Body image and BMI, health and nutrition, exercise and eating habits—these topics bombard us each time we turn on the TV, flip through a magazine, or surf the web. Advertisers clamor to convince us that we’ll only get the good life once we get mastery over our bodies and appetites. We’ll be inferior, it’s suggested, if we don’t have this or look like that. Given our proclivity to find fulfillment in things other than Jesus, we consume their products without even realizing what’s happening. Obsessing over how we look and what we eat, we end up caring about meeting the beauty standards airbrushed onto magazine covers more than honoring our Savior with our bodies.

In this new video, Amie Patrick talks with Mark Mellinger about what it looks like for Christians to have a healthy body image as well as the heart issues that often cause us to look for comfort outside of the gospel. Patrick, co-author (with her husband, Darrin) of the forthcoming book The Dude’s Guide to Marriage: Ten Skills Every Husband Must Develop to Love His Wife Well (Thomas Nelson, November 2015), considers the place of exercise in the Christian life, common misconceptions among believers, and much more.

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Related:

“Eating, Body Image, and the Gospel” (article)
“Eating, Body Image, and the Gospel” (TGC15 workshop audio)

Mark Mellinger is a news anchor for WATE-TV (ABC) and the marketing and development director for the National Embryo Donation Center, a life-affirming Christian non-profit in Knoxville, Tennessee. He also contributes part-time to several outlets, including Bott Radio Network and The Gospel Coalition.

Amie Patrick holds a degree in music education and is passionate about leadership and teaching women to practically apply the gospel to all areas of their lives. Amie and her late husband, Darrin, authored The Dude’s Guide to Marriage: Ten Skills Every Husband Must Develop to Love His Wife Well (Thomas Nelson, 2015).