Tag Archives: looking for love in all the wrong places

I spent the first half of my life trying to gain weight, always shiny and frail.  Exercising was a way of life, running 5 miles and swimming 3 miles a day at my physical peak, resulting in only a 4 percent body fat.  However, once I stopped running a year after I got married, my weight ballooned for the first time in my life as I began to thirst for the wrong things.  Although I survived a near death experience of alcohol poisoning at a friend’s wedding after college, my gut now contains a 12 pack of soda.

 

Unfortunately, the days of burning off calories for me have subsided as my waist size is running out out belt loops.  Forced to a diet during my running and swimming days, the only time I pigged out was the spring, able to walk off any weight gain on the golf course.  Today, if I don’t limit my intake of snacks, soda or treats, my scale gives me the bad news at the end of the day.  While the message of Luke 12:19 sounds good, “take life easy, eat, drink and be mercy,” the context refers to a rich fool.  Thus, I am either looking in the wrong place for answers or I’ve lost my former discipline to abstain from things harmful to my body.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riK0uwtAc80

The 4th chapter of John records the longest conversation Jesus encountered in the Bible.  Like most modern struggles, a Samaritan woman began to thirst for the wrong things in life.  This unhealthy desire led to an unfilled life, chasing after love, never to be found in the 6 relationships she sought, John 4:15-18.  Unaware of who she was talking to, Jesus offered a cure to her dilemma, John 4:10-14.  Something inside of this woman’s heart spurred her on to tell others, John 4:28-30.  This hunger for the truth led this Samaritan and several others to believe, John 4:39-42.  Taste and see that the Lord is good, Psalm 34:8.

by Jay Mankus