You Can’t Outwork Your Fork

By Mike Glenn, but I, Scot McKnight, wish I could claim a title like that one.

Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash

Several years ago, I started working out with a trainer. I don’t recommend it. For one thing, life brings enough pain on its own without any of us having to pay for the torture we try to hide under the euphemism of “personal training.” After a few weeks, I was making gains. I was stronger and my profile was becoming more defined. The only problem was I wasn’t losing any weight. This isn’t unusual. After all, I was told more than once muscle weighs more than fat. As my body was growing stronger, muscle replaced fat and caused a temporary gain in weight.

He emphasized “temporary.” My weight wasn’t temporary.

That was when he brought up another code word – nutrition. Notice, he didn’t say diet. For personal trainers, diet is a four letter word. They won’t talk about giving up anything or restrictions of any kind. They’ll always talk about making sure you’re putting good things in your body. Are you getting enough protein? What about your greens? Fiber? Are you drinking enough water? Notice what he never mentioned? He never talked about sugar or fat. For my trainer, diet is about what we don’t put into our bodies. Nutrition is about what we put in our bodies. For my trainer, we’re always in control of nutrition. We control what we put in our bodies and that determines how well our bodies are able to meet the daily demands of life.

Our bodies will respond to the quality of fuel (nutrition) we put into our body. A high performance car won’t run on cheap gas. Neither will our bodies. That’s why my trainer always emphasized proper nutrition. Good food is what makes the body work.

And here’s the kicker. According to my trainer, you can’t outwork your fork. That is, no matter how hard you work in the gym, if you aren’t supporting your health goals with good nutrition you will never succeed. The body, it seems, adheres to the early truths we were told about computers – “garbage in, garbage out.”

You can’t outwork your fork.

Interesting insight, isn’t it? I thought of this while listening to all of the discussions about the dangers of social media and how extended periods of scrolling are actually rewiring people’s brains. Everything we see, everything we watch, every podcast has an agenda. Sometimes, social media is always trying to get us to do something. They want to buy something, support something, give to something, march for something – it’s always something! More and more we’re discovering how successfully social media is forming our thoughts which in turn shape our desires which ends up forging our character. What we think becomes who we are.

Let’s get this straight. We don’t live in a Christian nation. Maybe we did at one point in our history, but we don’t now. We live in a post Christian, postmodern world. Why do you think everyone is so interested in studying Daniel and Revelation? More and more people are recognizing we’re living in Babylon.

How do we live in Babylon? By taking responsibility for our spiritual nutrition. Remember what Daniel did in the first chapter of his book? He refused to eat from the king’s table. Remember, he was a captive. He had no control over his life and yet, he took responsibility for what he ate. Likewise, as Christ followers, we have to take control over the things that enter our minds and hearts. We have to be responsible for our spiritual nutrition. We have to be intentional about what we read, what we watch, what we talk about and what we think about. The Apostle Paul said it like this:

Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you (NASB Philippians 4:8–9).

In Romans, he writes:

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect (NASB Romans 12:2).

Life renewal begins with a renewal of our thinking. Our thinking is renewed by our serious and deep study of God’s word and long, intense prayerful conversations with the God who defines reality. Turn off social media. Read a good book. Study the Bible. Don’t just read it. Study it.

Stop getting mad at the world for acting like the world. Babylon is going to be Babylon. Take responsibility for your spiritual nutrition. There’s a lot of good stuff out there if you take the time to find it. (Scot McKnight has several good and thoughtful books).

You’re in control of your mind and your heart. Feed them well. After all, you can’t outwork your fork.