Fat Chance Read online

  Bill later told me that his speedy progress during that competition was due to the fact that he picks up leaves on Long Island every fall in much the same way—diving a big sheet underneath the pile and then scooping up as many as he can hold. Thank goodness Bill does his own lawn!

  As I caught my breath and waited for the team tallies to be revealed, I thought about the sacrifice that Mike and I had made six years prior. I thought about the freedom I longed to enjoy once more.

  Finally, Alison spoke. She announced the bottom three duos and the amount of weight each had hauled, which meant that now it was down to two teams—Amy and Kae, and Bill and me. I couldn’t even look at Alison, I was so nervous. I blew all of the air out of my cheeks as I reached down to hold Bill’s hand. “Please, oh please, oh please, oh please”—I think those were the profound words I prayed.

  “One duo hauled seventy-five-point-eight pounds,” Alison said rather cryptically. “The winning duo hauled ninety-eight-point-four pounds,” she then said to everyone’s oohs and ahhs. Alison paused dramatically before continuing, and I couldn’t help but peek at her with anxious anticipation. “The duo who won gets these,” she said as she jingled two sets of car keys. At the sight of those keys I reached for my knees. My stomach was a jumble of knots.

  Still peering at the ground beneath my feet, I heard the words that made my spirits soar. “And that duo is … Bill and Julie.”

  With that, of course, I cried.

  To this day, when I reflect on the can-challenge from that amazing afternoon, I think about how God lovingly returned to me what he had willingly allowed to be removed. Mike and I had been determined to create a situation in which I could be an at-home mom, but admittedly it was never fun to be stuck inside all day with a toddler and no place to go. There were so many times when I wanted to take Noah to the park or run a few errands with friends, but God had other, more significant goals in mind. Like helping me learn to stay the course, for instance, even when things got hard.

  After being handed the keys to my beautiful new Ford, I climbed into the driver’s seat and marveled at every square inch. Leather seats, a CD player, a sunroof—it was far nicer than anything I ever would have bought for myself, but isn’t that just like God? I thought about the verse in Ephesians that says God will give us exceedingly abundantly above all that we can ask for or think.8 And I thanked him for being true to his word.

  “I’m your portion, Julie,” he seemed to say in response to my thoughts. “And I’ll provide for you to the end.”

  MY DELIVERER

  My shield. My strength. My portion. And, my deliverer.

  As I began to look to God to supply every single thing I needed, I witnessed him releasing me—“saving” me, as it turns out—from the things that had held me captive for years: legalism, an overemphasis on trying to please people, fear, heaviness both in my body and in my heart. At every turn, he was fulfilling his promise to help me bear up under what life had thrown my way.

  “God is faithful,” 1 Corinthians 10:13 says. “He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” There were plenty of temptations for me on campus, but you try sneaking a Snickers with the God of the universe standing right by your side. “I’m with you in this struggle,” he’d remind me, “and with my help, you’re capable of making choices that are wise.”

  “WAIT, SO IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT ME?”

  What is interesting to me as I reflect on the spiritual awakening I experienced while on campus is that somehow I thought that God had orchestrated it just for me. Julie had a need, and Jesus decided to meet it. Julie shed a tear, and Jesus bent over to catch it. Julie suffered a little pain, and Jesus rushed over to soothe it.

  I would come to discover that I had gotten the whole thing entirely wrong. God had not revealed himself to me in a personal, powerful way so that I would be comforted only; he had gifted me with his presence so that I could extend that comfort to others—both on the show and beyond.

  One day I was grabbing a bite to eat in the kitchen when Jillian motioned me over. “I need to talk to you,” she said quietly.

  I felt sure that I was in trouble.

  Looking into Jillian’s eyes, I saw seriousness lingering there. What could I possibly have done to make her this mad?

  As I would soon find out, her intensity had nothing to do with me.

  “Hollie’s stepdad just called,” she said in an even tone, “and the news is really not good.”

  Hollie’s mother had been diagnosed with cancer years prior and although the terrible disease had lain in remission for a long time, evidently it was relapsing now. When Hollie accepted a slot on the show, her mom was faring pretty well. How could Hollie have known that during the same season she would pursue her lifelong weight-loss dream, her own mother would suffer such a terrible fate?

  The production crew had told Jillian that Hollie’s mom didn’t have long to live. Now Jillian was supposed to break the ridiculously tough news to the girl who was finally finding her niche on the team. “Hollie is just now taking ownership of her own body,” Jillian whispered to me. “This is the opportunity of a lifetime, and she’s finally giving it her all.”

  Jillian, of course, was right. But equally true was that Hollie needed to do what was best for her and her family. She would decide to go home that day, to be close by when the woman who gave her life finally bid this life good-bye.

  I missed Hollie so much when she left to be by her mom’s side. Isabeau and I would lie in our beds at night and talk about how the game was totally different without our good friend. We knew then that we’d never vote off Hollie.

