Young Earth and the Paleo diet....Does it mix?

Before I dig into this topic lets make it clear that I am a young earth creationist.  This means that I believe that Genesis is the true account of creation and that God did it in 6 literal days, about 6-10,000 years ago.  I am also a trainer and stark supporter of the Paleo Diet and even as strict as a Ketogenic diet.  I will explain those as I go.

Paleo as I will use it does not necessarily mean the cave man diet or neanderthal diet.  It is a hunter/gatherer, living off the land type of diet with a few tweeks here and there.

Ketogenic diet, is a diet where your body burns fat for energy instead of carbs, simply because you dont give it enough carbs to burn.

First off how did we eat before we were exiled from the Garden?
God placed Adam in the garden and told him that he would have every green plant for food...
-Gen 1:29-30   "²⁹ Then God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the ^[an]surface of all the earth, and every tree ^[ao]which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; ³⁰ and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the ^[ap]sky and to every thing that ^[aq]moves on the earth ^[ar]which has life, I have given every green plant for food”; and it was so."


Does this mean that we only ate vegetables and fruit? Yep sure does. What about cereal grains?  Maybe, I dont know.  But, we were vegetarians at this point.  If we were meant to eat animals at this point God would have included them in the statement "it shall be food for you".  


When were we allowed to eat animals?
After Noah's flood, when God dispersed the animals he also put the fear of man into them.  This is when he gave them to us for food.
Gen 9:2-3 The fear of you and the terror of you will be on every beast of the earth and on every bird of the ^[a]sky; with everything that creeps on the ground, and all the fish of the sea, into your hand they are given. ³ Every moving thing that is alive shall be food for you; I give all to you, as I gave the green plant. 
Just as He gave the green plant he now gives us the animals.  That means we are supposed to eat meat.  The question now comes, WHY?  Why cant we just live as a vegetarian?  Well you can but you will not be your healthiest.  We need animal protein and I will give you my reasons as to why.


When we started off in the garden of Eden we were physically perfect human beings.  That means no breakdown in our bodies requiring protein to rebuild.  However due to our stupidity and selfishness Adam disobeyed God, and when he did he brought sin into the world.  Sin entering the world cursed the whole of creation, that means everything, not just humans, or animals, but the plants, the ground, the sky and everything in them.  With the curse, now comes mutations.  Mutations in our own DNA causing us to no longer be able to thrive on a vegan diet.  Mutations or changes in humans + the changes in plants is where I think we developed the allergens to gluten and other plant properties. So as time goes by that relationship gets worse and worse until our bodies are so out of wack that they require a substance(protein) to help restore or rebuild  them.  Over the many generations since that time, our tolerance has gotten less and less, well, tolerant.


Today how do we eat?  We as humans eat a huge diet based mostly on grains.  A plant that whether we could eat it in the beginning or not is very detrimental to our health now.  Fruits although loaded with nutrients and other good things they are also loaded with fructose.  For more info on fructose read previous post.  Are we a healthy society?  You had better say no to that.  Obesity is on the rise, disease and tons of other ailments are constantly plaguing our lives.  So what are we left with?  Meat, nuts/seeds, veggies, and occasionally some fruit.  What do we stay away from?  Sugar, grains, high starchy vegetables, and dairy.

Yes the Bible and "paleo" can coexist.  It is just a healthier lifestyle.

God made it...

This post is not going to be about how great God is.  It is simply to show a false argument that I have heard come up many times, and have posted on it before...
This post is going to deal with something I have been researching lately and had put off doing for a long time simply because I didnt want to know the truth.....FRUIT!!!
To be more accurate the sugar in the fruit...Fructose!!
From what I have read, just about everyone out there wants to bash sucrose(table sugar) and all the artificial sweeteners but leave fructose alone.  Thats because its natural you say... Your right it is natural but again just because its natural doesnt make it good for us.  Most everyone out there knows that sucrose is bad news right, that white sugar that gets baked into our cakes or sprinkled on top of who knows what is bad for you.  No surprises there we knew that.  But did you know that sucrose is almost 50/50 glucose and fructose?  Every cell in the human body can use glucose for energy.  Fructose on the other hand is almost entirely metabolized in the liver and some studies have shown that prolonged effects on the liver are similar to alcohol. Higher consumption of fructose stimulates Lipogenesis, which is, sugars converting to fat and then triglycerides, raising the level of triglycerides leads to heart disease and the metabolic syndrome.  "Metabolic syndrome is the combination of high blood pressure, high blood sugar, too much fat around the waist, low HDL ("good") cholesterol, and high triglycerides. Metabolic syndrome increases your risk for heart disease, diabetes, and stroke." -WebMd
I am not saying to never eat fruit.  And yeah an apple is probably better then grabbing a snickers or kit kat, but truth of the matter is that fruit has its ups and downs and if you are over weight, or already insulin resistant then you should stay clear of it.  If you are healthy, and athletic, in good shape then you could probably eat it here and there.  We were not created to consume fruit all the time.  Before we could fly and get food from all over the planet we may have had some fruit every so often a few months out of the year, but now that we can get it anytime we have gone way overboard with it.
To come back to the argument that God made it, your right he did.  He also made every plant out there poisonous and or edible.  Fruit is cursed just like the rest of creation and we may be getting further and further away from being able to safely eat it.

