Why
Diets Don’t Work, Especially For Christians.
Part 1
By Paula Neall Coleman
Each January the diet ads are everywhere – TV, magazines, radio – because
the companies that offer diet programs are hoping to cash in on women’s
New Year’s resolutions to really try this year to lose that weight and
keep it off this time. When I see these ads, I feel very sad and also very
angry. Starting at age 12, dieting became for me a source of great pain,
shame, and hopelessness. Yes, I’ve often succeeded at dieting. But for
every success, there was the corresponding failure – usually regaining all
the weight I’d lost and often gaining even more. Every time I hear a
friend or co-worker talk about the latest diet she’s on, I cringe. I feel
sure, especially if the dieter is a Christian who truly seeks God’s will,
that the new diet may “work” for a while, but there’s heartache ahead. Why
am I so sure? Not just because of my own experience and that of hundreds
of other women who have gained back as much weight or more than they lost
from dieting, but also because of what the Bible says about legalism and
its affect on all people – and especially on Christians.
To start to see
why diets are especially unsuccessful for Christians, let’s look at a
passage from Colossians. See if parts of it sound really familiar to you.
Since you died
with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you
still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: “Do not handle! Do not
taste! Do not touch!”? These are all destined to perish with use, because
they are based on human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed
have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false
humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in
restraining sensual indulgence.
Colossians
2:20-23 (NIV)
Remind you of anything?
How well I remember the lecturer at a diet program class I attended
telling us to avoid having certain foods in our homes, to avoid even
touching or seeing these foods. Rules, rules, rules. Diets, even those
that are called “lifestyle changes” rather than “diets,” consist of
varying amounts of rules by which the dieter is to regulate herself. But
look at how that passage in Colossians ends. “Such regulations...lack
any value in restraining sensual indulgence” (v. 23, emphasis mine).
The rules don’t work! But why? In this chapter, we are going to explore
why diets do not work, especially for Christians. In order to understand
why this is, we will look at an overview of the concept of legalism, an
often subtle and insidious opponent to our walk with God and to living in
dependence upon him.1
We are going to
look at three main concepts involved in legalism: “the Law,” “religious
legalism,” and “standards.” First, when referring to “the Law,” this means
all the rules and regulations that are spelled out in the Old Testament.
In Romans 7:12, the apostle Paul tells us that the laws of the Old
Testament are “holy, righteous, and good.” Paul also says of the Law that
its purpose was to point us to Christ: “So the law was put in charge to
lead us to Christ...” (Galatians 3:24a). How did the Law lead us to
Christ? By proving to us that we were incapable of keeping it and thus
incapable of living up to God’s holy standards. Therefore, the Law brought
us to the realization that we were in desperate need of a Savior. No one
(but Jesus) has ever been able to totally fulfill all the requirements God
laid out for a holy life. Therefore, no one has ever been able, through
keeping the Law, to achieve the righteousness that would allow him or her
to live in union with a holy God. Without special intervention on God’s
part – without the sacrificial death and miraculous resurrection of
Christ – we cannot achieve holiness and righteousness. We could not do
this on our own, no matter how hard we tried to follow all the rules. The
rules were right, but we went wrong. The rules actually pointed out to us
how far afield we were from holiness. And that is good, because it creates
in us an awareness of our need for Jesus.
With the advent
of Jesus Christ – in light of his atoning death that, through faith,
enables us to enjoy his righteousness and an eternal union with God – how
are we then to view the Law, the Old Testament rules and regulations?
First, we can see that the Law is an outline of how life was intended to
be lived. The Law provides us with wisdom and understanding about the
parameters of life as God created it. (See Deuteronomy 4:5-8.) We realize
that God never intended for us to worship anyone or anything other than
him. We understand that God made us in such a way that it is healthy for
us to engage in sex only within the confines of marriage, that lying to
one another and stealing from one another is harmful to all involved, that
getting rest on a regular basis and stopping to worship God is absolutely
necessary to our well-being, along with many other guidelines for living.
As Bill Gillham says, the Bible is the “manufacturer’s handbook” for how
people were designed to run smoothly.2
In looking at
the Old Testament dietary laws from a New Testament perspective, we see
that Jesus himself rescinded them. See Mark 7:18-19 and Acts 11:7-9. And,
all of the sacrificial laws are completely fulfilled by the “once and for
all” sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. See Colossians 2:13-14 and
Hebrews 10:1-12. All of the moral and ethical laws are totally fulfilled
by Christ living in us and having written his laws on our hearts by means
of the Holy Spirit. See Galatians 2:20 as well as Hebrews 8:10 and
10:14-16.
So, to summarize
this first concept regarding legalism, “the Law”: For the believer, the
Law gives us understanding about life and is fulfilled, summed up, and
lived out by and through Jesus Christ.
In turning to
the second concept, “religious legalism,” we see in 1 Timothy 1:8 that the
Law can be used improperly. The improper use of law is religious legalism.
Religious legalism occurs when a person believes that acceptance by God is
available only through keeping the Law. This makes performance the basis
of obtaining God’s acceptance rather than the finished work of Jesus
Christ on the cross. Religious legalism puts the emphasis on self-effort
and promotes the belief that man actually can fulfill God’s righteous
standards. The Pharisees of Jesus’ day engaged in religious legalism. They
even added their own laws to the Law of God in order to make sure they
would stay well within the parameters of the Law. As Jesus pointed out,
though, they failed to actually keep the Law because their hearts were not
right. They appeared compliant on the outside, but they were still corrupt
on the inside. Not only that, but also they had so much faith in their
adherence to the Law that many of them totally missed the fact that they
needed a Savior – even though he was standing right in front of them!
