Finishing Well

Better is the end of a thing than its beginning, and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit. Ecclesiastes 7:8

A week ago, like most of us, I was celebrating all the freshness and rejuvenation that come with the new year, setting goals for 2019 and considering what new things I would undertake.

I love a fresh start, don’t you? So much, in fact, sometimes I find it easier to just start over than to actually finish the last thing I started.

Finishing is much harder than starting. Finishing requires endurance and perseverance. It requires continued focus, the ability to set aside distractions. It requires sacrifice and struggle. That’s because in between the start and the finish we inevitably encounter setbacks, and how we deal with them determines whether we will finish well or just walk away in pursuit of yet another beginning.

Culture has a lot to say about this, and it often seems culture wants to reward us for walking away. Don’t like your job? Quit! Life’s too short. (I’ve said that one myself more than once.) Unhappy in your marriage? Get a divorce. Betrayed in a relationship? Walk away, save yourself. Overwhelmed? Bail out. In financial debt? Declare bankruptcy and wipe it all away. And one of my favorites: I blew my diet. I’ll just do whatever I want today and start again tomorrow. Or next week. Or next month. Or next year. Or … never.

Is it too harsh of me to say that our culture has become really skilled at enabling us to walk away from messes of our own making with the misguided idea that we can just dodge difficulty and sidestep consequences forever?

Don’t get me wrong. There are times when walking away (or even running) are absolutely appropriate. But if we find ourselves dropping over and over just because the going gets tough, or we get bored, or something more interesting comes along … it’s time to ask ourselves some tough questions.

Case in point: the 8 million or so failed weight loss attempts I’ve embarked upon and abandoned, with nothing but wild weight swings to show for it.

I am beyond tired of fighting this battle with my weight. I am frustrated and angry with myself. I know what to do. I’ve been at it so long I’m practically an expert. But like Paul, I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing (Romans 7:19). I want to stop starting it and finally finish it. There is so much more to life. So a little over a year ago, I finally took it to the Lord in prayer and have been following Him on my journey to the finish line ever since. The lessons He is teaching me along the way have both humbled and floored me — humbled in that I’ve had to face my own weakness and shortcomings as never before, and completely floored by the wisdom, love and compassion of God in using this journey to heal me, teach me and prepare me in ways I never expected.

I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing (Romans 7:19).

I’m still not finished. When God heals us, He doesn’t usually do it the easy way. He could, but in His grace and love for us, He gave us the ability to choose to learn and grow and choose Him instead of just forcing compliance. And let’s face it: when it comes to changing the human heart, we’re slow and stubborn and almost always have to learn the hard way. Finishing, then, means facing the hard things God’s way.

Our sin nature makes just about everything holy very hard for us to do on our own. The Apostle Paul paints a great picture of this in Romans 7:15-25. Finishing well, facing hard things God’s way, is counter to what our culture tells us. God’s way is submission instead of control, struggle instead of numbing, facing setbacks with repentance instead of denial, handling success with humility, and responding to stress with faith.

Let me say again, I don’t have all this figured out. I am that girl in Romans 7, doing all the wrong things and wishing they were right most of the time. I am not an example of all things holy. I am not that. But I am a witness of what God can do in a life, and that is what is worth sharing.

Submission

Genuine submission to God is letting go of all our conditions, requirements and need to control and being willing to do things His way, whatever that means. It means admitting we can’t do it on our own. How humbling it is to admit that as an otherwise successful middle-aged woman, I struggle with feeding myself in a way that is healthy. But there it is. And honestly, it is tough to submit this problem to the Lord until we actually admit it exists and that we’re not in control of it. Yet, when I earnestly admit my need and ask Him in prayer to help me, He does. Cravings are easier to deal with. Procrastination is easier to overcome. All the temptations are still there, but He gives me strength I don’t have on my own to deal with them.

Struggle

Especially early on, fitness seemed like a never-ending struggle. I knew I needed to improve in this area. I was weak and out of shape, and I hated it, but workouts were tough. Glaring at my idle Bowflex machine one day, I remember thinking I hate to struggle. Struggling made me admit I was weak and my pride didn’t like that at all.

