Why Jonah 2:8 Is My Life Verse for Body Image Issues, Part 1/2 [Podcast Transcript]

Title: Why Jonah 2:8 Is My Life Verse for Body Image Issues Part 1

Podcast Date: September 24, 2024

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Description 

Today Heather explains why Jonah 2:8, part of a prayer that Jonah prayed from the belly of the great fish that swallowed him, is her life verse for body image issues. Heather shares how the Holy Spirit convicted her of clinging to vain idols in her life and how she came to see through this verse that the more she clung to these idols, the further she became from feeling and recognizing God's love and mercies in her life. Here's the verse in the three translations Heather reads from today:

Jonah 2:8:

Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love. (ESV)

Those who worship false gods turn their backs on all God’s mercies. (NLT)

“Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them. (NIV)

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New to the show? Learn more about Heather Creekmore, Heather's books, and the ministry of Compared to Who? at: www.improvebodyimage.com

Ready for real body image change? The 40-Day Journey begins again in January. Learn more here: https://www.improvebodyimage.com/40-day-challenge

Outline

03:56 Recap Of Jonah’s Story

08:40 Conviction Of My Body Image Idol

13:44 The “Jesus Plus…” Gospel

19:07 Rest Is Elusive In Idolatry

25:33 Turning Away From God’s Love

Heather Creekmore [00:00:02]:

Life audio. Hey there, friend. Heather Creekmore here. Glad you're listening to the Compare To Who show today. Today, we're gonna talk about my life verse. Now I gotta be honest with you, I've never really been a life verse kinda girl. Like, I always kinda believed that we shouldn't just pick out a verse and make that our life mantra. That really the entirety of scripture is probably what we should live by.

Heather Creekmore [00:00:29]:

But when it comes to body image issues, there's one verse that just reached out and grabbed me. It was really the holy spirit who grabbed me through this verse, several years ago, almost a decade ago now. And it changed my life. It changed the way I thought about my body and my body image issues, the way I felt about myself and my calling and my purpose, and all of those things. And the verse oh, friends. The verse is found in the book of Jonah. It's actually something Jonah prayed from the belly of the great fish. And today, we're gonna talk about that verse and how I think this verse can really make a meaningful mark on your life also if you too struggle with body issues.

Heather Creekmore [00:01:21]:

So thanks for being here. You know, this came up because I am walking a group of 60 women through my 40 day body image workbook. It is so fun. We call it the 40 Day Journey. We do it every quarter. So the next group will start in January. Be on the lookout for that. If you've not been a part of a 40 day body image journey yet, plan on it because it's so good.

Heather Creekmore [00:01:45]:

The community is so sweet, and we dig into this tough stuff so that you can get on the road to body image freedom. And it's affordable. It's super affordable. So watch for that and join us on the next 40 day journey. Now let's get to today's episode. Welcome to Compare To Who, the podcast to help you make peace with your body so you can savor God's rest and feel his love. If you're tired of fighting body image the world's way, Compare To Who is the show for you. You've likely heard lots of talk about loving your body, but my goal is different.

Heather Creekmore [00:02:21]:

Striving to fall in love with stretch marks and cellulite is a little silly to me. Instead, I want to encourage you and remind you with the truth of scripture that you are seen, you are known, and you are loved no matter what your size or shape. Here, the pressure is off. If you're looking for real talk, biblical encouragement, and regular reminders that God loves you and you're not alone, you've come to the right place. I hope you enjoy today's show, and, hey, tell a friend about it. Well, hey, friends. I'm glad you're listening today. If you are brand new to the show, I just wanna take just a minute and thank you for being here.

Heather Creekmore [00:02:59]:

On this show, we talk all about body image and comparison issues from a biblical perspective. And you can find out everything you need to know about where we stand on things at improve body image.com. You can also find suggestions for, like, our most popular episodes. Episodes that'll kinda give you a good feel for what we're all about here if this is a little unfamiliar to you, but we are so glad that you are here. So today, we're talking about a little verse in Jonah 2:8. And I wanna read it to you from a couple different translations because, oh, I think they're all pretty powerful. Right? But, again, these are words that Jonah prayed from the belly of the fish. Now little recap on Jonah, I would say, even if you didn't grow up in church, you probably heard the Jonah story at some point.

