I struggle with binge eating.

And I have my whole life.

All through my childhood, high school and early college, I was active enough that I never really saw the effects of binging, so it was never on my radar. Honestly, it’s shown up in different degrees and intensities throughout my life. The September of 2019 is when it hit the hardest: I was struggling with depression, anxiety and isolation. At first, I was running miles and miles every day to release the disruptive emotions I was experiencing, to cope, to survive. After I sustained a foot injury, I turned to binge eating as my primary coping mechanism and that’s how I coped for a long time (like….well over a year).

My experience with binge eating is marked by lots of things: sneaking food, overeating ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ things (anything can be unhealthy in great amounts), saying “I’ll do better tomorrow” every day and giving myself excuses to eat more “this last time,” and shame — crippling, paralyzing shame. The shame triggered more disappointment and uncomfortable emotions, which triggered continued binging. It’s a vicious, brutal cycle, as anyone who struggles with this knows.

Today someone asked me, “As a Christian, how did you deal with the temptation of food and the struggle of binging?”

In that moment I was reminded of the desperate prayers I prayed in February of 2020 asking God to help me change my relationship with food. “God, please help change my perception of food. Help me see it as fuel for my body rather than as something in which I can overindulge.” I remember also feeling a nudge from the Spirit, “And God, help me grow to love myself the way that I am right now, that I would not be more worthy of love if I were in better shape or if I had a better relationship with food. Help me train to strengthen the body you gave me rather than for the hopes of ‘looking better.’ I am loved by you and I am worth being loved right now, just as I am.”

Yikes.

In our conversation today, I realized that the answer to my first prayer didn’t show up until after the Lord answered my second prayer, the one I prayed almost nonchalantly, the one I cared about less, the one He cared about the most. He addressed the heart problem: He addressed the fact that I wasn’t loving myself or my body well. Only after I started surrendering my self-loathing to the Lord did answer to the first prayer come along later.

Thankfully, God cares far more about my heart than anything. In the past, it didn’t matter how athletic I was: it was never good enough and I was never good enough. Now, my heart has undergone (and is still experiencing) a transformation that has resulted in a better understanding of my self-worth. The opportunity to pursue bodybuilding arose after I was at a place of greater contentment with and love of my body, with the way I was. I can genuinely say that I wanted to grow stronger and that any physical changes were a byproduct of the strength I was gaining.

I share this to encourage anyone who may be struggling with something similar: the Lord deeply cares about your heart and about your ability to love yourself. Even in the moments when it doesn’t feel like prayers are being answered, He’s working and moving. He’s loving you better than you could ever love yourself.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out if you need to talk about anything you may be struggling with.

There is much to be learned from animals, and I often find myself humbled by the lessons they inadvertently teach me. Growing up with pets and living most of my life around animals, I've learned much about innocence, dependency, responsibility, love and friendship. Today I want to share several things that my dogs have taught me about God and my relationship with Him.
​

First, let's have an introduction.
​

Together these two make quite the duo and are one of my very favorite things in the world. They absolutely love peanut butter and have a knack for always knowing when my mom is cutting up chicken in the kitchen. They are fun to be around and, as I've discovered through the years, full of love and lessons about my relationship with God.
​

'Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.'
John 12:26

There are two specific interactions that happen between me and my dogs that remind me of the desire we should have to be close to the Lord:

Scooter: Whenever I leave the room for too long, Scooter goes on a house-wide search to find me, checking through every open door to discover where I might be. He is relentless in his search and doesn't give up until he finds me. He loves to be with me and can't stand to not be in the room together.

Walker: When it's time to go to sleep, Walker always curls up pressed against my stomach. Every single night. It absolutely melts my heart. If I move and create empty space between us, Walker will get up and move to wherever I have gone, once again nuzzling up against me in order to go to sleep.

