113: Lessons from Jesus Camp
🌟Susan Heck, our speaker at Jesus Camp, challenged us to grow in our Christian walk. She said the person you are five years from now should intimidate you. That means there was an incredible amount of growth, that in the present, feels kind of scary and impossible.
🌱Growth happens when we DO. Whether it’s in our Christian journey or our health journey, transformation happens when we APPLY what we know. This week’s podcast is all about the appetite and growth that leads to the DOING. Listen in for the powerful takeaways I got from Jesus Camp!
EPISODE 113: Lessons from Jesus Camp
SHOW NOTES
(0:00) Intro
Hello my friend! Welcome back to the club. How are you today?
(3:35) The story of Jesus Camp
How Darcy found me
Blessings from becoming The Christian Nutritionist
(7:40) Fellowship over Food
Jesus Camp - Carnivorish Edition
This year was honestly a little challenging for me.
This took me to new discipline and new awareness.
Brooke Castillo
She said that when she changed her diet and quit drinking it’s always hardest in social situations.
It’s one thing to stay disciplined at home, much more challenging when you’re out, right?
So she had to really focus on all the things that she loved about going out to eat or getting together with her friends or spending the holidays with people that wasn’t about the food or the alcohol.
I loved the conversation I had with Gisela Kreglininger about wine and food- lingering around the table and being together.
Food can really bring people together and that’s a beautiful thing. But when it comes down to it, it’s not really about what’s on the table it’s about who’s around the table.
We also talked about this on podcast with pastor Doug Wilson.
The fellowship can happen around a bowl of chips or a fancy steak dinner.
(12:35) But the food can often be such a distraction...
For instance, my typical brain scenario around meal time at Jesus Camp is:
“Ooohhh I love this cheese, I want more cheese, I shouldn’t have more cheese, I’ve had too much cheese. Should I have the bread with my chili, I don’t know, I want it, but I also want the brownie and ice cream later. That could do me in though, it’ll probably clog me up if I eat all that. But it’s all gluten free and how I often do I have a delicious dinner served to me like this when it’s all gluten free.”
But this time - I had none of that.
It was so interesting. I got my bowl of meat and avocado, and yes, I looked at everyone’s plate with a little longing and a little salivating, but there was none of that dialogue or negotiating happening in my brain when I was serving my food or sitting at the table with my food.
It was space in my brain that had to, wanted to look for something else to focus on, which happened to be the people in front of me. They got more of me. I was much more engaged because more of my brain was there.
There was so much to appreciate about the gathering aside from the food.
(17:45) Spiritual Appetite:
One thing we talked a lot about at Jesus camp was how hungry are we to know Jesus, to get in the Word, to grow in our faith. When there’s no appetite, there’s no growth.
Our spiritual growth is stunted by lack of interest in consuming all that God has for us. We become spiritually malnourished.
And here’s the truth y’all just like a body is not satisfied without physical nutrition, our souls are not satisfied without spiritual nutrition.
When your body does not get the nutrients it needs, you’ll stay hungry and keep searching for more food
When your soul does not get the nutrients it needs, you will stay hungry and keep searching for more and sadly, just like we tend to keep filling our bodies junky food we tend to keep our souls filled with junky worldly stuff. We try to fill that void with money, career achievement, shopping, alcohol, drugs, overexercising...it can be anything except the thing that we need which is Jesus.
It’s like we keep trying to fill that discontentment with stuff that’s not going to cut it. And just like it ruins your physical appetite when you’ve filled up on junk, it ruins your spiritual appetite too.
We’ve got to make room for the healthy stuff and start feeding ourselves with the goodness of God’s Word.
Our speaker, Susan Heck, has the entire New Testament memorized.
She really encouraged us to try and do some memorization, to really get God’s word on our heart and in our minds so it stands at the ready to guide us in our daily lives.
Get rid of the junky thoughts, the junk food of the mind, the idle thoughts that tend toward worry, fear, complaining, overwhelm, and to renew the mind with God’s Word, give your brain it’s spiritual nutrition.
She really drove home the fact that once we know the word, we’ve got to DO the word.
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” James 1:22
(22:57) The rubber meets the road when you go from knowing to doing.
It’s just like changing your diet.
You can read all the books, pin all the pins on Pinterest, write your goals, sign up for the program or the gym, talk about it all day with your best friend, that doesn’t get the job done sister. The knowledge doesn’t change your body, the action that does.
It’s the applying the knowledge that gets us results.
It’s the same in our spiritual lives. Knowledge doesn’t bear fruit if it stays in your brain.
James said, faith without action is dead.
Our Christian walk is about changing into a person who better reflects Christ in the world.
We can never be perfect but we can improve.
Susan said, “The person you are 5 years from now should intimidate you.”
(26:09) Walking a Christian Life…
If I’m walking more of a Christian life - that’s gonna take a lot of work. And it might leave some things that I don’t want to let go of right now - people, habits, etc, in my wake.
This is such a good concept to break down and consider on the many levels in our life.
Think back to who you were five years ago…
Have you grown, changed, improved - or are you stagnant? Are you still stuck? Are you still circling the same mountain of those health goals, relationship goals, career goals - life goals? Are you going to let that happen in the next five years?
The fruits of living God’s Word span all of those areas in our lives that we are trying to improve.
Remember, growth starts with appetite. We have to be hungry for God’s Word, hungry to know Jesus and to be more like Him.
For he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul he fills with good things. Psalm 107:9
When I go to Jesus Camp I go with a big appetite. And I got what I came for this year like I always do but it was so much more profound because of the experience with my fleshly appetite.
Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work. John 4:34
I went to fill up on Jesus and that’s what I did.
I indulged in the delights of the Word. I drank in the worship music. I digested sound teaching. I poured in prayer. And I tasted the love of new sisters. It was a FEAST. Better than all the cheese, the bread and the gluten free brownies.
Taste and see that the Lord is good;blessed is the one who takes refuge in him. Psalm 34:8
How hungry are you for God’s Word? What is your appetite? Are you spiritually nourished?
(30:18) Outro & Disclaimer
Thanks for listening! Have a healthy and blessed week!