Health and Fitness.

I workout in the gym near to my office. There you see some people running in the treadmill as if they are angry at their own body. Then there are some ladies who walk in the treadmill in 1 mile/hour speed, even slower than their normal walk, all the time reading Cosmopolitan, People and other similar magazines. The other day the lady next to my treadmill was reading “10 crazy things you can do to improve your sex life” and commenting about it to the lady other side, who is also walking in ‘negative’ speed. In the locker room, men walk around naked. I am afraid some of them are gays! But overall, I like the gym, it gives me a sense of fitness after each workout. I started out in August with a high intensity workout thinking that I could lose 5 pounds in one day. Eventually (in few days!), I learned to agree with the reality that the pounds I have gained in past many years is not that easy to shed off. But more than the weight lose, it gives me a healthy feeling which is worth the pain.

The other day I told my wife that the reason I work out is to sweat, which is a ‘commandment’ of God. God told Adam: "By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food". My job is working on the computer and no matter how aggressive I type on the keyboard or move my mouse I wouldn’t sweat. So I take a break and go to gym, do some workout to sweat. She thought I was crazy.

I remember reading a book called Maker’s Diet, written by Jordan Rubin. This book was highly promoted by TBN and during those days my wife and I were huge TBN addicts. We watched TBN as if it was a ‘holy’ thing to do. We ended up buying this book and read it eagerly. In the book, the author tries to extract eating principles from Bible and provide a diet plan for everybody to follow. For example, in the Book of Leviticus God gives the dietary laws and said not to eat shell fish. So as per Jordan, it’s better not to eat shell fish such as Shrimp etc. He is not promoting it as a legalistic thing, but as a good thing for health.

We both stopped eating shell fish, pork and inorganic meat and poultry; and started buying organic milk, yogurt, fruits etc. Our grocery bill went through the roof. Since John the Baptist ate wild honey, we too bought raw, unprocessed honey from health store. Bread without yeast, and everything organic etc are few other suggestions by the author.

Later on, we have come to a realization that unless we grow everything in our own farm, we can't afford these. We eventually gave up and returned to 'normalcy' (Well, I don't know what is normalcy). By the way, I felt so good while following this diet but it was very expensive. I am left with no other option than eating all the processed, chemically modified junk food, because that's cheap.

My ideal place to live is a farm. And grow everything we need there including vegetables, fruits, birds and animals. Running in the open air would be a great, refreshing workout. Riding a horse through the unpaved farm trails would be adventurous. I love the sound of crickets in the night. I am naturally drawn to earth, it's smell and it's beauty and wildness. I am looking forward for that day to come...

The power of sin

I have dieted a lot in my life. My wife and I once tried 'Maker's diet'. This was before we came to an understanding of grace. We both were all excited about it because after all it is a 'biblical diet'. As Christians we always looked for the word 'biblical' or 'Christian' in front of anything- Christian handy man, Christian hair cut, Christian mortgage, Biblical eating habits, biblical way of losing weight and anything under the sun which says biblical or Christian. I think we were so much excited about 'Christianity' than Christ himself. What a tragedy!

Anyways, we tried that diet for quite a period of time. And you know what? It worked! We both started losing weight, people started noticing it and started commenting about our 'new' looks. We thought those comments paid for the struggle what we were going through. We acted as if it is not a big deal. Certainly there were many type of food we were giving up and the truth is, it was a big deal!

We went for about 30-40 days and finally we reached at the end of our rope. We slowly started giving up and started eating the things we enjoy eating. What a relief! The moral of the story is, I now weigh more than I weighed before I started that diet!

The attractiveness of law among Christians (or among any religious people) is that it works for a while. It does. It can give some wonderful results. But the truth is that while it's working, it is gaining all its power to fail you miserably in the future. Even the people who claim to be 'law keeping' Christians knows this truth, but they don't admit it. They hide it.

The sin itself has no power. Sin is just lying there, dead and powerless. It can't do anything by itself unless and until it is connected to its power source- the law. Sin gets all its power from the law. One of the verse which gave me a lot of revelation about the power of sin is found at I Cor. 15:56

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.

Yes, the power of sin is the law. I do not need any explanation to agree to this point. My own life proves it to me over and over, even today. When we put a hole in the wall, no one really cares. But the moment we hang a sign there saying 'do not look through this hole', we all know what happens! Until I told my daughter 'do not touch the stove' she never bothered. But now that I told her and she wants to touch it.

Paul talks about 'the sinful passions aroused by the law' in Romans. Our sinful passions are aroused by the law. That very well is the purpose of the law, 'so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God' (Romans 3:19). This simple truth can save us from a lot of trouble. I praise God for law, without it, I would have never understood the significance of His grace.

The secret of not sinning is not the law, but unplugging it. Sin is always going to be with us till our last breath, but as long as it is unplugged from its power source, it will not take control over our life.