These actions by my dogs convicted me: I should have the same — if not greater — desire to be near God as my dogs have to be near me. To be super honest, I don't currently have that desire, but Scooter and Walker have shown me what it looks like. There is absolutely no shame in praying, "God, help me want to want You more." On the contrary, it's actually one of my favorite prayers.

So what does it look like to have that sort of desire for closeness with the Lord?

As my pups have taught me, it's looking for God when you can't find Him or when you feel like He's not present (because He always is present — He'll never leave us). Ask Him to show you where He is in your current situation. Or it's going where He goes and moving when He moves for the sake of staying close to Him. ​
​

Sometimes the three of us are hanging out downstairs and I have to grab something from upstairs. In light of the previous anecdotes, one might expect my dogs to follow me up the stairs and then back down again, which is exactly what they do unless I tell them to stay put and that I'll come back. Even then, I usually have to hurry on my errand because if I take too long they'll come searching for me. That means that I will have to do exactly what I said I would do — return — and they have to trust that I will. 

I consider what Scooter might be thinking in those moments, and this is what I imagine:
​

And a voice from heaven said, 'This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.' Matthew 3:17

I love my dogs so much just for being the way they are. Before they have done anything — before they've done something cute or silly or sweet — I love them. I feel like there are no words to adequately represent just how much I love them, and I know there is no way to communicate that to them (I've also heard this is what parenthood is like, ha). I can only do the best I can: talking to them, giving them food and toys, letting them sleep in my bed, showering them with affection and so on.

This is only a glimpse of how much our Father loves us: so much that we cannot fully understand, so much that He adorns us — His beloved children — with gifts, intimate moments and reminders of His love in an attempt to demonstrate the love He has for us. The other side of this, too, is that He loves us just for who we are, before we've done any faithful (or unfaithful) thing, before we've told anybody about Him, before we've read our Bible. He loves us exactly the way He created us. In Matthew 3:17 God said about Jesus, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." This was BEFORE Jesus's ministry had started, before he began preaching in temple courts and revealing the Kingdom of Heaven to the earth. This is SO important to internalize, too, because it will quite literally change the way we live, the outlook we have on God, the way we love others and the way we love ourselves. Ask God to show you what He loves about you. Ask God to help you remember that He loves you just for being.

​God loved Jesus just as He was. I love my dogs just as they are. God loves us just as we are.
​

Whenever I head towards the kitchen there's a pretty high chance that I'll hear the sound of paws following suit. Like many dogs, mine hang around the kitchen in hopes of a morsel of food falling to the ground that they can quickly consume. Or maybe, if they're lucky, they'll receive a bite of human food just for being around and being cute (like I said above…showering them with affection and treats and such).

When I grab chocolate, grapes, raisins or something else that could harm a dog, they still beg for a bite. They don't know that these foods are incredibly toxic to them and could potentially lead to death. They don't know that I love them too much to give them something that's bad from them. From their perspective, I'm just withholding something from them that they want. The reality is, though, that I'm being a good dog owner: I'm keeping them safe and healthy. I'm not allowing them to consume something that is harmful to them.

God does the same thing with us. Things that we desire may be withheld from us simply because they would not be good for us, and the Lord loves us too much to allow us to have something that's bad for us. It's one of the things that make Him such a good Father. Now, we have the freedom to go crazy and do whatever we want whenever we'd like, but it would be wholly counterproductive for us to do so and could potentially end up causing more damage than good. There are real, practical implications to our actions, after all. 

Here's an example. At the start of my last week in Botswana I grew incredibly nervous and anxious. I knew that I would soon be on a flight home, and I knew that I was far from ready to say goodbye to the bush. I was greatly tempted to stay, to miss my flight and to not go home. What I would do after, I had no idea. Part of me was hoping that God would show up and tell me to stay (then I could blame that bad decision on Him instead of taking responsibility for it, yikes). I also knew, however, that the decision to stay would practically alter the trajectory of my life: it would mean flaking on an internship at the Georgia Aquarium, not fulfilling academic requirements for my full-ride at UNC Charlotte and driving a wedge of distrust between myself and those who were closest to me. All in all, it wouldn't have been great. Even though that's what I thought I wanted in the moment, lack of support from God actually helped keep me faithful and grounded.

