Known by Gym Rats & Petrol Heads

A friend recently gave me a copy of Auto Express car magazine. The following week he gave me a copy of Matt Brzycki’s A Practical Approach to Strength Training. Perhaps he was wishing to boost my flagging levels of manliness. Although I enjoyed flicking through both publications, especially the car mag’s top 100 models, I was interested to see that both dedicated sections to what we put in to their respective bodies of interest. For tough macho guys who attend gyms and lift heavy weights, diet and vitamin quantities are crucial. Mr Brzycki even offers some mathematical calculations to accurately anticipate needed protein levels. He gives sagacious warning to those inclined to overdose on vitamin A which he claims causes decalcification of the bones and muscle soreness. Auto Express ponders the virtues of different oils and fuel, and the additives we might put in our diesel and petrols to benefit the engines and improve efficiency.

It’s clear from both publications that what we put in helps determine what we get out. When I see a weak, struggling Christian, I wonder what they’ve been putting in. If they’ve not been reading their Bibles and good Christian literature, there’s little wonder they’re spiritually deficient. If they’ve been watching harmful or purely banal TV programmes, I’m not surprised their strength is fleeting and their stamina low.

The Christian life is not a gentle stroll in the park; it’s an up-hill race through a dangerous battleground. It needs determination and a good spiritual diet to succeed. Gym-rats and petrol-heads seem to have understood this better than many church-goers. 

I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.

1 Cor. 3:2