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Exploring Health as Wholeness, Revisited

The Goldilocks Principle

We are probably more influenced by the stories and authors that we discovered in childhood or youth than we realize. In a previous newsletter I mentioned that I describe my sensitivity in terms of my having been cast as the princess in an elementary school play, The Princess and the Pea. I have also written about my senior English teacher who introduced us to Francis Bacon's the golden mean: "Be not the first by whom the new is tried, or yet the last to lay the old aside."

I like the concept of balance, but that is not to say that we have not tried the extreme. Nine years ago, Dick and I were introduced to a vegan diet based on Genesis 1:29 as taught by Rev. George Malkmus, founder of Hallelujah Acres, now located in Shelby NC. We both experienced extraordinary results; my arthritis of 15 years disappeared in three months; Dick's cholesterol dropped 100 points, he lost 50 pounds, and his doctor took him off medication for hypertension that he expected to be on the rest of his life.

As I wrote in my Winter 2002 newsletter, Udo Erasmus says, "Health has to be the presence of something -- all parts in proper arrangement, working in harmonious balance -- [to make] us whole, hale, holy, and healthy."

I agree that instead of defining wellness as the absence of sickness, we need to discover and embrace wholeness -- in order to come into a balance that gives structure and harmony to our entire person: spirit, soul, and body.

Wellness as wholeness means balancing work, rest, sunshine, fresh air, pure water, exercise, passion for learning, worship, and serving others. "Retirement" has offered us the opportunity to pursue balance, and we have enjoyed serving others by introducing them to the lifestyle that we have followed for nine years, through our Let's Be Well classes and our every-other-summer Optimal Health Seminars at St Olaf College*. This morning I was journaling Matthew 7. I read, "If your child asks you for bread will you give him a stone? Or if your child asks for a fish, will you give him a snake? ...Even though you are evil, you know how to give good gifts to your children. So how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him?" It's obvious that Jesus is calling bread and fish "good gifts". Yet the Hallelujah diet does not allow fish, calling it "dead food."

All this is to say that we are no longer following the Hallelujah diet. We have realized that the Bible, has many more things to say about food than Genesis 1:29, and we want to teach the whole counsel of God. In our 2003 classes we will be using materials developed by Greg and Judie Westbrook and their family, creators of the Weigh of Wisdom Workshop; Gordon Tessler PhD; and Dr Michael D. Jacobson, all of whom base their understanding of health as wholeness on many more scriptures than one verse from Genesis. Our Creator knows our bodies. He gave us the Bible to tell us who we are, where we came from, why we die, and how we can live forever. He also promises us abundant life if we know his Son. We are excited about the new direction we are headed. We hope that some of you can join us for our first ten-week term in 2003, and that you will find the program "not too hard, not too soft, but just right."

If you have taken our classes, attended our summer seminars, and/or been influenced by our newsletters, we ask your forgiveness for teaching what we now believe is not the whole truth.

Life is a journey, but the path is only revealed as God shed his light on it. In I Corinthians Paul says, "now we know in part..." We want those who listen to us also to seek God themselves to find balance, and the way to health as wholeness.

We appreciate those who share with us what they have found helpful. We aim to do for others what we hope others will do for us. May it be so.

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Let's Be Well, Inc.
ph: (507)645-7202 fax: (507)645-2594
e-mail: carolcover@letsbewellinc.com or dcover@letsbewellinc.com

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