If you ever find yourself in a place in which you don't understand why you're not receiving something from the Lord, try considering the possibility that it wouldn't be healthy for you. Go as far as asking the Lord to bring up ways that it wouldn't be healthy for you and for your growth in discipleship.
​

If it's not evident by now, I love my dogs. Just as much as they love being around me, I love being around them. Even as I type, I'm warmed knowing that they are lying on the floor behind me. Though this is a very daily interaction, I don't treasure it any less. I actually look forward to the times that we all just sit in the same room just because we like being around each other. There are times, however, when I have more intimate moments with each of my dogs. Though he usually sprawls out on his side of the bed, Scooter occasionally snuggles as close as he can to me. In that moment I usually stop whatever I'm doing for the sake of soaking up and cherishing every moment with him. 

Though these intimate encounters happen less frequently, they don't mean any more to me than the daily interactions I have with my dogs. I simply appreciate them differently. In the same way, we should stray from sitting around waiting for big life-changing encounters with the Lord and grow more in an appreciation of our everyday interactions with Him. Intimate encounters are necessary and good and essential to our growth in relationship with Him, but they don't happen all the time. We shouldn't try to expect them or force them or chase a feeling. The daily moments we spend with God are just as important and just as necessary and good and essential.

Daily moments with God take more intentionality on our part. It allows us to be more aware of His presence in every moment of every day. It helps us grow with Him. I'm trying to grow in this, myself. It's so easy for me to get caught up in school work, research projects, working out and so many other things that I miss opportunities to spend little moments with God. If you don't know what little moments with God look like for you, take some time to ask Him now. I just did, and I felt like something that could be helpful in increasing my awareness of His presence on a daily basis in the midst of everything I'm doing is to dedicate all that I do to Him with a quick prayer: "God, I dedicate this to you." Before school work, applications, research, writing, photography, work, whatever, I am going to try to start it with "God, I dedicate this to you."

I am so humbled by the things that my dogs have taught me about being a follower of Jesus and a child of God. ​​They have made relevant topics that had yet to click with me. I'm in awe of God's desire to speak through us in so many different ways, including loved ones and our passions. This is also a reminder to not put God and the ways He speaks to us in a box. Writing this presented such conviction for me about ways that I've not been trusting the Lord fully and not treasuring daily time spent with Him and so many other things. I hope it has spoken to you in a similar way. 



As always, feel free to share your thoughts and questions below. :)

This is by far my favorite passage in Scripture. It not only suggests an innate awareness of God in the essences of every living creature but also incentivizes us as believers to make a greater priority the issue of conservation. The church, at least in my experience, has not demonstrated much support as it pertains to the preservation of the natural world and to wildlife conservation (somebody PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong — it would be quite encouraging). For whatever reason that may be, my hope is that followers of Christ can grow to love and appreciate nature, especially in light of Job 12:7-10. Perhaps if we approached the issue with an understanding that we can learn things about God through nature we would cherish our earth more.

So I beg the question: how can we know God better through the natural world?

Many attributes of God are described in Scripture using references to nature:

• "Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the Lord descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled violently." Exodus 19:18
• "Do you have an arm like God's and can your voice thunder like his?" Job 40:9
• "Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them." Acts 2:3-4
• "The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters." Revelation 1:14-15
• "Then one of the elders said to me, 'Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed'…." Revelation 5:5

These examples are just a handful of the passages in Scripture that utilize our understanding of nature to help us understand God. There are plenty more examples. If you've ever heard the roaring of a violent wind or experienced the intimidating presence of a lion or seen the strength of deeply rooted trees, you have had a taste of what God is like. Nature sheds light on unfathomable traits of God.

