If you spend your life focused on overcoming sin, you will never succeed. But if you focus on Christ, He will make you sinless by your willingness to let Him work in your life changing and preparing you for eternity. The same principal applies to losing weight. If you do not focus on losing weight, but focus on being healthy, the weight takes care of itself in the process.

Many weight-loss programs and health tips only lead to unbalanced lifestyles. Here is some practical advice to help you dispel the rumors and establish a lasting healthy lifestyle.

Scales and Calories
The weigh scale is not your friend; it is actually your enemy. One of the best things you can do for losing weight and feeling good is to throw the scale out. It is easy to become captive to the scale and only focus on your weight, rather than your health. When this happens, you desperately try anything to lose the weight, and that is where weight loss programs and supplements come in. After a while, people on these programs can’t wait to start binging again because they think they deserve to resume bad eating habits as a reward for their hard work.

Another practice to throw out is counting calories. This habit can lead to restrictions from foods that your body really needs in order to be healthy. For example, don’t stay away from potatoes, stay away from what you usually put on potatoes. A potato has around 150 calories until it is deep fried into potato chips and then it becomes 1200 calories. Food is not the problem with weight gain. It is what we do to the food before we eat it that is the problem.

How much Protein?
It is often said that weight-loss diets must contain plenty of protein to be effective. What we must remember, however, is that there is protein in everything from lettuce to bananas to nuts. Protein is the very structure of the cells of the plant. The suggested diet we give below is rich in vegetable protein, but limits concentrated proteins such as tofu, nuts, and nut butters.

We have a misconception in North America that we need a lot of protein. People are consuming excessive amounts and suffering from poor health as a result. The recommended dietary allowance (RDA) for protein is 0.8 g/kg/day. For a person weighing 150 pounds, that works out to 54 grams of protein. Most people are consuming upwards of 300 grams of protein every day. These habits contribute to many of our culture’s "diseases of excess." If we are consuming excessive amounts of protein, our liver and kidneys will be overworked trying to eliminate this excess. This strain on our organs leads to disease.

Our bodies run almost exclusively on glucose. The easiest source of glucose is from carbohydrates such as whole grains, brown rice, organic corn, organic potatoes, and other high-starch vegetables. When consumed in moderation, these carbohydrates provide sustained blood sugar levels to keep our energy levels up throughout the day.
 
High protein/low carbohydrate diets are effective in weight loss simply because our bodies would much rather turn fat into glucose than turn protein into glucose. Therefore, when high amounts of protein are consumed with low carbohydrate intake, the body starts to burn the fat.

A high-protein diet will not increase your metabolism, nor will it add lipase (an enzyme used in fat metabolism) to your body. Your body will produce lipase as necessary to metabolize fats consumed. However, excess protein intake can cause weight gain just as surely as high carb intake. An excess of either carbs or protein will end in weight gain.

High protein intake does not curb hunger. It is actually the fiber and nutritional content of the food that signals to the body that it is satiated, and then the slow release of glucose from the metabolism of complex carbohydrates (such as grains and starchy vegetables) that keep the energy levels up. High amounts of protein will actually leave you feeling tired and "heavy.”

Detoxification
For weight loss to be effective, we need to understand why there is excess weight to begin with. As our bodies become toxic, our livers and other organs become overloaded trying to deal with the toxins, and begin to store them in adipose (fat) tissue. This is a slow process, augmented by over-eating, a sedentary lifestyle, and poor stress management.

We do inherit natural tendencies that will also factor in weight gain, but these traits have a minimal effect. Therefore, in order to lose weight, the body will require daily exercise, good stress management, and good nutrition to neutralize the toxins.

When our bodies intake nutrients, they can go to work removing and neutralizing the toxins stored in adipose tissue. This process is called detoxification. As the tissues are freed from toxin, the body will break down the adipose tissue and the weight will come off. That is the reason why we have had countless individuals tell us that after they did a ten-day cleanse their weight literally fell off.

Of course, you don't need a ten-day cleanse to detoxify the body, but because cleanses are intensive, the results are quicker. Body cleansing, along with high nutritional input and regular exercise, is the only way that your body will keep the weight off.
 
Planning Your Day
There is a lot of confusing information out there, but as we follow what God has revealed to us, we can be confident of His blessing. We are told in Counsels on Diet and Foods p. 174 that a two-meals per day plan would be best for most of us—a far cry from the five to six small meals that many health practitioners are currently prescribing. We need to give our digestive systems plenty of time to digest the food we eat, and then have a period of rest.

We also need to eat a balance of fruits, nuts, grains, and vegetables as the perfect fuel provided by God. Grains should be in their most whole forms, such as well-cooked whole oats, quinoa, millet, and brown rice. Due to the high levels of genetically modified corn, ensure your corn is organic. A healthy balance will include whole-grain breads and pasta in moderation, and some starchy vegetables like potatoes, yams, corn, squash, and legumes.
 
Several years ago Jeanie and I ran a weight-loss program at our Bayside Health Clinic for one month. Individuals came to stay with us for the month, and we placed everyone on the same schedule: they had two full meals a day, six to eight glasses of fresh vegetable juice, daily exercise, and steam baths for cleansing and "feeding" their bodies. The average weight loss was one pound per day! This shows that cleansing and nutrition lead to good health and weight loss.

In all the years that we have been helping people with their weight problems we have discovered some key things that really work. However, these tactics do take some effort, and few people are willing to practice self-denial.

