Wednesday, October 23, 2013

The State of Affairs


By the time I turned sixteen I had catapulted past three hundred and fifty pounds. It is not something I am proud of, nor is it something I am ashamed of, it’s just the way it was. Somewhere deep within myself, where the rational part of man’s intellect spends its waking hours, I knew I was getting bigger with each passing season, but for the longest time I was not ready to confront it, face it, and most difficult of all, acknowledge my own culpability in the matter.

At first I tried blaming my mother, accusing her of shrinking my clothes, then the mirror for being warped, and this went on for a while until finally I had the epiphany of all epiphanies on flight to Canada wherein I thought I was having a heart attack.

Sometimes we come to our senses of our own volition, we come to our senses willingly and without being prodded or influenced, and other times we have to be smacked across the face and awoken from our slumber. Whether willfully or by force, eventually we all have to come to terms with the reality in which we are living, and either choose to continue ignoring it, or do something about it.

Eventually I had to come to terms with the fact that I’d gotten too big. I knew it wasn’t my mother shrinking my clothes, or some insidious secret society exchanging my clothes for smaller sizes while I was at school, it was me. I was eating too much, not getting enough exercise, and if I continued down the road I was on I’d be another statistic, and nothing more. I had to acknowledge to myself, and come to terms with the reality that I was too heavy, and I needed to do something about it. That was just the first step.

Coming to terms with something is only half of the equation. It is simultaneously the hardest and easiest step one will have to go through in order to change their predicament, whatever that predicament might happen to be.

Upon coming to terms with the fact that I’d gotten too big, I then had to take the next step and decide to do something about it. I joined a gym, started eating less food that came out of boxes and more food that came from trees, or from the earth, and I dropped one hundred pounds in about five months.

Although I am by no means thin, I never plan on becoming a male model or wearing skinny jeans, so I don’t have to be. I am, however, much smaller than I used to be, and this would not have happened if first, I had not admitted I had a problem, and second, if I had not taken steps to remedying the problem I was confronted with.

The worst issues to acknowledge are the ones we are guilty of perpetrating upon ourselves. There is always that inference when it comes to such issues, that we are to blame for where we are due to the choices we made in getting there. Most individuals would rather just ignore the problem than be confronted with their own culpability in any given matter, especially if the matter in question is something as disastrous as the situation we currently find ourselves in as a nation.

Although I haven’t had my laptop during these handful of days, I have been doing allot of reading. It seems everyone is beginning to see we have a serious and immediate problem, but too few are willing to take the next step and actually do something to remedy it.

As long as we are unwilling to change anything, as long as we are unwilling to make any sacrifices, then nothing will change. We can wish it, hope it, think about it, talk about it, sing about it, but until we actively go about doing what is necessary to remedy a thing, that thing will always remain the same.

To continue discussing the current state of affairs would be tantamount to beating a dead horse, and so, my next post will be the beginning of a brand new, multi part teaching entitled ‘A Call to Arms’.

The sad reality is that even now, with all that’s been happening, with all the signs we are seeing, with all the steps we’ve taken as a nation toward the outright persecution of the saints, too few by far are willing to hear, listen, or receive the truth.

As yet we are still clinging to the childish notions of positive attitudes and inspirational affirmations, believing that wishful thinking and the embracing of depravity will deter the enemy from his ultimate goal.
 
How childish we have become in our thinking, and how harmless we believe our enemy to be.

With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea Jr.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Michael,
We are so glad you are able to post again,and look forward to your new teaching. Thank you so much for what you boldly write about our current state of affairs in this country. You are right on with your messages, and we are so blessed to have them. We share them with our church members. Please be encouraged.
V

Barbara said...

Obesity seems like a problem of blessing. You have so much food, you are able to overeat it. Some people struggle to have enough food to keep them gong, so they don't have this problem. When you have more than enough, it is sometimes hard to know what to do with it.

God made us so that we really don't need much food. What people do need a lot of is the company of others. When they don't get enough of that, they seem to turn to food.

If there are days of famine ahead, I would want to be able to withstand it. I would try to be in the best shape possible so that I could endure an extended period without food. It is hard to go from overeating to completely fasting. By cutting back a little each day, you can train yourself to get by on less.

Anonymous said...

Dear Michael,
Your candor is so touching and refreshing. Thanks for sharing.
In Christ,
Melanie