To French Fry – or not? Victory’s secret ingredient.

The car was almost packed. The dog was dancing around the back hatch, anxious to jump in. My stomach grumbled as I made another trip through the garage, unhappy about a skipped lunch. Noticing the time, I realized how late dinner would be when I arrived at my destination. I started considering a snack for the road. I could make a quick smoothie. No – I really want to get on the road. I’ll just swing through McDonald’s and get fries and a drink. That settled, I loaded the dog, grabbed my purse, and pulled out of the driveway.  

Munching the salty, crispy golden yumminess as I continued my journey, the conversation I’d had with myself replayed itself and a startling realization dawned. I’d planned to fail.

Maintaining, or even having, a positive body image has long been a daily battle. I know the “right” things to do. I find myself at the age where the scale leaps upward and creeps down. Every year the graph charting my cholesterol points north. I exercise and still jiggle in the wrong places. I make menu plans, shop the perimeter of the grocery store, limit my sugar, use olive oil. I set goals. Make commitments. Join healthy eating groups. Track calories, protein, points. You name it, I’ve done it or am currently doing it. I wage a constant war to lose weight and be healthy. Yet there I was, driving down the interstate eating French fries.

Failing to plan wasn’t the problem. I had other options, considered other options, and made the conscious choice to do the unhealthy thing. I’d literally planned to fail.

There is nothing inherently wrong with eating French fries. Even if you, like me, are constantly trying to get that number on the scale moving left. French fries are not the enemy!  My decision to drive-through McDonald’s instead of making a smoothie is more an indication of that state of my heart than anything else. I am a Christian. As a Christian, I believe that the Holy Spirit resides in me as my counselor, my guide. Unfortunately, the Holy Spirit doesn’t kick out the human part of me that has a long history of making decisions to fail. They co-reside. The question becomes, whose counsel will I follow?

As we start the new year, some of us may be thinking about the pointless exercise of making resolutions because we are part of the 91% of Americans who give up on them. Maybe now is a good time to explore how we can change our thinking so that we plan to succeed in becoming who we are called to be in Christ.

My French fry conundrum is not unique to me. Or even to our time. The battle between what our flesh wants and what our Spirit wants, started back in Genesis when Eve saw the fruit was pleasing to the eye and good for gaining wisdom. She took a bite and offered it to Adam, who took a bite (Gen 3). From that moment on a battle has waged inside of us. This battle has far more consequences than the “fail or succeed” terminology suggests. The writers of the Scriptures, Old and New Testaments alike, refer to it as a battle of life or death.    

The Apostle Paul, describes this battle like this in his letter to the Roman Church:

So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good. So I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.

And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.

I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin….

Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit. So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace. For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will. That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God. (Rom 7:14-25, 8:5-13 NLT)

To me, this is one of the most confounding things Paul writes. But it perfectly describes the conflict. The reason 91% of us give up on our resolutions is not because we don’t know how to keep them. We have the information. It’s because we have a very real enemy working hard to keep us from succeeding. If we want to plan to succeed, we must view the changes we desire in the light of flesh v Spirit, death v life.

I had facts as I stood in my garage before leaving on my trip. I knew I was hungry. I knew it would be three plus hours before I would eat dinner. I knew that I was tracking meals – ever attempting to be healthy. I knew that God was changing my perception of myself – recalibrating the measures I used.

My flesh-self weighed in with the tempting choice of fries and the lure of a quick solution. The problem with this option was that I’d beat myself up for it later, simply strengthening my negative body image.

The Holy Spirit weighed in with the choice of a healthy protein shake that would have taken 5 minutes to make (less time than I sat in the drive-thru) and would have satisfied not only the grumbling in my stomach, but would have been a choice for success over failure, a choice for life over death. A choice to let the Spirit produce the fruit of self-control.

Paul describes the decision like this:

When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. (Gal 5:19-25, NLT, emphasis mine)

My French fry example is silly, I know. It doesn’t seem to be a decision with eternal consequences. But it highlights the every part of our lives choices we face every single day that either bring death or bring life. Decisions about how we speak, how we act or react, who we spend time with or are in relationship with, how we write an email or a social media post, how we spend our money. And yes, decisions about what we eat and drink. These are all decisions the Spirit will weigh in on.

If we want to be part of the 9% who experience lasting change, we need to change our thinking. The question isn’t what can we do to succeed?  It’s who will we listen to? Who will we yield to?  The voice that brings death or the voice that brings life and transformation?

I must warn you. The voice that brings death is loud and persistent. We have been us for a long time and our flesh-self will not concede easily. Hence getting fries over a protein shake. It will seem like we fail a lot. It’ll even seem like we plan to fail.

Don’t give up. You aren’t in this alone. You have a very powerful advocate.

Once we declare our faith in Christ, we have the Spirit of God living in us. We are no longer a slave to, controlled by our flesh-self. The Spirit of God raised Jesus from the dead. Goodness, that’s a lot of power living in us. We need to tap into that. We are under no obligation to yield to our cravings, our habits, those things that bring us death.

God is transforming each one of us into the person he called, created us to be. Through the power of the Spirit, let’s turn the tables. Let us put to death the enemy who wants us to die. Let’s choose life this year. One decision at a time. You, my friend, are more than a conqueror.