What happens
with religious legalism and those who practice it is, because no one can
possibly live up to God’s Law, they have to contort the laws to fit what
they can fulfill. Religious legalists emphasize the rules they are
able to keep and turn a blind eye to others that they fail to keep. Look
at the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5. When Jesus said, “You have heard
that it was said..., but I tell you...,” he was telling the religious
legalists that they were keeping only part of the Law and not all of it.
Haven’t you known someone who, for religious reasons, refused to go to
movies but thought nothing of watching television or renting DVD’s? This
is an example of how religious legalism engenders inconsistent behavior
and hypocrisy.
When you read
the Bible as a set of “oughts” and “shoulds,” you get caught up in trying
harder and harder to do all those “oughts” and “shoulds.” Eventually, you
either fail and give up completely by leaving what you perceive to be “the
faith” or you have emotional problems from the stress of trying to live
the Christian life in your own strength. This is exactly what happened to
me when I was in my early twenties. I tried desperately to adhere to all
the “laws” I felt I had to keep in order to be a “good Christian.” I
couldn’t do it. I collapsed. But, before I came to the end of myself, I
experienced all of the typical symptoms of legalism: panic attacks,
bitterness, workaholism, depression, resentment, and being hyper-critical.
Finally, to
understand legalism, it is important to examine a third concept,
“standards.” Standards are the rules people have for themselves that may
or may not be based on Scripture. These rules are what people feel they
must do in order to gain acceptance from others, God, or just from
themselves. Standards are usually “caught” from our families, the culture,
peers, authority figures, the media, and religious training. We are often
told, either directly or tacitly, that when we do “thus and so,” we will
be thought of as a “good” person. The basic belief is: I must be
accepted and approved of by others in order to feel good about myself;
therefore, I must do “this.” A prime example of standards is how women
believe they must be reed thin in order to be acceptable to themselves and
others. Many women even feel this is one of God’s standards.
Symptoms of
legalism – either the religious kind or the kind that’s based on keeping
one’s own standards – include smugness (I keep my standards but
others don’t.); high expectations of others (If I have to, so why
don’t they have to keep this standard too?); being critical of others
(They really don’t have very high standards, do they?); a low
tolerance of people making mistakes (He should have been able to keep
that standard!); fear of failure (I’ll hate myself if I fail at
keeping this standard.); and self-punishing behaviors (I didn’t
keep that standard, so I deserve to eat a ton and make myself fat.).
These symptoms are very often evident in women who are on diets.
Even for
those who become convinced that legalism is negative and not productive
(even counterproductive), it is difficult for them to let go of their
standards because they believe their legalism is what’s keeping them in
line, keeping them from going off the deep end and getting totally out of
control. But just the opposite is true. Not only do laws and rules “lack
any value in restraining sensual indulgence,” as Colossians 2:23b says,
but also they actually lead us to sin more, not less. As we saw in the
last chapter, according to Romans 7:8-9, there’s nothing like a “Do Not
Walk on the Grass” sign to arouse a strong desire in us to tromp on that
grass! As Paul said, “when the commandment came, sin sprang to life...”
(Romans 7:9), and “the power of sin is the law” (1 Corinthians 15:56b Think about how totally luscious everyday foods such
as butter and mayonnaise seem when you’re on a diet that forbids or limits
those foods.
So, if rules,
laws, and standards don’t enable us to live a godly, moderate life, what
does? Read Galatians 3:3, 5, 10-14 and 5:16-25. The alternative to
legalism is living life “in the Spirit,” living in constant and total
dependence upon the indwelling Christ, humbly asking him to guide us and
being confident that he will and does. The emphasis at the beginning of
this book on understanding one’s new identity in Christ as a “new
creation” was to serve as the underpinning for grasping why we can trust
that the Holy Spirit is at work in us to guide us into right behavior. We
do not need to constantly crack the whip and toe the line in order to make
sure we live as we “ought.” Instead, we need to humbly rely upon God and
his work within our lives. We can accept that he has given us a new heart,
that we are motivated from within to be holy and moderate. We can follow
the promptings of the Spirit, who directs us, for example, to pause and
ask God for help in figuring out why we want to eat even when we’re not
physically hungry. As Galatians 5:16 (AMP) tells us, “...walk and live
habitually in the (Holy) Spirit – responsive to and controlled and guided
by the Spirit; then you will certainly not gratify the cravings and
desires of the flesh – of human nature without God.” “Where the Spirit of
the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Corinthians 3:17b, emphasis
mine).
So, why don’t
diets work, especially for Christians? Because diets are a form of
legalism, and legalism is the polar opposite of how we, as new creations
in Christ, are designed to live our lives. When we try to follow a set of
rules and regulations, we cut out the Holy Spirit and we engage in
legalistic self-effort. Women who struggle with overeating and overweight
have prayed and prayed that God would enable them to stick to their diets.
But God doesn’t answer their prayers as they’d like because he wants us to
fail at self-effort. He wants us to realize that the only
way to live life as he designed it is to live in constant communication
with and dependence upon him. He didn’t design you to control your
eating through rules. He created you to respond to inner urgings – not
only physical, but also spiritual – which perfectly and individually
direct you far better than any one-size-fits-all diet program possibly
can.
Reflection Questions
1.
In what areas of your life do you currently have discipline and why
do you think you have it in those areas?
2.
What are some of the reasons you are motivated to “do right” (avoid
sin, do loving acts, pursue a relationship with God, treat others with
kindness, etc.)?
3.
What
would happen if you never, ever dieted again? What would happen if you
continued to diet?
_____________
1
Parts of this chapter are adapted, with permission, from “Torah Syndrome,”
Chapter 10 of the unpublished manuscript Pneumanetics (Oklahoma
City: Scope Ministries International, 1992).
2
Bill Gillham, untitled conference, Tahlequah, Oklahoma, June 1990.
|