  As the other black-team members and I helped carry Hollie’s luggage to the car that would take her to the airport, the game seemed to screech to a halt. All of my concerns about inspiring a nation dissipated into thin air as I realized the person needing inspiration the most was standing right beside me. Until that point I had begged God to be with me, to help me, to give strength to me, and to comfort me. But with this sudden turn of events my eyes were finally fixed on someone other than myself. Now my prayers were for Hollie—that she would sense God’s presence, his help, his comfort, his peace.

  “Your ways really aren’t like my ways,” I told God. “This was never about me at all.”

  WORDS I NEEDED TO HEAR

  When Jillian first learned of my faith in Christ, she had some fun at my expense. “Oh man, I got me one of those crazy Born Agains on my team!” she’d joke.

  “Jillian,” I’d clarify, “born-again is an adjective, not a noun. I’m not ‘a born-again.’ I am ‘born-again!’”

  Jillian actually made this comment to another born-again Christian, Pete Thomas from Season 2, who happened to be visiting the set of the show that day along with his wife. Pete chuckled at Jillian’s comment and said, “That’s what you used to call me!”

  She’d just laugh as she sauntered away, but the irony of her remark stayed behind. Jillian may have pretended to misapprehend what it meant to be a follower of Christ, but hadn’t I done it for real? All of my legalism and distance and fear-based behavior—did I know what it meant to relate to God at all?

  In retrospect, I know that I could have accomplished my weight-loss goal without the help of The Biggest Loser show. What I don’t know is whether my faith could have been remade by any other approach. As I learn more about the God I love, I find it more and more plausible that he flew my flabby butt all the way to LA for four solid months just so I’d be still enough to hear him speak. I thought I needed the big, dramatic experience in order to become the woman I wanted to be. But as it turned out all I needed was him.

  I learned so much while I was on The Biggest Loser, about arm curls and calorie counts and how to make plain ground turkey taste absolutely delicious. But perhaps the most profound lesson I took away was how to walk with God. As I continue to sort out what that truly means, I find myself c
linging to three divine refrains that God gave me while on the show. They represent the words I still need to hear, each and every day—words I pray will bless you as well.

  “ACCEPT MY LOVE”

  Moments after my son Noah was born, a nurse cleaned him off, swaddled him tightly in a blanket and laid him on my chest. I peered at that tiny bundle through tear-clouded eyes and thought, “I love you more than words can express.” Which was sort of an interesting response, given the fact that he really wasn’t very cute. Noah weighed four pounds dripping wet, his bug-eyes were too big for his face and his limbs fell at odd angles like a baby bird that had been dropped from a tree. But the moment I saw him, I loved him—not because he was magnificent, but simply because he was mine.

  It’s the way I have come to understand God’s marvelous love for us.

  “I love you unconditionally,” he says, “not because you’re magnificent, but just because you are mine. You don’t have to be faster, thinner, prettier, smarter or more organized to warrant the love that I feel.

  “I see you, I accept you, I know you, I desire you … I am your Father, and I am near. Accept the love you find in me, and I will walk with you every step of the way.”

  It was the first counsel I sensed God giving me regarding how to walk closely with him—“Accept my love, Julie. It’s my heartfelt gift to you.”

  “OFFER YOUR LIFE”

  The second piece of divine advice I got was to offer my life up in service of God. It was imperative that I learn my whole purpose for living is to love and serve God so that I can then go love and serve the people I come across.

  Here’s the deal: I hate public speaking. And yet, since my time on the show, nearly all of the high-impact opportunities I have been given involve some form of public speaking.

  Funny, God. Very funny.

  Speaking still scares me to death, but I know that God has given me this opportunity for such a time as this. And not seizing it scares me far more than seizing it ever will.

  So, I accept the engagements. I show up. I speak from my heart, sweaty pits and all. Each time, I coerce the stomach butterflies to fly in formation at least until I can vacate the stage and then look heavenward with this thought: “You endured the cross. Clearly I had to endure that.”

  It always amazes me when people show up at the places where I’ve agreed to come to speak. Talk about a relief! Their presence would make for a fantastic ego boost, except for the fact that I know they’re not there because of me. I am not rail-thin, I am not particularly eloquent and I tend to lose track of time. Obviously, they are not there to hear me. They are there to hear of my struggle—a struggle that they see themselves in.

  In my view, it is far more inspiring to hear of a person’s struggle than to be told of her great success. What endeared me to Hollie was not the person she presented herself to be. It was her struggle over her mom that would draw me toward her in the end. Likewise, it was not Jillian’s picture-perfect abs that invited me to care deeply about her life. It was when I understood the struggle that she had one day won that her heart would be knitted to mine.

  Struggles are powerful because they tend to reveal a glimpse of where God is working in the world. He loves us in the midst of our struggles and longs for us to look to him for strength. Certainly I never would have signed up for the pain and the pressure I faced while working to drop half of my body weight, but now that I’m on this side of the equation, I see God using the agony for good.

  One of my favorite Casting Crowns songs says, “Are we happy, plastic people under shiny plastic steeples, with walls around our weakness, and smiles to hide our pain? If the invitation’s open to every heart that has been broken, maybe then we close the curtain on our stained-glass masquerade.”9 Everyone has a facade up that makes us appear to be perfect, but you and I both know there’s another “us” behind that mask. If only we’d be freer in revealing our areas of struggle … just think of the bridges we’d build between our hearts and the hearts of others we meet.

