Rev. Shawn J. Smith

I found myself closing out last year needing a change. My wife Liz said that we should commit the month of January to doing a Whole 30 fast. Lots of people have done this kind of adjustment to how they eat and several practice this plan as their regular diet. Just to be clear I was not told that I had to cleanse or diet or eliminate certain ingredients from my life due to allergies. I chose to treat the start of this year as a new beginning for me and this shift in how I treat food is part of that fresh start. Meals in this plan can look like this one

In this plan I say no to cheese, butter, milk, anything with flour, corn, rice, soy, sugar, and alcohol.

Here is what I am learning about myself. I can put a lot of foods and drinks into my body that taste good, even great, but do not work as fuel. In fact they end up working against my body sometimes.

When I was in college and high school I fasted for 30 hours to learn what my people feel like when they go without food on a regular basis. Those lessons then were positive in generating a feeling of sympathy and to some degree empathy.

This is not a complete fast, but it is me educating my body what it is like to go without sugar, wheat, milk and soy. It is crazy to see how many salsas in the store have either sugar or soy in the ingredients.

This has also given me an opportunity to have a clear mind as I consider other areas of my life that would benefit from momentarily removing them from my life.

As I went through the first couple of days I did actually pray for the ability to stay on target with this goal of making it to February 2nd.

It has not been easy and it has been worth it.

I have come to really appreciate all that I have access to and all that God has blessed me with in this life during this time. I find a deeper and beautiful meaning to the words in Deuteronomy 8;

³ He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

How might the word of the Lord help you this day? What are you thankful for today?

Thank you for reading this and may God bless you with peace and restore your hope.