I was asked this question last week when I announce that I am contemplating to go vegetarian.
I was taken back for a second. I stammered. I didn’t know what to answer. Because I asked myself the most basic question. Why do I go the extra mile to be healthy? To watch what I eat? To exhaust every resources I can lay my hands on about alternative medicine? To be so paranoid on toxic chemicals in every product I touch?
I went down to the the basic and core of my passion. I became honest with myself.
Why am I trying to be healthy? Is it even God’s will? Or where is God’s will in my desire in maintaining a healthy body? Is it just vain and fleshly desire or is it biblical?
I gave that person these answers:
I’m scared of hospitals. Who isn't?
I’m terrified of the sharp needle that I always face every time I went to the hospital. (I swear, your ears would hurt just to hear me screaming.) Again, who isn't?
I hate the smell of hospital and the taste of food and medicines I have no choice to take.
I don’t want to waste my provider’s money to hospital bills and conventional medicines.
I am a Christian lady. And I have a head/provider who works hard in order to provide my needs.
I can easily escape buying conventional medicines if I will just take care of my body in order for my body to take care of its own. (You know, a balanced body is a healthy body)
To influence others that we can properly manage and take care the body of flesh and the money God has given to us.
To tell them that we can save our money and let it not go to waste with hospital bills or conventional medicines that doesn’t even cure the root cause of the disease but only cover the effects of the disease.
In short, to let them understand that prevention is better than a cure.
And yes, the Bible commands us to take care of our health (III John 1:2). It is a state. A state where your whole body’s system is balance. But the Bible commands us to have a deeper and more precious kind of health. Aside from properly taking care of our bodies, we should acknowledge and believe that God is the source of all the health we need. He is the health of our countenance (Ps 42:11, 43:5); trusting and fearing God will bring health to our navel and marrow to our bones (Prov 3:8); His Words is health to our earthly flesh (Prov 4:22); having a wise tongue is health (Prov 12:18); being a faithful ambassador is health (Prov 13:17); speaking pleasant words are like honeycombs which is sweet to the soul and health to our bones (Prov 16:24); and that meat is created for our health (Acts 27:34).
In the practical side, I want to quote what Dr. George H. Malkmus said in his book “Why Christians Get Sick”: Citing the verse Gen 3:19,23, he writes: “The further man removes himself from the way God intended man to live, the more likelihood there is that man will experience problems!! We are not only eating processed, packaged foods almost totally devoid of nutritional value, loaded with chemicals but no physical exercise was required to obtain them.”
Dr. Malkmus reminds us of the consequences of defiling our body citing I Corinthians 3:16-18, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.” But he notes, “The average person uses more care in selecting the grade of gasoline into their automobiles than they do the food they put in their mouth.” Dr. Malkmus said that “Christians ought to be the healthiest and happiest people on the face of this earth!!”
Yes, as a Christian young lady, a receiver of God’s grace and mercy, I do believe that me and my fellow-Christians should be the healthiest and happiest people on this earth. Just for the plain reason that Jesus died for our sin is enough to make us joyful and take care of the provisions and health that God has given to us.
So, to that person who ask me that question. Thank you. Thank you for provoking me to search myself for the reason and whys of me being healthy. It made me realize a lot of things and made me go back to the core of my passion.
I may not be a full-pledged vegetarian but I do practice watchful eating and healthy living in this world.