Heather Creekmore [00:03:56]:

But Jonah was a prophet of the Lord, and God told him to go preach to the people of Nineveh. Now what you need to understand is Nineveh was a wicked, wicked, wicked place. I mean, we find ourselves as being despairing in the culture and world we live in when we see wickedness, but Nineveh was as evil as it gets. And to some degree, Jonah didn't really wanna go preach to those people for a couple reasons. Reason 1 is it was a wicked place. Like, okay, please, God, don't send me to a wicked place. Send me someplace nice, maybe with a beach. Alright? I don't wanna go to the evil place.

Heather Creekmore [00:04:38]:

But second, I wonder to what degree Jonah, like maybe me I don't know. Maybe you, but maybe me for sure, was a little self righteous and maybe even a little afraid of how merciful and grace filled God is. And he thought, I don't wanna go preach to those people because I know the gracious God might just go ahead and save them and forgive them for all these atrocities and turn it around and save the city. And, oh, I don't know if I wanna be any part of that. I kinda think they deserve the worst. I mean, they are the worst. They deserve the worst. I mean, that's a justice mentality, and I have one.

Heather Creekmore [00:05:23]:

Oh, I wrestle not to have one. Maybe you have one too. But the long story short is that God called him to Nineveh. Go preach to Nineveh. And as our, I don't know if you've had the bible story book. I think it's called the Jesus storybook Bible. But we had it when my kids were little, and we read the way they wrote the Bible stories. It was just very compelling.

Heather Creekmore [00:05:45]:

It's all gospel centered. But the way they wrote it was, Jonah went to buy one ticket to “not Nineveh”. Okay? He was willing to go anywhere that wasn't Nineveh. Now just so happens, I've been studying Jonah, like, a lot the last couple months, and I happened to hear another sermon on Jonah. I've been listening to Tim Keller's series on Jonah, but I happen to come across another sermon on Jonah, and he laid it out like this. So Jonah ended up getting a ticket to Tarshish, which was the other direction. And so Nineveh was 500 miles away from where Jonah was. Tarshish was 25 100 miles away.

Heather Creekmore [00:06:27]:

And this particular minister made what I thought was a fun point of, like, how many times are we willing to do something that is, like, 5 times harder? We make life 5 times harder for ourselves if we can just go the direction that is opposite of what God has called us to. Right? We get afraid of what he's called us to, or nervous about it, or frustrated about it, or we just don't wanna do it. And so we go do something 5 times harder. Well, that's what Jonah did. He went to Tarshish, and he ended up on a boat. And there was a great storm. And the sailors on the boat, even though they didn't follow the one true God, they knew, like, something supernatural was going on. And they're like, Jonah, what's this about? And he's like, yeah.

Heather Creekmore [00:07:12]:

This is about me. And if you just throw me overboard, then it'll all go away. And so they did, and Jonah was swallowed by a great fish. And so Jonah 2:8 is a verse that is part of Jonah's prayer, part of his, he was in the belly of the fish for 3 days, 3 nights. Maybe that is reminiscent of something. Right? It's a kind of a precursor, a foreshadowing of Jesus being in the grave for those 3 days, 3 nights before he rose again. But Jonah from the belly of that fish prays these words, and I think they are super important for those of us who wrestle with body image issues. Okay.

Heather Creekmore [00:07:55]:

Let me read it to you in a couple different ways. The first way, I believe, is the ESV. It says those who pay regard to vain idols, forsake their hope of steadfast love. The second translation is the new living translation, and it reads like this. Those who worship false gods turn their backs on all God's mercies. And then the 3rd translation, the one I'm gonna use throughout the rest of this episode is the NIV. Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them. I'm gonna say it one more time because I know some of you are just listening and didn't have a chance to open your Bible.