2. Learning about the natural world helps us love God with all our minds.

According to John Ortberg in his book Who Is This Man?, "To love God with your mind begins with being curious about God." He goes on to say, operating from the understanding that God created everything, "Therefore, anytime we learn something that's true, anytime we learned about how creation works or even about math or logic, we are actually thinking God's thoughts." He even suggests that the opposition to science is one of the most visible sins of the church. My jaw dropped when I read this. As someone who has been deeply passionate about animals and wildlife conservation since I was a kid, I have longed to see the convergence of science and faith in the church. Granted, I rarely do, and this was the first time that I felt someone had spoken out in this way about the church and its relationship with science. I was both amazed and comforted.
​
To know that the pursuit of science — of understanding the world around us — can be seen as a method of discipleship was overjoying and encouraging to me. Learning how ecosystems function, discovering the intricacy of every interconnected biotic and abiotic factor in the world, understanding the behavior of animals in their proper contexts — all of these things help us love God with all our minds. The deeper we press in our relationship with God as individuals, the more He will reveal to us about Himself. And just like our universe, there is no end to what can be known and learned about God.
​

Hey, Paul said it, not me. Here's the bottom line: nature is a reality by which we know everything around us, and there are invisible qualities of God that are clearly reflected in it. This idea makes logical sense: nature was created by God and thus is a way by which we can know and understand Him, His character and His thoughts. In what ways are His eternal power and divine nature revealed, though? I'll give you a few examples.

In the same way that nature can be both relentlessly unforgiving and serenely enlivening can God be characterized by righteous wrath and unrelenting love. Or consider light, which is both a wave and a particle. This oxymoronic quality of God can be better understood by looking at nature, and that is only one of the things that we come to learn about God.

As another example, take natural disasters like hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, etc. They have oft been considered with negative connotations, which is understandable. They have very disastrous, real consequences that deeply affect people's lives. I have always been enamored by and drawn to them (I KNOW I'm not the only person who can say this). My friend pressed me to think about why I was so drawn to them, and this is what I concluded: they are pure power. Not arbitrary power that people are convinced they have because they hold "such and such" title. There is nothing we can do to stop natural disasters; we can only respond to their arrival with preparation. Take Hurricane Katrina, which hit New Orleans in August 2005, causing unimaginable damage along the Gulf Coast. There was nothing that could be done except prepare and respond. Natural disasters have the power to level cities and redefine our perception of normal.

And yet even these are just a glimpse of the power of God: unstoppable, fierce, unpreventable, dangerous.

There are countless biblical accounts of people encountering God in the wilderness. Here are a few:

• God appears to Moses through a burning bush (Exodus 3).
• The Israelites were being led by a cloud (representing the presence of God) when they were in the desert (Numbers 9:15-23).
• God uses Balaam's donkey to communicate clearly to Balaam (Numbers 22:21-41).
• The presence of the Lord passes by Elijah while he is on a mountaintop (1 Kings 19:11-13).
• The Lord speaks to Job out of a storm (Job 38:1).
• Jesus calms a storm, causing His disciples to realize that "even the winds and the waves obey Him." (Mark 4:35-41). 

As is evidenced throughout the Bible, nature and animals are things of importance to God. Rocks and mountains worship Him, animals trust Him to provide, the wind and the waves obey Him and the unending galaxy reflects His infinite essence. God utilizes that which He has created to help us know Him better, so I pray that we can grow in our appreciation and understanding of nature and wild animals.

I encourage you to take some time for personal reflection. Maybe take a walk or spend a few minutes outside. Look at the natural world around you: the bugs, the leaves, the flowers, the clouds, the birds. Ask the Lord to reveal Himself to you in a new way through nature or through animals. Please let me know what comes up — I'd love to hear about it. :)

