentional when it comes to spending time with his kids, he says, is paramount. 

“I do my best to carve out some chunks of quality time each day with each of my kids,” says Kudrick, who lives in Level Green, Pennsylvania. “But I also look for ways to have daily highlights with them, whether it’s wrestling for a few minutes, playing a board game, drawing pictures or reading books with them.”

Recently, Kudrick took his youngest daughter for a walk at a local park then to a diner for bagels and hot chocolate.

“My wife and I alternate weeks, so, with three kids, that means that every six weeks each of our kids will have gone out and done something one-on-one with Mommy and Daddy for some quality time,” he says. “And the great thing is that it doesn’t have to blow the budget.”  

Quality time and experiences with one’s children, LaRowe says, don’t have to be expensive.

“Too often parents get focused on entertaining, rather than engaging their children,” LaRowe says. “It doesn’t really matter what you do, just take an interest in what your child enjoys doing and spend time doing it together.”

According to Suzanne M. Bianchi, John P. Robinson and Melissa A. Milkie, authors of the Changing Rhythms of the American Family, today’s mothers and fathers are busier than parents of past decades yet they manage to spend as much or more time with their children as their predecessors did.

That’s beneficial, even if the time comes in short bursts of attentiveness or quick words of encouragement. For example, research suggests that children whose fathers regularly ask how their day went and what they learned at school actually do better in school.

Time with their fathers also teaches boys how to interact with other men and how to properly treat women. For girls, time with their fathers can help set expectations on how they should be treated by males. Maybe even more important is that time spent with their fathers lets children know they are loved and cherished.

When children don’t get the attention they crave from their fathers, LaRowe warns, they usually find other ways to get that attention.

“It’s important for fathers to realize that when they don’t spend quality time with their children, it often translates to the child feeling rejected,” she says. “Children may feel like they’re not important enough, not good enough or that they’re just not lovable enough to be around. When that happens, a child’s self-esteem and sense of self-worth can be shattered.”

LaRowe says that can cause boys to rebel against authority while girls might go looking for love in all the wrong places.

A couple of years ago, Johnson and her father hired a guide, a mule train and some horses for a two-week hunting expedition into the Rockies. Each morning they met at their campfire, read Scripture, discussed their faith and prayed before setting out to hunt.

Johnson says she learned something on that trip about her father that she had never considered. “My dad has never stopped being a dad,” she says.

For the original article, visit .

For years, Christians bemoaned the state of Hollywood movies—the sexuality, the language, the violence—while simultaneously wondering, “Will we ever be able to go to the theater as a family?”

Those days finally have arrived, and the films are anything but cartoonish.

With movies such as Fireproof, Courageous and Heaven Is for Real drawing Christians and non-Christians to theaters in droves, faith-based filmmaking has entered a historic moment that should not be overlooked.

At no point in film history has there been so many successful Christian movies backed by Hollywood studios, and at no point has there been so many rising directors, actors and actresses with one goal: making faith-based films that change lives. Christian films that once would have gone straight to DVD now are given a larger budget and a path to the big screen.

Sure, there have been Bible-themed films here and there—Ben-Hur and The Ten Commandments in the ’50s, for instance—but there have never been this many faith-based theatrical films in this short of a time frame, with more on the way.

The “cheesy” element is vanishing—even if there is still room for improvement.

“Where we are in the Christian film arena is kind of where Christian contemporary music was in the early ’80s—where it’s just finding its feet,” says Alex Kendrick, the faith-based mainstay who directed Facing the Giants, Fireproof and Courageous. “There’s so much room to grow. We’re so grateful for what the Lord has done, but we all want to continue growing.”

There’s plenty of congratulations to go around, but Affirm Films, a Sony Pictures Entertainment company, deserves much of the credit. Consider:

• Affirm’s Heaven Is for Real opened at No. 2 in April this year, besting one opening weekend film (Transcendence) that had a budget eight times its size.
• Courageous, an Affirm film, opened at No. 4 in 2011, which placed it two spots in front of another first-weekend movie (Dream House) that had a budget 25 times its size.
• Affirm’s Fireproof was the top independent film of 2008 despite a budget of $500,000—pennies in Hollywood’s eyes. It opened at No. 4.

Those films were even more successful when considering the so-called per-theater average—the amount each movie made, on average, at each location. Heaven Is for Real and Courageous were No. 1 and Fireproof No. 2.

Affirm also was behind Soul Surfer (2011) and Moms’ Night Out (2014), two films that had respectable openings, and the studio has two more films slated for release this year: When the Game Stands Tall (Aug. 22) and The Remaining (fall).

The modern-day faith-based film movement got its spark from Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004), which grossed $370 million in the U.S. and showed Hollywood—and everyone else, for that matter—there was a gigantic market hungry for faith films.

Two years later, Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Georgia, put together Facing the Giants, which was made for $100,000 and grossed $10 million—100 times its budget. The lesson? A good message, and not a massive budget, was what attracted Christians.

Kendrick and his brother, Stephen, began casting for their fifth feature film in April of this year. They have yet to release a subject or title.     

“It’s still a young arena,” Alex Kendrick says, referencing the faith film industry. “It’s very exciting.”