Heather Creekmore [00:08:40]:

Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them. So how does this encourage someone with body image issues? I know. I know. You're thinking like, Heather, I don't get it. So let me tell you my story and how this, I don't know, it sounds like a diet commercial. How this works for me? But I wanna share that with you to encourage you that I believe this principle can work for you too. That this principle could be the key to helping you unlock what's keeping you stuck in your body image issues too. 

Heather Creekmore [00:09:23]:

So it was almost a decade ago now when I was standing in my kitchen and my husband was listening to a Tim Keller sermon blare through our house. Now this was before any of us owned AirPods. I think this was before podcasting apps existed. I don't remember the exact date on that. But he was listening to this sermon about modern day idolatry. And, honestly, I was like, I don't really need to listen to this because we don't have any statues in our house. Like, how is this applicable? Like, can't we have a good sermon on just how to live the victorious life? Like, what is this? And, honestly, I wasn't used to teaching like Tim Keller's. I grew up in the Assembly of God denomination and went to churches that just taught things a little differently.

Heather Creekmore [00:10:17]:

And so it was just unfamiliar to me. He seemed a little liturgical, a little stuffy. I don't know. He just wasn't the style I was used to. But what I realized that day and, really, it was just the Holy Spirit just tapping on my heart. But I realized that I had an idol problem because I was walking around that kitchen. I think I was cleaning the kitchen, maybe been cleaning the kitchen floors. And every other thought was, I wonder what I could stop eating or what way I could eat so I could be thinner.

Heather Creekmore [00:10:59]:

I wonder how many calories I'm burning right now as I'm cleaning this kitchen floor. I wonder if I can get a workout in later. I know I already worked out this morning. I wonder if I could get another one in to burn more calories. I wonder if there's some supplement I could take that would just speed up my metabolism so that I could lose more weight. I was thinking about my body like that nonstop. Now, I'll be honest with you. No one knew that.

Heather Creekmore [00:11:28]:

Right? It's not like I was sharing that with people widely. No one knew. I mean, my husband didn't know. No one knew that that was the constant conversation in my head, but it was. And the holy spirit that day interrupted my thought, I'm gonna say thought jumbles, about my body and what I look like and what I needed to do to change that with this sermon by Tim Keller where he shared the simple truth. Anything that consumes your time and your money and your heart has become your treasure and your that's an idol. Anything that you feel like you can't live without is an idol.

Heather Creekmore [00:12:09]:

Anything that you are constantly thinking about daydreaming about trying to hold onto is an idol. And I realized that the answer for my body image issues was never gonna be found in losing another couple pounds and toning the part that hadn't gotten toned yet and getting my hair different and getting my skin clearer and getting 6 pack abs or a tighter rounder butt or any of those things. I realized in that moment that I had spent almost 30 years chasing the winds like Ecclesiastes would say. I was chasing and chasing and chasing and never catching it. It was always something else, always something more. I always needed to change the way I ate in a different way. And, oh, I've been eating this, and now they say this is bad, and I've got to start eating this. I've been exercising like this.

Heather Creekmore [00:13:06]:

Now they say exercising like this is bad. I've got to start exercising like this. Oh, it was nonstop. And I realized that I believed in my heart of hearts that if I could just get the body I'd always dreamed up, if I could just look like I'd always wanted to look, then I would have peace, joy, rest. I really believed that that would be my salvation. And so God convicted me right then and there that that's not where salvation was found. And in some ways, that's what happened for Jonah too. Right? God convicted him there in that fish.

Heather Creekmore [00:13:44]:

That salvation is not found in anything but the Lord. And in fact, like, this is the key to spiritual maturity, spiritual growth. Like, this actually is the message of the entirety of the Bible and the gospel is that salvation is of the Lord, period end of sentence. There's no such thing as, salvation comes when I lose weight. Oh, yeah. And Jesus. It's not, salvation comes when I find the right man or have the baby. Oh, yeah.