The High Nutrition Diet
If you are truly serious about becoming healthy and are currently overweight, this diet is for you. I am giving you an outline for a weight-reducing, health-producing diet. But remember this: for this plan to work, the focus needs to be on health, not weight loss. Our focus is on adding good things to what you are currently doing rather than focusing on quitting things that may not be so good.

Your body builds itself from the foods you eat. You need to feed your living body with living foods. Any food heated past 107 degrees Fahrenheit has greatly diminished enzymes. Cooking at even higher temperatures will destroy most of the remaining nutrients as well. The good news is that you can have a 20% cooked food, 80% raw food diet and have a long, healthy life. All you have to do is make sure you have a good amount of raw and living foods before you have your cooked foods and follow the recommendations below.

The current North American-style, cooked food diet, will only produce disease. People who have accustomed themselves to the rich, highly stimulating North American diet have developed an unnatural taste, leaving them with no desire for plain and simple food. It will take time for the taste buds to be restored and for the stomach to recover from the abuse it has suffered. But those who persevere in the use of wholesome food will, after a couple of weeks, find it enjoyable. They will appreciate the delicate and delicious flavors. The stomach—neither fevered nor overtaxed—will readily perform its work with no stress.

I find that most people’s diets are very deficient in green foods. I have also found that adding plenty of greens to the diet greatly helps in returning the body to health. I am recommending that you have a very special concentrated green foods diet for the next eight weeks. You will need to get a good vegetable juicer, blender, and coffee grinder.

The Crucial Ingredients
Green Smoothies
Look for these leafy greens at your grocery store: kale leaves, collard greens, mustard greens, alfalfa sprouts, dark green romaine lettuce, parsley, dandelion greens, bok choi, or any other leafy greens. Also purchase pineapple juice, orange juice, or tomato juice.

Put two cups of juice into your blender and add one large handful of each of the greens you have chosen for the week. Select two or three greens each week and change to a different combination of greens the following week so your body gets a good variety. Add one tablespoon of Udo’s Oil 3,6,9 blend with DHA and blend well until smooth.

You can also use different fruit juices from time to time such as guava or mango juice. The key is to get a good variety so that you do not become bored of the flavors. The drink should be the consistency of a medium thick shake. If you find that the drink is too thick, add fewer greens.
Have two 16oz smoothies each day. Follow the smoothie with the rest of your meal such as oatmeal or toast for breakfast, or a baked potato, rice dish, or sandwich for lunch.

If you find that you are not hungry after your smoothie, do not eat anything else. You will be fine until your next mealtime. If you find that 16oz is too much, adjust the amounts to suit you.

Seeds
In the morning, take 2 heaping tablespoons of flax seeds. Grind them in a coffee grinder and add them to your green smoothie or put them on your fruit. Flax seeds will bind any excess estrogens and other hormones and remove them from your system through the bowels.

Half an hour before bed, take one teaspoon of psyllium (seed or husks) in a glass of pineapple juice or water. Follow this with another glass of water. Stir in the psyllium very quickly and drink it immediately because it will get too thick very fast.
Psyllium is considered to be an intestinal broom, and will clean your bowels very effectively. If you find that your bowels are not moving, or slowing down, reduce the psyllium intake to half of a teaspoon. If you still find that your bowels are not moving right or have slowed down, then stop using the psyllium and continue with the flax seed in the morning.

Take the flax seed and the psyllium for six months for a good bowel cleansing.

Water
In the morning, drink four glasses of room temperature water within ten minutes. This will help your body complete its important morning functions.

Each day, drink one ounce of water for every two pounds of body weight up to what your body weight should be. Also, have one ounce of water for every twenty-five pounds that you are overweight. You should sip your water throughout the day instead of gulping it down all at once. Start drinking water about one hour after eating and stop drinking it about a half hour before a meal. You should not drink any liquid with your meals, as this will dilute the digestive juices.

Exercise
Six days a week, do 30 minutes of brisk exercise, or as much as you are able. Walking is the best form of exercise, but a stationary bicycle will work as well. Exercise to the point of sweating, as this will release toxins from under the skin.

Sample Menus
Breakfast: Green smoothie by itself, or with bananas and apples with oatmeal; pineapple, mangoes and toast; pears, grapes, and cereal; or oranges, grapefruit, and trail mix.

Lunch: Big green salad (with onions, peppers, celery, and tomatoes) with a baked potato, brown rice, pasta, or baked beans.Or, have another green smoothie.

Supper: Green smoothie by itself, or with popcorn, apples, dates, raisins, or a toasted tomato sandwich.
Do not eat between meals or after supper. Rather, drink water and vegetable juice.

Never mix unjuiced fruit and unjuiced vegetables together at any meal, as this will cause digestive problems. Also, avoid dessert. If you want to regain your health, you will follow these guidelines seriously.

Eat a rainbow of foods every day to get a good variety of nutrients, and ask the Lord to help your body heal itself.

If you are currently taking a prescription drug of any kind, tell your doctor that you are changing your diet and lifestyle. Ask them to monitor you because your medication may become too strong, and you may need the dose diminished. This way, your doctor can see and record the results of a proper diet and lifestyle. They in turn may help others by sharing with them the things you have been doing.

By Rudy and Jeanie Davis. Rudy and Jeanie enjoy taking long hikes throughout the Maritimes, where they also operate a health center in Baie-Ste-Anne, New Brunswick. They hold public health seminars across the country bringing the principles of health reform to many people who would otherwise never enter a church.