As a dietitian since 2004, I have rarely met a person who has discernment regarding the messages consumed in both the Church as well as the culture at large around food and body (and most things happening in society).
For someone whose business is people; why people act, think and feel how they feel about their bodies, eating and worth regarding these subjects, you notice patterns and trends and see it as not an individual failure but as something to pay attention to and alert not just the individual but the body of Christ at large that whole generations of people are being taken down for a lack of knowledge.
While following cultural trends to worry about health and weight or criticize one’s body as a Christian may not be a salvation issue (take that to the Lord) it will certainly cause a lot of suffering and not the abundant life that Christ wishes for us and definitely not allow us to be the salt and light and fulfill what God has written for us while we are alive here on this Earth.
So ,if you hear the passion in my voice here it is because we must wake up to the lack of the fruit and gifts of Holy Spirit NOT IN USE in the body.
We talk a great detail in our one-on-one sessions, Peaceful Eating Community and in our SoulCare group about wisdom, knowledge, emotional capacity and how a radical departure from how the world and carnal church “do life” regarding food, body, knowing the love of Father is different from the imperfect attempts at love from our earthly caregivers. We “see” how taking a spiritual look at how God set up the world to work in the natural is a lot different than what most of us were taught and the side effects in our lives are obvious in the way we talk and treat ourselves and others.
So where was the rupture for Christians? There is a lot of “head knowledge” but not experience with using discernment to not fall into the traps the enemy has laid in the traditions of this world. There is a lot of tradition and a lot of lack of love towards God and each other.
I won’t go too deep here into how and why because that is for another post but I will tell you it is because of how we were not raised up in the way we should go according to the Word–healing from past wounds/emotions/rejections leads people to focus on surviving relationships and not thriving–and also from not seeing those in charge of us using the discernment they also had/have access to along with the Word of God to test everything in culture to see what is or not to participate in.
In other words, not asking God about everything!
Let’s discuss discernment a bit:
Discernment & the Church
“But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.”
1 Corinthians 12:7-11
Reading through this list, we may think, “I don’t have any of these!” Quite frankly, we may have seen few of these actually exercised over our years attending the church. We may have never even seen a miracle or a healing with our own eyes or heard anyone get prophecy right, at least not yet. How about the word of wisdom or the word of knowledge? We may have witnessed a little more of those than we realize, not being “tuned in” enough to recognize it!
What about the gift of discernment, or as it reads in the passage, “discerning of spirits”? The New Testament in Modern English by J.B. Phillips paraphrases Paul’s expression as “the ability to discriminate in spiritual matters.” This latter phrasing seems to be a more precise expression of what Paul means—not just the ability to detect evil spirits but to distinguish between the spiritually positive and negative.
Dictionaries like Wikipedia define discernment as the ability to obtain sharp perceptions or to judge well. In the case of judgment, discernment can be psychological, moral, or aesthetic in nature. . . . Christian spiritual discernment can be separated from other types of discernment because every decision is to be made in accordance with God’s will. The fundamental definition for Christian discernment is a decision-making process in which an individual makes a discovery that can lead to future action.
This description of discernment emphasizes making correct decisions that proceed to wise actions. Of the verb form (diakrino, Strong’s#1252) of the word Paul uses in I Corinthians 12:10, Strong’s Concordance comments, “to separate thoroughly, i.e. (literally and reflexively) to withdraw from, or (by implication) oppose; figuratively, to discriminate (by implication, decide), . . . contend, . . ., discern, doubt, judge, be partial, stagger, waver.”
Discerning is a matter of separating, discriminating, evaluating, and judging, and once done, a person either approves or opposes the subject of his discernment.
In our society, words like “discriminate” and “judge” are considered almost taboo, but the truth is that we must make judgments all the time. What would be the point of discernment if it does not lead to a judgment? In Solomon’s prayer before God in I Kings 3:9, he asks for discernment between good and evil so he could judge God’s people. God, pleased with both the humility and good sense of his prayer, rewarded Solomon immensely. —Ronny H. Graham
The bottom line is that discerning is about being in righteousness or right standing, with God. It is not about trying to decide if one is superior or inferior to someone else regarding body or food to maybe “earn” more love, safety, worth or significance. This is wrong use of discernment in the Body of Christ but sadly is found in most Churches and certainly is the way the world works.
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If you want to take a little bit deeper dive, please follow the link below as well.
The Gift of Discernment and Godly Love (cgg.org)
I am keeping this message short and intense because that is how it was laid on my heart by the Lord. People are being lulled asleep to not take action in their recoveries because of the relative lack of disasters since lockdowns were lifted. It is actually the calm before another set of storms coming and it is up to us to be ready to help others by getting free ourselves and having the ability to hear from the Lord about our assignments to serve our families/community/sphere of influence. With the clutter of worry about food and weight and doing lots of performing and religious things, that hearing may be blocked.
I know some of you may hear this message with wounded ears and be offended. Or maybe afraid. That is not the intent at all. In fact, I don’t like writing up these messages, but I have to obey what I hear so that I don’t delay any one else’s mission. This is a message of hope that we can still redeem the time, repent where we came into agreement with lies, get our minds renewed, rest in the Lord’s love and safety and be used mightily by the Lord.
If you are ready to do all it takes to be free from food and body image issues, consider one on one work to get to the depths of the soul wounds and mind-control programming regarding food, body, love, worth and not trusting God. We can chat here:www.tracybrownrd.com/get-started
If you would like to have a space of learning regarding the deeper things of God in your recovery from food, body image and relational trauma issues, consider joining our Peaceful Eating Community.
This is for people who truly want freedom and peace, not those who want to hang on to parts of their eating issues to belong to this world. The times are short and healing your food and body image issues is the testing ground for being used at a higher level by the Lord and to be in the kind of Church the Book of Acts modeled for us.
If you want fellowship regarding the deeper things that the Lord wants to teach those who are hungry for relationship with him in all things, please reply to this email and I will email you back. We invite all those who want truth about what is happening in the world to make sense of their past and have felt that they have been minimized or told they are “too sensitive” or “too serious” regarding spiritual things of God to be a part of our Soul Care group. We appreciate any giving that you are led to however this group is free.
Thanks for reading. If you find anything I have said here in error, I am always welcoming of correction. We have a heart for folks who have lived lives that don’t always feel like they make sense, that things have been hard a long time and have tried other programs, even Christian “programs” and haven’t gotten freedom.
We dive deep, love hard, challenge what people think they know and what they hold onto out of deception and fear but offer the truth of how much the Lord loves us all no matter how long they have run and done things “their way” to survive.
Much love in Christ,
Tracy and team