Heather Creekmore [00:14:18]:

And Jesus. There's not a “Jesus plus” gospel. It's just Jesus. Salvation is of the Lord. And at that moment, Jonah realized that there's a lot of things that you can chase in this life. Like, maybe for Jonah, it was just comfort and security, or maybe just his own, like, I don't know, cause oriented self where he wanted justice. Right? He didn't want those Ninevites to be saved. Right? But he realizes there I guess he had a lot of free time in the belly of that fish.

Heather Creekmore [00:14:51]:

And he realizes, no. Salvation is only from the Lord. And it was the same for me in that kitchen. Right? The holy spirit showed me no Heather. None of these things that you believe about changing your body or getting your ideal body or becoming more like your ideal self. None of these things will save you. Salvation is only of the Lord. But here's what's interesting, friends.

Heather Creekmore [00:15:23]:

Let me go back and read that verse for you one more time. Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them. Right? So if salvation is only from the Lord, what are we doing when we believe that there's something else that will save us? Right? Like I believed having a different body size or shape or look or face or skin or hair, or, you know, build. I believed that would save me. Now I knew that wasn't gonna take me to heaven. Right? Like, I had been around church long enough to know that wasn't the ticket to heaven. Oh, but it was the ticket to this heaven on earth that I really wanted to unlock. Like, I really believed it would do amazing things for me.

Heather Creekmore [00:16:13]:

Like, I believed my marriage would be incredible. I mean, before I got married, I believed it would get me married. You know, I believed I'd have friends. I believed I'd never be rejected. Right? Life would be sunshine and rainbows if only I could get the look. And, again, I don't know if I could have articulated it to you that clearly, But in hindsight, oh, that's what it was. It was an idol. And I was clinging to it.

Heather Creekmore [00:16:42]:

And by clinging to it, I mean, I had my hands wrapped around my body image, my food, my exercise, my scale, the size tag in my jeans. All of those things about the way I looked, my hands were so tied around it. There was no letting go. Like I say in my book, The 40 Day Body Image Workbook. I mean, I was in church raising my hands singing, I surrender all. That wasn't really true. I was willing to surrender everything but my body size and shape and look and appearance. And, honestly, I was able to kinda, like, theologically talk myself into this false reality that maybe that was okay because, like, God didn't really care about that stuff.

Heather Creekmore [00:17:34]:

Like, maybe that was on me. Like, God had delegated that to me to be entirely responsible for, and he didn't need to be a part of that. And so it was all mine. All mine. You know, it's funny, like, Scrooge McDuck. Well, I guess he's not always Scrooge McDuck. I'm thinking of the Disney version of the Christmas Carol. But in the Christmas Carol, right, Scrooge has a problem with greed.

Heather Creekmore [00:17:57]:

Right? He holds on to money. And it's really easy to see, especially in that story. Right? That's wrong. That's evil. That's not good for him. But it's pretty hard for those of us who live in our culture to see that clinging tightly to our food rules and our body size and thinking about our body and worrying about our body. Like, that's healthy. Like, that's just being responsible.

Heather Creekmore [00:18:20]:

Like, that's what you do if you are a smart responsible person or, oh, the Christianized version, that's what you do if you're a good steward of your body. You just hold super tight to your, you know, everything because that's your responsibility. But friends, when we do that, when we are clinging so tightly to something, we're not letting God touch it. We're not letting God speak into it. Chances are, we've put it on a pedestal and we are actually looking for it to save us. We make it an idol. We cling to worthless idols.

Heather Creekmore [00:19:07]:

We believe I can get a certain body size, shape, appearance, look that will bring me things that only Jesus has promised to bring me. And, like, I talked about another one of my books. You know, I think the reason most women go on diets is because we wanna rest. We don't go on a diet to be on a diet for the rest of our lives. You go on a diet because you hope to be on a diet for a certain amount of time, and then you hope at the end of that amount of time that you can just rest, that you can just be. You hope that all the noise around what you have to eat and how you have to exercise will just go silent because you met a goal weight. And now, that's all muted and you can just I can finally breathe because I've gotten to the body that I wanted to get to. But the truth is it never works that way.

