12/29/10: Crazy Love

Yesterday's food:

12/28/10: Bed at 10:30 pm/up at 8 am

*Mini spice drops (~ 20)

Tea with creamer

Egg white

Kashi

*Chobani Greek yogurt

*4 cookies

Nightfood bar

Skim milk (1/2 c)

Filet roast leftovers w/ gray

Sweet potatoes

Broccoli salad

Nightfood bar (x 2)

Milk (1/2 c skim)

4 c water (including tea)

My church's adult Bible study recently read the book, Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God, by Francis Chan. I've never attended Bible study class regularly, but I was psyched for this book to be discussed. I ended up making only about a third of the classes but read the book on my own. It wasn't overly smarmy or pious, thank God, and although as a writer and editor I would have changed some things, the content resonated with me such that Chan's words run through my mind at least several times a week, if not more often. The biggest idea that caught my heart was the sheer extravagance of my lifestyle compared with that of the world's neediest people (and I currently earn near the poverty level [and have for several years], just to give you an idea of my "extravagance" . . . not). I've spent so much of my life looking after myself (re: raised by an alcoholic father and all that that brings; having lupus along with depression, a handicap, stroke, and cancer; being single, i.e., no helpmeet) that I've never thought much about what I can give back to my community, let alone the world. I have sponsored a little girl in Bolivia for the past 8 years or so, but that's about it. But reading Crazy Love has changed my mind (structurally I think). I now pray every morning to see opportunities where I can give, and every morning I ask God how I can love Him. According to the Bible, that would be loving "the least of these." I live in a fairly affluent neighborhood of Pennsylvania, so I don't see the "least" population often. Or ever, really. So I would have to put myself in such an environment to carry out God's wishes, and that scares me, mostly because of my handicap and being relatively defenseless. But then I'm not trusting God, am I?

That Crazy Love could make such an impact on me, and that I even would want to go to adult Bible study in the first place, is a reflection of the degree of being "present" and open that I get from not eating sugar (or, at least until the coming experiment, having limited my consumption of it).

Have a good night (or whatever time of day you read this).