I've been following Jamie Oliver's recent TV programme "Jamie's American Food Revolution". Some of the programme felt a bit set up and fake however I can't help feel inspired by Jamie's obvious passion to bring good food and cooking skills to a nation that is getting culinary deskilled and fatter by the year. I've seen TV shows and read articles about America's (and the rest of the West's) obesity crisis but watching Jamie's latest project has brought the issue of poor nutrition and obesity right to the front of my consciousness again. In this programme Jamie goes to a city called Huntingdon in West Virginia which is said to be the fattest town in the fattest state in the fattest country in the world, he works with local schools, hospitals and community groups to get the message across to the community that their eating habits are killing them.
Food is something I am really passionate about, I love it, its sociable and indulgent, it allows me to be creative and to serve my friends and family and it sustains and brings life and health. I believe it has the power to heal but misused it has the power to harm too. I love cooking and eating and thinking about food which has led me to do a fair bit of reading on the subject and as I have read I have found lots and lots of evidence to suggest that the health problems in the west are connected to the food we eat and the way we eat that food. I also believe that what we eat is a spiritual issue, in the New Testament book of Romans we are implored to offer our bodies as living sacrifices to God, as our spiritual act of worship. Jesus said He came to give us Life and Life in all its fullness and I believe that part of living in that fullness of life includes our health which can be optimized through good nutrition (amongst other things).
This is why it felt so refreshing to hear of Pastor Steve from the First Baptist Church in Kenova, Huntingdon. Pastor Steve was one of Jamie's first supporters when he started his Food Revolution campaign in West Virginia. I googled Pastor Steve and his church and found out some interesting things. A few years before the report that highlights Huntingdon as the worst town in America for Obesity was published, Pastor Steve noticed that lots of his congregation were getting sick and he associated their various illnesses with obesity and poor nutrition. He started to preach about the importance of honouring God with our bodies and challenged his church to change their eating habits and anyone in the obesity category to drop at least 40 lbs, he offered all kinds of support to do this. Pastor Steve's main premise was that if the church were to be agents of change and help local families they had to start living it out first. He suggested that if there town had the worst problem in the world, then their church needed to be the most passionate in the world to bring about a change.
Pastor Steve had a vision for a church based community centre that taught people in the community how to live well, gave them essential cooking skills and lessons on how to make healthy meals, and also provided a space for family exercise to get the community active. Pastor Steve, in his sermon series which brought the challenge to the church, prayed that God would help them, would send them resources and power, a new passion to the area and favour so they might bring about the change that needs to happen in that town.
A while later Jamie Oliver rocks up and with the backing of ABC media secures funding to amongst other things develop the community centre attached to the First Baptist Church in Kenova. They put in basket ball courts and a brand new kitchen and Jamie stirs up the whole town to want to change and learn how to cook and how to eat well. God answered Pastor Steve's prayer and in a way he never ever imagined. What a brilliant God!
After reading all about that story, I feel inspired and encouraged in two ways.......
Firstly: Food, Nutrition and our health is important to God, he wants us to flourish and to live well and we do this by eating the right amounts of the right kinds of food.
Secondly: God cares about the needs in our community and if we pray and partner with him to meet those needs, he'll bring resources and favour to help us in ways we could never imagine! BRING IT ON!
If you are interested you can listen to Pastor Steve's challenging sermon to his church here http://www.fbckenova.com/home.aspx?igid=129141
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