Heather Creekmore [00:19:53]:

And anyone whose met a goal weight can tell you that going on maintenance is a lot of work as well. Right? Trying to maintain it. Oh, that's sometimes even more work than getting there in the first place. And there's studies out there. I've mentioned them, I think, even on recent episodes. There's studies out there that talk about how women who lose a significant amount of weight actually obsess about their bodies more after the weight loss than they did before. So are we making our bodies, our body image, what we want people to think we look like or are who we are, are we making that an idol? I did. And if it is an idol, you have to repent.

Heather Creekmore [00:20:33]:

You have to confess it as sin. Right? Idolatry is very similar to another word, adultery. But really, that's what idolatry is. It's adultery against God. Because we are saying, I'm not 100% yours, Lord. I'm, like, maybe 70% yours and, like, 30%, like, you know, getting this good body. Like, that's really gonna work out for me. Like, that could be the ticket.

Heather Creekmore [00:20:57]:

So thanks for the free pass to heaven, but really for here right now, I think this better body thing is gonna work out for me. And our hearts are divided. But, friends, it's even deeper than that. And I'm gonna talk about this more next time on the next podcast. But it's that second part of the verse that really gets me. When you cling to the worthless idols, you turn away from God's love for you. The ESV version, those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love. Back to the NLT version, those who worship false gods turn their backs on all God's mercies.

Heather Creekmore [00:21:47]:

And then finally, back to NIV, those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God's love for them. You see, friend, I think the biggest challenge women with body image issues and men with body image issues, frankly, have is believing that we are fully loved by God. Believing that his love is real and that it's good enough. Because if I really believed that God loves me as much as he does, like, why would I care what you think about me? Like, why would I spend all day obsessing over 5, 10, 20, 30 pounds if I knew I was already completely loved and accepted in him? Why? I wouldn't. I wouldn't if I could just fully believe that I'm loved. And so many of us, friends, so many of us have this intellectual knowledge that God loves us. Right? Maybe you sang Jesus loves me in Sunday school. You know, if I asked you straight up, like, does god love you? You'd be like, sure.

Heather Creekmore [00:22:59]:

God loves me. God loves everyone. But it's not personal. It might be in your head, but it hasn't gotten to your heart. In fact, if I pressed you a little bit more and said, no. But does God love you? Does God love you just like you are right now today? Does God see you? Does God know you? Does God love you specifically? Or is it just God's love is just kinda like this blanket over everyone and you're not special? It's harder, right, to believe that God knew what He was doing when He made me. Right? Like, God's not surprised how I look, how long my fingers are, what my hair does in humidity. Right? Like, God's not holding me to any of these standards that culture and this world hold me to.

Heather Creekmore [00:23:54]:

God's looking at my heart, and he sees oh, he sees that there's some bad junk there. But because of what Jesus did on the cross and because I've committed to follow Jesus and confessed him as my Lord and Savior, I'm forgiven for that junk, and I'm free to follow him to actually be a slave to Christ is what scripture, what Paul tells us. But can I believe that I'm loved and all that? And is it hard for me to believe that I'm loved because the voices of these idols are so loud? These voices, these messages calling out saying, as soon as you lose weight, then you're gonna feel love. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone's gonna notice you. You're gonna feel love.

Heather Creekmore [00:24:45]:

As soon as you get that surgery, as soon as you get that Ozempic, as soon as you do the thing to change your body, oh, then you're gonna feel loved. Then you're gonna just oh, it's just gonna be like, oh, this warm fuzzy feeling. You'll be able to breathe. Finally, you are gonna feel so loved as soon as you change your body. Friends, it's just not biblical. Like, there's zero biblical justification for that. Like, find me the verse, you can't. There's no scripture that says, thou shall change your body to feel love.

