Thank you for joining the Partners in Health and Wholeness Book Club. You can officially sign-up here. Through it, we hope to engage people of faith in discussions over why our health matters. Our current choice of reading is from the free Saddleback Church Daniel Plan Curriculum. We are posting updates through the PHW Facebook page, but our PHW blog page has the discussion posts in full with responses from staff. Just look for the apple on top of the book picture among the blog post pictures and you will find past Book Club entries.
This week starts Session IV of The Daniel Plan Curriculum.
We are half-way through this curriculum. Does it have to end? This curriculum is helping me to reinforce the importance of seeing health through the lens of my faith. The scripture in Romans 12:2 that Pastor Rick Warren offers I’m quite familiar with, and is rooted deep within my perspective of my body. He has offered many scriptures such as this one that have helped me meditate on health as a faith issue.
Pastor Rick says that practicing health is a spiritual discipline, “an expression of worship.” I love to worship. It’s even better for me when I worship God instead of man. Know what I mean? I have been recently reminded of the Israelite Kings who built idols and altars to other gods, and those Kings who tore down the idols and rebuilt the altar of the Lord. I know this is what I need to do for my health. I need to tear down my dependence on unhealthy habits and refocus my dependence on God.
Discussion question, excerpted from the curriculum:
1) Have you found that thinking about your health through eyes of faith increases your thoughts toward God through the day? If so, in what ways do you see this happening?
2) Romans 12:2 (NIV) says . . . “Offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.”
Why do you think God wants you to offer your physical body to him? How is that an act of worship? What practical steps can you take to do that?
–Joy Williams, PHW Regional Consultant
Partners in Health and Wholeness is an initiative of the North Carolina Council of Churches. PHW aims to connect health as a faith issue. Please visit our website to sign your personal pledge to be healthier, and to find out about grant opportunities for places of worship in NC.
