Kisses of an Enemy

Proverbs 27:6 " Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful."

Something has really made sense to me lately; and this verse sums it up well. I'd like to apply this to our diets -- and by diet, please know that I mean our way of eating, not a weight loss plan. If you're reading this blog, then you most likely struggle with the same types of issues that I do. (Either that, or you just really like reading my stuff--and that's okay too ;) Your body is your friend. Think about it: if you were fallen into sin, a true friend would confront you with it, and steer you back into the right paths. It might "wound" you to hear what your friend has to say; but this is truly a faithful friend to do this for you. Well, most of us are wallowing in the sin of no self-control, or general undernourishment of our bodies. Our body, our friend, is screaming out to try to steer us back into the right path. It's wounding us with excess body fat, and many, many different types of health problems...faithfully trying to alert us of the danger we're getting into. At the same time our friend is wounding us, we are receiving kisses from an oh so sneaky enemy. This enemy can take on many different forms. Mine is sugar. I always thought of sugar as my friend. I loved sugar and wanted to be with it as often as I could. When I was hurt, sad, frustrated, stressed, happy, bored.....I ran to my friend, sugar. But sugar truly was deceitful. While I was enjoying its company, it was destroying my body. It was no friend at all; but was instead my enemy.
This may sound like a cheesy allegory to you (I have been reading Pilgrim's Progress); but I'm sure you can see the truth behind it. Once I let go of the false love that I had with sugar, I was ready to get on with my new healthy life. At first I was very sad to think that I never again will taste chocolate, or pie, or cheesecake, etc, etc, etc, etc. But I have come to realize that the damage it does to my body and my mind is not worth the few moments of joy that it makes me feel. These last few weeks without having sugar in my body have been amazing! I feel so good; body and mind.
Someone e-mailed me recently and asked if I use artificial sweeteners such as Splenda or Stevia. I was using these, although sparingly, but I thought of something yesterday that changed my mind about continuing to use them. For me (this may be different for you), if I taste the sweet, even in the artificial kinds, it starts my cravings. I can handle the kind of sweet that is in a banana, or sweet potato, etc. I'm really going to work on getting the artificial sweeteners out of my life.
One last thing....I tried a cookie recipe yesterday that my kids and I are very happy about. It has no sugar or sweeteners; only banana, whole wheat flour, oats, nuts, salt, baking soda, & oil. I know, it sounds really boring; but they were very good considering what they were. Now, if you compared them to a chocolate chip cookie, than no, you wouldn't pick this one. I only ate two of these really small cookies, and that was plenty for me. They were satisfying and filling, without making me crave more. Plus my kids like them....so that's always good. If you think you'd like to try these too, let me know and I'll post the recipe.