Heather Creekmore [00:25:17]:

No. No. No. No. In fact, I would say, we wanna change our bodies to feel love because we wanna actually do something ourselves. We wanna earn something. Like, we wanna contribute to the equation. Right? Yes.

Heather Creekmore [00:25:33]:

Jesus paid it all for you, but we wanna help. Like, can't I just help out by, you know, making my body look good? Like, won't that help me be righteous in your sight, oh Lord? Oh, friend. It doesn't work that way. No. We get his righteousness because of what he did. There is nothing more I can do to make him love me more or make him love me less. But it's really hard to feel his love when I'm clinging to these vain idols. In fact, Jonah 2:8 would say, I've turned away from God's love.

Heather Creekmore [00:26:10]:

I can't feel it at all. I'm facing the other direction. I am running to Tarshish. I'm fleeing Nineveh. One ticket to “not Nineveh”. I want what this idol promises me. Yeah. Thanks for what you did, God.

Heather Creekmore [00:26:24]:

That's great and all, but I want this thing. And I can't feel God's love, and I wonder why. It's because of the idolatry. That's what it is. Oh, friend, it's tough stuff today. We're gonna dig more into God's love and feeling God's love and kinda what that does and means to those of us with body image issues in the next episode. But for today, would you consider just praying? Asking God to show you, do you have any idols that you are clinging to? If this idolatry concept is brand new to you, go grab my 40 day body image workbook. In it, I'm gonna talk about the history.

Heather Creekmore [00:27:05]:

Like, these demons have been around a long time. Alright? These idols are not new. Women were worshiping voluptuous, sexualized, like, all the things. They were worshiping images of women who symbolized all those things centuries centuries centuries ago, back in old testament times. So go look at the history of idolatry that I lay out in that 40 day body image workbook. There's also a diagnostic in there where you can figure out what your idols are. And don't just tell me your idol is food. I did an episode on that.

Heather Creekmore [00:27:44]:

Oh, everyone with an eating disorder, disordered eating wants their idol to be food so they can stop eating it. That's ridiculous. That's not it. Yes. There are some of you who may legitimately have a food idol. I'm not arguing with you, but a lot of my disordered eating, eating disorder women want that to be their idol, and it's just not. It's a body image idol instead. Are you clinging to that idol? Are you forsaking your hope of steadfast love? Are you forsaking God's love for you? Are you turning away from His great mercy for you? Just pray and ask Him.

Heather Creekmore [00:28:19]:

He'll be faithful to tell you, to say, yeah. Yeah. Look at this. Look at this. And the holy spirit's voice is not shaming. Conviction is not shaming. It doesn't make you feel bad other than to feel repentant for the ways that you've hurt God's heart. It's not condemnation, though.

Heather Creekmore [00:28:38]:

It's not condemning. You shouldn't walk away from that prayer feeling like I'm such a loser. Oh, I'm the worst. Like, no. No. No. That was the conversation you had with the enemy and not with the Lord then. Right? But just pray about it, and then maybe get some help.

Heather Creekmore [00:28:52]:

Right? We're gonna be starting another coaching group here very soon. We'd love to invite you to join that or just plan on joining us on the 40 day journey in January. Grab the 40 day body image workbook. I've got resources out there to help you with this. But, friend, you need to feel God's steadfast love. You need to know God's steadfast love is true and real for you. Jonah 2:8 may need to be your life verse for your body image issues too. We are creating idols all the time.

Heather Creekmore [00:29:23]:

Our hearts are idol factories. But if we can stop clinging to our idols and start clinging to Jesus, that's the first step to freedom. And I want you to have that freedom too, friend. So reach out if you need us. Hey. Thanks for listening today. I hope something today has helped you. Stop comparing and start living.

Heather Creekmore [00:29:43]:

Join us next time as we continue this conversation.