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

The truth is that we need to struggle. It’s the only way we get stronger. There are not only physical but mental muscles that get exercised when we step up to struggle. They’re the same muscles that help us with things like self-control, endurance, perseverance. Making those mental muscles stronger is crucial to finishing.

Another big benefit of stepping up to the struggle is the realization that you can. From every completed workout grew the knowledge that I could struggle through the next one. Stepping up to struggle is teaching me that I can finish, with God’s help.

Setbacks

Sometimes the scale stopped moving. Sometimes I ate something I shouldn’t, or skipped a workout and my victorious and successful streak hit a speedbump. Sometimes this lasted for a meal or a day or a week at a time. What I’m learning is that setbacks are opportunities to practice repentance and confession. The more quickly we abandon the wrong choice and resume right choices, the more quickly we get back on track. Sometimes for me, that means throwing out the other half of whatever unhealthy food I am eating mid-bite. Sometimes it means getting up to do my missed workout at 9 o’clock at night. Every setback creates an inflection point where we can again choose what matters most.

Success

Last summer, I reached a weight I hadn’t seen since high school. I felt great. And I congratulated myself right into complacency. I forgot to keep depending on the Lord. I got a little bit lax about finishing what He and I had started together. I’m not sure why it’s so easy to forget we need the Lord after He’s helped us into a comfortable spot. But it is, and I did. I didn’t fall back into old patterns, but I didn’t progress any either. The problem with this period of Success is that though it was a victory to be celebrated, I still wasn’t finished, and I stopped working so hard. And important muscles started to atrophy.

Stress

That’s when trouble hit. The bottom fell right out of my whole world in ways I had never faced before and that I still really have a hard time putting to words. Maybe that sounds like some event in your own life — sickness, loss, cancer, disappointment, betrayal — that has left you, too, utterly undone, doubting the goodness or maybe even the very existence of God. In my brain, I knew God was who He had always been, good, unchanging, loving and right. But in my heart … well, my heart was broken and just couldn’t understand any of it. And suddenly all I had learned of struggle, setbacks, submission became about so much more than weight loss. They became the basis upon which I was able to get out of bed every day.

My fragile faith gave way to old patterns, and I took my broken heart to the pantry instead of the prayer closet. It’s been a rough couple months. I’ve gained some weight back, and I hate that. More than that, I hate walking around with this grief and confusion. I hate that I have doubted a God who I know to be faithful and steadfast in His love. I hate that the only way through this is to feel all of these things and to know God is not defined by my feelings. I hate writing all of this down because now I’m crying again.

But God was there, and He is here. I am learning that my shaken faith will be stronger as I press on again toward the finish. I see His grace in preparing me for a struggle I could not face alone. I see His mercy in forgiving my lack of understanding, my anger and doubt. I see His love in taking upon Himself in His providence a decision I wouldn’t have known how to make. I see His sufficiency in getting me from one day to the next. I see Him, and I will continue to seek Him.

Because I am still not finished. I am still prayerfully practicing the meekness to submit to God’s greater way, the humility to face struggle, the repentance to rebound from setbacks, the faith to trust in His faithfulness no matter what. I am not starting again. With God’s help, I’m just finishing what we started, because the end of a thing is better than its beginning.

Because I am still not finished. I am still prayerfully practicing the meekness to submit to God’s greater way, the humility to face struggle, the repentance to rebound from setbacks, the faith to trust in His faithfulness no matter what. I am not starting again. With God’s help, I’m just finishing what we started, because the end of a thing is better than its beginning.

Dear Heavenly Father, help me to seek your word and gain wisdom about how you would have me care for this body. It isn’t as fit as it should be Father, but I’m so thankful for the ways you’ve changed my heart regarding food and eating and exercise. Please continue to work in me to remove any wrong perspectives, vanity, pride and self indulgence so that I can see things the way you do. Teach me the discipline to obey without debate, struggle without procrastination, and care for my body decisively without damage either from too little or too much. Help me to trust You in all things. In Jesus’ name, Amen.