It’s also exciting for fans to watch Christian films attract more well-known talent. Moms’ Night Out featured Sean Astin (Rudy, Lord of the Rings), Patricia Heaton (The Middle, Everybody Loves Raymond) and Sarah Drew (Grey’s Anatomy), while When the Game Stands Tall will star Jim Caviezel (The Passion of the Christ).

Some debate what constitutes a faith-based film, but not Alex Kendrick. The Kendricks mostly target the church with their movies, with the goal of awakening and convicting Christians. Other directors and producers, though, seek to make movies that have more crossover appeal. Both types of movies, Kendrick says, are needed.

Besides, he says, there’s very little competition among Christian moviemakers. Kendrick starred in two faith-based films (including Moms’ Night Out) in which he was “only” an actor and not part of the crew. He says he wants to see all faith-based films succeed.

“This synergy that we’ve got going is wonderful and needed,” he says. “We all want to grow in our presentations, honoring the Lord with the right stories that He wants us to tell, and certainly with our production quality.

“We’re able to help each other raise the bar.”

Loving the homeless is their calling. Now, as a church, they face homelessness themselves.

“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I” (Is. 58:6-9, NIV).

Having once been homeless, pastor Mike Hobby and his wife, Linda, felt called by God to establish a church in Quartzsite, Arizona, to minister to the physical needs of the homeless and hurting.

Only miles from the border of California, Quartzsite attracts tens of thousands of RVs and, due to the warm temperatures, numerous homeless who come to sleep in the desert. It’s the perfect town for the church named the Isaiah 58 Project of Arizona.

Providing a free clothes closet, place to shower, job counseling, transportation and approximately 13,000 meals every winter season to the homeless, the church of the Isaiah 58 Project lives up to its central Scripture verses, Isaiah 58:6-9, on a shoestring budget of around $50,000 per year.

But on June 1, this selfless ministry faces foreclosure and, ultimately, homelessness.

Why? The church of the Isaiah 58 Project of Arizona is being illegally taxed. 

Even the mayor of Quartzite, the chief of police and the town manager fear the impact on the community from losing this church.

For the past three years, Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys litigated the case, but the Arizona courts have refused to allow the challenge to the illegal tax until the church pays the tax first. Most recently, the Arizona Supreme Court refused to accept the church’s challenge.

With interest, the church now owes around $68,000.

A church that survives on a little more than $50,000 per year cannot possibly pay a tax bill that exceeds its annual budget. The church would have to close its doors to pay this illegal tax before it could challenge it.

The foreclosure is slated to begin on Sunday. If the church pays off the tax, not only can it survive, but we can challenge the tax and seek a refund. A win in this case would prevent these types of illegal actions in the future.

Body image and weight issues are two of the most overwhelming issues a person deals with on a daily basis. We have a constant reminder on billboards, radio, TV and in the news that obesity is an epidemic in the United States.

For those struggling with weight problems, much of this information just adds to the hopeless feeling they have.

Information shows us the need for change, but transformation gives us a desire to change. In my years of struggling with my weight, I did not realize that I was actually becoming addicted to food because of the food choices that I made. I did not realize that I was playing into the hands of the world that is under the god of this world (2 Cor. 4:4) that was setting me up to steal, kill and destroy my health and eventually my life.

When I saw a sign that said, “The devil wants you fat!” it was a jolt to my mind. It became very real in that moment what was going on in my life. I hate the devil, and the last thing I wanted was to please him.

In that moment, I had a desire to change. This was a God moment. It was not just information, but it was a transforming thought placing a burning desire in my heart to change. It was a moment that brought repentance and an awareness that I was responsible and accountable for the way I had cared for my body.

Talk about getting my attention. I cried out to the Lord for help. I asked Him to give me a word for this situation in my life. Daniel 10:19 says, “So when he spoke to me I was strengthened, and said, ‘Let my lord speak, for you have strengthened me.'” At that moment I needed strength.

Soon after this jolting moment in my life during my devotion time, the Lord spoke clearly in my spirit: “Break the habit.” Break the habit? That’s it? How easy is that? Well, I soon found out it was not easy. This was not just a food problem; it was a spiritual problem that had to be dealt with by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit led me to study nutrition. I became aware how certain foods affected my body. I’m not an expert, and I strongly urge you, if you are interested in losing weight and taking care of your body, to start at this point.

As I studied how chemicals have been added to our food to stimulate our taste buds, stripping the nutritional value and creating cravings that demand these foods, I understood how I had become addicted to certain foods through ignorance. Hosea 4:6 tells us, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”

Once I surrendered my food addiction to the Lord, He gave me a battle plan that worked from the inside out and took 88 pounds from my body. During this time, I never had one thought about how much weight I wanted to lose. I wanted to honor God in my body and spirit, as I am told to do in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. I constantly meditated on God’s love for me as a woman of God made in His image.

I had to walk in forgiveness toward those who had said very hurtful things to me, toward those who had criticized me and rejected me because of my outward appearance—yes, toward those in Christian circles. I had to take responsibility for my actions and guard my heart.

It is possible to get off the roller coaster, fighting the battle of the bulge, when you understand there is a power greater than your taste buds. “Understanding is a wellspring of life to him who has it” (Prov. 16:22).

We can gain information from the world, but the power to change comes from the One who created us.

Joyce Tilney, founder of Women of God Ministries, teaching women today from women of yesterday, is the author of Why Diets Don’t Work: Food Is Not The Problem. To learn more visit her websites at  and .