“Jesus saith unto them, ‘My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.’”—John 4:34
I’m so glad this is my life verse. If it weren’t I might have had a fit on Christmas. Time didn’t allow me to cook the Christmas meal I told you about. So when I came home after going to my uncle’s for dinner (where the green vegetable and the dressing were prepared with meat and the other sides were starches) I made me a tuna nacho and a fresh juice. Yes, I skipped a traditional Christmas meal and instead had a fancy snack and a vegetable juice, something I have regularly. My meal itself wasn’t special but what was special was that I was truly okay eating it on Christmas. I was truly okay with my family not understanding that a person who doesn’t eat meat doesn’t want to eat things cooked with meat, that I don’t want a meal of potato salad, macaroni and cheese, candied yams and cornbread and that vegetarian means eating a host of vegetables prepared different ways.
I don’t expect anyone to fully understand my choice to be a semi-vegetarian. They aren’t the ones feeding me. I knew that going to my uncle’s house and I know that wherever I go. “Don’t worry about them; they aren’t putting any food on your table,” my mother would say if I was bothered by someone at school or work. And I know the same is true when people misunderstand my vegetarianism, when they wonder why my hair is locked and why we home school and the same is true for you. People may not understand where you choose to work, whom you choose to befriend, where you choose to live or the way you choose to raise your kids, but if your choices are God’s will for you, doing them—not following or giving weight to the opinion of others—is what nourishes you.
My transition to a more holistically healthy lifestyle is something God made clear I had to do. His charge to me is my food and I continue down this path, past the naysayers and those who suggest other ways to me, so that I can complete the work He put me on earth to do. As you seek a holistically healthy lifestyle I hope you will anchor that in God’s will for your life so you can complete the work that He sent you to do.
