Just a little niggling

Do you not know that your body is a house of God where the Holy Spirit lives? God gave you His Holy Spirit. Now you belong to God. You do not belong to yourselves. God bought you with a great price. So honor God with your body. You belong to Him. (I Corinthians 6:19-20)

Is there anybody out there other than me that struggles to treat their body right? You know what I mean - eating healthy, making wise choices with your physical activities so as to not stress out your body too much, and getting enough rest. If you struggle with any of these, then just know you are not alone. I constantly go back and forth between desiring to eat healthy, but also craving a luscious brownie! The two are incongruous, aren't they? I haven't met a 'healthy' brownie yet! We crave a whole lot of things in this lifetime that are incongruous with what God desires for our lives. If you don't really understand what that word means, then let me explain. Anything that is 'incongruous' is inappropriate, unbecoming, and not in harmony with the character we are to be exemplifying in our lives.

There are times I almost do the Eve thing and blame God for putting the brownies on this earth. After all, if God had not created brownies, I wouldn't have the desire to eat them, right? I don't think God created brownies. Actually, the first known 'creator' of brownies was Fanny Farmer - placing the first recipe for this delightful treat into her 1896 cookbook. It is also believed that a socialite by the name of Bertha Palmer commissioned her chef to create a luscious treat for the ladies who would be attending the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition in 1893, so not sure who 'created' the brownie, but I am certain the creation came some time after God created the heavens and earth! Regardless, the treat isn't God's fault and the appeal it has is not his, either. I 'own' my response to the delightful craving.

All that aside, let me assure you of this one thing - God gave us his Holy Spirit to help us rise above all things that are inappropriate for us in this lifetime. He is there to help us spot the things that will not add goodness into our character. He is right alongside us when we are about to choose a response or action that would be unbecoming in some fashion. If that is the case, then how come we still act so 'wrong' at times? God doesn't send his Holy Spirit to negate our choice - he just sends him to help us make the right ones. We still do the choosing - he just helps remind us which ones will be the best for us. I know it would be a whole lot easier if God just gave us no choice in the matter, but then we'd be puppets.

Remembering that we don't belong to ourselves any longer, we need to be cognizant of every choice we make - the little ones and the bigger ones. Certainly we can be trusted to make a wise choice from time to time, but let me assure you, we don't do it consistently. This is where the Holy Spirit comes into action in our lives - reminding us which choice is the best - niggling our subconscious as well as our conscious minds. We need to heed the 'niggling', though. Just sayin!

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