Today my spirit has been heavy, harrowed with sorrow. Over the last couple weeks I have experienced the steadily increasing weight of the world’s burdens, but today it reached its tipping point. This morning as I distractedly completed my last final of the semester, I was overwhelmed with emotion and sadness for the family of Ahmaud Arbery, who, as I’m sure many of you know by now, was followed and fatally shot as he was jogging through a neighborhood in Brunswick, Georgia. I could hardly react, hardly process what happened (over two months ago, I might add). And yet, I experienced an irrepressible ache not only for the racial injustices and corrupt systems that plague the world but also for the injustices committed against the innocent on a daily basis. The part that saddens me the most is that WE are inflicting this pain upon each other and upon our planet.
​

I look at nature, at animals, and I see innocence. I see creatures trying to survive. I see them dying at our hands, hit by our cars, driven out by our expansion, hunted for our pleasure. I see our planet being leeched of its resources. Our planet — and the animals that inhabit it — are desperately trying to adapt and survive to the changes we are so rapidly imposing upon them. It shatters my heart and brings me to tears that millions of animals are dying by our hands. But many people perceive nature and animals as cruel. They see a vulture scavenging a car-struck deer on the side of the road and don’t think for a second that it’s worth saving. They see a lioness kill a newborn zebra and a sympathy is evoked.
​

Humanity has become so comfortable in its own sin that when people see something as fundamental as survival in the wild they call it ‘cruel’ whilst simultaneously overlooking the far more horrid injustices we commit to our brothers and sisters. We have convinced ourselves that we are good enough on our own.
​

When I look at humanity, I see our desperate need for a Savior. It’s obvious that we aren’t able to fix the problem ourselves or we would’ve figured out a way to do so by now. We have forgotten our humanness, our brokenness, our innately evil tendencies.
​

We have forgotten how badly we need someone to save us.
​

I called my mentor crying, asking him how he deals with the weight of all the evil in the world. And he reminded me that it serves as a reminder of our desperate need to be saved. It unmasks our humanity, showing us the reality of the human condition, and it makes room for Jesus to come in and heal our hearts, our lives and our societies if we let Him. The hope we get to cling to is named Jesus — He will come and rule the world one day with truth and justice. Until then, we get to cling to the promise that He will do so.
​

I did a lot of wrestling today. A lot of contemplation with the Lord. A lot of allowing myself to feel everything. I felt physically heavy, a tangible weight pressing on my shoulders. I cried at the world’s brokenness. I cried at the fact that we live in a world in which people are more appalled at the seeming cruelty of nature than they are at mankind’s ability to hate and steal and murder. I cried at the fact that some people will never get to taste the assurance of the hope named Jesus. I cried to the Lord. Then I thanked the Lord for His promise of hope. I thanked the Lord that one day He will rule with truth and justice on the earth. I thanked the Lord that one day we and all creation will be free from the bondage we have made ourselves slaves to.
​

I encourage whoever is reading this to feel everything you are feeling. Feel the anger, the brokenness, the sadness, the pain, the confusion and anything else. Cry. Lament. Talk to God. Allow yourself to be vulnerable with Him. Ask Him to bring up new things and comfort you in new ways. Allow Him to do so. Commit your hope to the coming of Jesus.

If you’ve never experienced Jesus in this way before, if you have any questions or if you need to just talk, please reach out to me. I’d love to chat with you.

We've been in quarantine for about a week now, and I'm doing everything I can to keep myself from boredom, complacency and laziness. I'm not too worried about the virus itself -- I've long expected some kind of crazy pandemic-type thing to hit the US, and I actually trust the Lord about it a lot. It's not hard for me to trust Him with this (Side note: it is very hard for me to trust Him in other areas, and I had to repent for the pridefulness that arose from trusting Him so much over Coronavirus. The reality is that I have a very hard time trusting Him over the things that are of more importance to me).

It is very difficult for people to trust Him through this, and rightly so. This is a lot to be confronted with all at once. Students across the United States have transitioned to online courses for the remainder of the semester. College kids have packed up their dorm rooms and headed home and returned early from study abroad programs and trips. Many businesses across the country have transitioned to allow employees to work from home. Others have yet to make changes, keeping employees at work out of necessity. Many businesses have been forced to close. People are losing jobs. People are falling behind on bills and payments. People are struggling to cope with the uncertainty and changes. People are getting sick. People are losing loved ones. People are experiencing the very real implications of this pandemic.