  I have a feeling that even on my dying day I’ll still be wishing I were better at offering up my whole life to God. Maybe that’s the point, that this is a never-ending process and therefore a way to stay close to him. This much I do know: real living only surfaces when you’re seeking total surrender to God.

  These days I am nothing more than a broken vessel who yearns to be used by God. Whatever he asks me to do, I’ll do it. Wherever he asks me to go, I’m in. For the first time in my life I find myself flat on my face, fully trusting, fully yielding, fully expecting great things as I rely on God for each breath. My cup now runs right over, and my soul is soaring high.

  If only I could celebrate with a little slice of chocolate cake …

  “LEAVE A LEGACY THAT POINTS TO ME”

  Can I share the third piece of encouragement I received? “Leave a legacy that will undeniably point to me,” God seemed to tell me while I was on the show. “Whatever accomplishments you amass, whatever successes you enjoy, always make sure that your victories point to me.”

  There’s a passage in the Bible I came to appreciate even more while I was on campus for those four months. In Luke 19, Jesus is about to enter Jerusalem, the city he loves. His disciples are walking ahead of him, whooping and hollering and cheering their shouts of praise for all of the miracles they’d seen Jesus do, when a group of legalistic Pharisees who were standing nearby told Jesus to shut them up. Evidently they were a bit too joyous for the Pharisees’ bland taste.

  Jesus turns toward the Pharisees and says nine words that make my day every time: “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”10 With subtle but powerful language Jesus was teaching a bunch of legalists how to praise him. And somehow I could relate because I was learning to praise him for the first time too. I acknowledged that I was living and breathing and moving and competing not just inside a TV-show set but inside the magnificent creation of God. For once I was sensing his presence—and it was personal, relevant and real.

  I want my legacy to be that I praised God at every turn. Until I breathe my last breath, I want to praise him for the mountaintops and praise him for the valleys. I want to praise him for my history and for a future that seems so bright. I want to praise him for my husband and for my children and for my friends. I want to praise him for my body—which, though imperfect, carries me through each and every day. I can walk. I can run. I can build muscle mass and confidence and strength. And for those things, I’ll always be grateful—gratefully full of praise.

  The contemporary Christian band Watermark released a song years ago that echoes the heart of this theme. In “Gloria,” they sing, “I wish I could crash like the waves and turn like the autumn breeze, in an effort to praise you. I wish I could smell like the forest, the fragrance lifting a mighty chorus in an effort to praise you.”11

  They go on this way, wishing they could cry out praise as effectively as rolling thunder or falling summer rain but then acknowledging that we humans have limitations when it comes to such things. When the chorus rises, the lead singer expresses her praise the only way she knows how—by singing “Gloria.”

  Gloria!

  Glory in the highest

  Forever I will hide myself in Thee

  Oh, Gloria!

  Glory in excelsis Deo

  Gloria!

  Gloria!

  Gloria!12

  I get what the singer is saying. How I wish my praise for God were as powerful as thunder! While I was on The Biggest Loser campus, I used to wish my praise could have rung out like those church bells or smelled like the sweet strawberries whose scent often woke us up. Knowing those things were impossible, I’d praise God the only way I knew how. With every minute on the treadmill, my soul was saying, “Gloria!” With every healthful handful of almonds eaten, my lips were speaking, “Gloria!” With every quiet prayer mouthed when I was too tired to actually speak, my heart was crying, “Gloria! Glory in the highest! Forever I will hide myself in Thee.”

&nbs
p; Although you and I are limited creatures, we can praise God still. We can do what God calls us to do. We can strengthen ourselves—body, mind and soul. We can accept his great love. We can offer up our lives in service to him. We can leave behind a legacy of faithfulness to all who knew us well.

  The first weekend I was home after being on the show, I couldn’t wait to go to church. Sunday morning showed up with crystal blue skies and bright, warm sunbeams, and a sense of distinct, divine hope that I’d missed.

  As I stepped into the auditorium I realized that while everything was the same, it was altogether different too. The people were nicer, the music was sweeter and my attitude had been remade. How true it is that you don’t really appreciate something until it has been taken away from you for a while. I had been in church for all those years without enjoying all that it means to be “in Christ.” Funny how I’d overlooked him until I encountered him in a gym.

  I sang a solo that weekend, Babbie Mason’s “He’ll Find a Way,” and as I looked out from the platform at the loving eyes looking back, I couldn’t help but think about how these were the people who had been praying for me for four months straight, the people who had been caring for me from afar every second I was on the show. “You did find a way, didn’t you, God?” I thought as I belted out the chorus. “You found a way to break through, to be near, to beckon me toward authentic faith.”

  It wasn’t the church of my youth that had been the problem. It wasn’t legalism’s rules that had led me astray. The chasm between God and me all that time was one of my own making. And how grateful I was when it was finally bridged. “When you’re feeling at your weakest,” that Babbie Mason song goes, “Jesus will be strong. He’ll provide an answer when you find all hope is gone. He’ll find a way.”