New Month - New Challenges

Today is the end of a month, and the 6 month mark of my "No Taco Bell or McDonald's" challenge that I embarked upon on December 31st.

183 days ago.

It's been a very LONG 6 months.

I have learned some things about myself, and I have listened to the Lord speaking to my heart about some things that need to change.

One of those things He is asking me to do begins tomorrow morning.

He wants me to give up eating out.

At any restaurant.

None.

For the entire month of July.

It may seem trivial to some people, and it might seem totally reasonable to others.  For me, it is a difficult thing to surrender.

The fast food hasn't really been "hard" to walk away from, as long as I had the option of still going to a restaurant.

And that's where the idolatry has been revealed.

There is such pleasure in the eating out, so much comfort and familiarity to me.  An unhealthy sense of refuge, a place of peace and joy that comes over me when I go inside an eating establishment.

These are things I should be deriving from Christ.  From devouring His Word.  From spending time in His presence.

But instead, I get more excited about planning a lunch date with a friend.  Or thinking about what restaurant has lunch specials. Or searching for coupons so we can all go out to eat.

And so, as I prepare my heart for my trip to Kenya in 7 weeks, I will be spending the month of July fasting from restaurants.

It is not going to be easy.  Not at all!

Because, once again, it reveals that while I have stayed away from fast food, it wasn't the "food" that was the issue.  It is my heart.

What's the old saying, "You can take the girl out of the city, but you can't take the city out of the girl?"

Yeah.  You can take away the food that she loves, but you don't take away her love of food.

Rules, regulations, fences, legislation, all those things do not 'fix' problems.  They merely serve to identify how wicked a heart really is.  How rebellious and determined a person will become, and how quickly they will find a way around them.

My desire in this time of fasting is for the Lord to really break my heart.  (I know those are scary words to type!)  I want Him to be Lord of my entire heart.  For Him to be more appealing to me than anything this world has to offer.

And so it begins.