Western Christianity is finally experiencing a TINY glimpse of what Christians around the world have been facing ever since Jesus walked the earth: discomfort, uncertainty, challenges and the impact of corruption induced by mankind's sin. For many, faith is being shaken. Foundations built upon the sand are crumbling under this storm (One of my close friends Chantel wrote an excellent blog post about what it looks like to be a disciple during this time -- it's definitely worth the read. You can find it here). 
​

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” 
​Matthew 7:24-27
​

As I've talked with fellow believers, we've discussed the comfort of knowing that God is here in this time. God is turning this evil into something for His glory, and He's doing it at on international scale. Foundations built on anything other than the rock of God are being shaken, torn down and felled so that lives can be rebuilt upon the cornerstone of Jesus. We are experiencing something we've never experienced before, and we have the opportunity to encounter God in a way we've never experienced before.

But what does a foundation built upon the sand look like? Ah, the enemy is crafty. He has given many people a false sense of control over their lives through financial stability, job security, home ownership, education and degrees, and through the lie that Christians are supposed to "have it easy." There are a couple harsh realities to be addressed here:

(1) Once we give our lives to Christ, they are no longer our own.
​Then He said to them, "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for My sake will be saved." Luke 9:23-24
We are not meant to have control over our lives. The whole point of surrendering our lives to the Lord is trusting that He knows better than we do, that He is a better God over our lives than we are. This is something we constantly have to do, though. I know for me, the temptation is to lay down my life and then pick it right back up again. We constantly have to lay down our lives.
Pause and ask the Lord what it would practically look like for you to surrender your life to Him.

(2) Christianity was never about living a life of comfortability.
This is evident throughout all of Matthew 10, when Jesus sends out the 12 apostles. Wrapped up in this passage is a message that is both an encouragement and a warning. The whole thing is incredibly convicting. If this is what following Jesus is supposed to look like, what is it that I am doing? 

God calls different people to different things, and I'm not saying that it's bad to have financial stability, job security, home ownership or education. What I am saying is that it's bad to build your life with those things as your foundation. Why? Because one day the storm will come, and your foundation will be put to the test.

Well, my friends, that day is here, courtesy of COVID-19. We are in the midst of one of the most uncertain times in our lives, and our foundations are being put to the test.

So where do you find yourself presently?

Are you worried about what is going to happen to you and your family in the midst of this? Here are some encouraging verses:
Matthew 6:34: "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." 
​Do not worry" is a command, not a suggestion.

Luke 22:42 "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done."
Jesus prayed this prayer in the garden before He was taken to be crucified. This needs to be the center of our prayers: Not my will but Yours be done.

Are you not experiencing the worry of the world and instead finding it easy to trust God through all of this? You should tell people, then, in encouragement. Give them an opportunity to have the hope that you were given. Show them the good news that is Jesus.
​Mark 16:15: He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation."

A relationship with the Lord more than enough to get you through the challenges presented by COVID-19. It's time for you to assess where you are in your relationship with the Lord. Take this opportunity to grow in trusting the Lord if that's something you're struggling with. The implications are real: it means laying down your life in surrender to the Lord and letting go of control, not just saying "Trust the Lord!" It means changing your language from "I'm so worried about x, y and z" to "Even though it doesn't make sense, still You are God over my senses. God, Your presence is more real. I'll walk by faith and not by sight and put my trust in You" (from Even Though by We Will Worship). It's time for the lukewarm to make a decision. It's time to either trust the Lord or don't, to lay down your life or keep it. But don't be disappointed when you try to employ inspirational quotes and comforting Bible verses to rescue you without ever turning to the Father.

It's time to radically trust the Lord in the way that He was always meant to be trusted.

May the dust of the Rabbi cover you,

Kerrington