Controversal???... NAHHH

It has been a while since last I blogged... I know but I have been coming up with a bazillion ideas but not getting deep enough into them to feel like I can put them on here yet...

Lets talk about life.

What is life? It is said that you are born, you live, and you die.  Is that life?  Is work life? When does life begin?  When does life end?  If life ends when your brain and your heart stop, does that mean when they start your alive?

I am sure that there are about a million places to go with this and I want to talk about a few that are very important to me.  I am a father of two awesome rotten little boys.  They have their moments but I love them more than I could ever thought possible.  No matter what they do I cant help but love them.  They are my children and I decide what they do, what they eat, what they wear, what they watch, etc.... (actually mom does most of that, but you get the point).  Right now I control my kids lives.  They can wine and complain but in the end Mom and I get our way, but that does not make my kids my property.  They are not property.  If my son was to back talk me (like I know he will) it is not ok for me to cut out his tongue.  I do not have the right to hurt him like that.  Should I be able to do that to my boys?....

NO of course not, its just not right.  However if a women gets pregnant and decides that it would be an inconvenience to have a child right now, she is able to terminate that baby's life. WHAT??? I know the arguments, she was raped, she cant handle that right now, its not a baby yet, blahh blahhh blahhhh.  It is still murder.  Look no one deserves to be raped and I am not down playing that horrible crime.  A rapist deserves much worse then what he gets in our society. I think that we should just cut off junk and put him in prison, or worse.  However it is not the kids fault, if you cannot handle it put him/her up for adoption.  There are a lot of good homes out there with people who cant have their own children and would love to raise one as their own, and the whole its not a baby yet, thats just stupid.  "If its not a baby, your not pregnant".  Everyone deserves a chance to live, everyone.

Choice? or Life?

The part of this that gets me is that if you are pro choice and ok with abortion, then are you not taking away that childs ability to chose?  If you are pro life then the only choice that the mom really has to make is to keep the baby or not.  If she gives the baby away then she is back to square one, no kid and can make all the choices she wants.  If she kills him/her she took away someones choice.  

I will do more on this subject at another time I just wanted to get this out there and stir up some discussion.

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. -Psalm 127:3

Is it right?

Over the last few days all I have heard over the radio, is the excitement about killing Bin Laden.  Yeah he was a scumbag and as far as I am concerned probably deserved much worse than a simple bullet, but what gets to me is the reaction of the people.  Parties, celebrations, its just a bit much for me.  I think we did what had to be done but to celebrate the taking of another life regardless of how dangerous is not right.  There are times when we have to kill, and this was undoubtedly one of those times, but it should be a sigh of, we did it because we had to, not WOO HOO we killed someone.  Killing someone should never be celebrated.  If you have never read, heard, or seen End of the spear, you should.  The story is of a tribe of Indians in Ecuador who were extremely brutal.  So much so that they were not only killing people who were trying to build or work too close to their jungle, but also murdering each other into extinction.  A group of 5 missionaries decided they wanted to reach out and try to save these Indians known as the Waodoni. The problem is no one had ever made contact with them and lived... The men took guns with them and one of the mens kids asked if they would defend themselves.  His answer was amazing; Son we cant shoot the Waodoni, they are not ready to die yet, they dont know God." (Or something very similar to that).  Those men were slaughtered by the Indians and they never shot one of them.  The families of these men later went and also made contact with the Waodoni, and well eventually brought them to Christ and in doing that peace.  I guess I say all that and wonder what could have been?
  
To our soldiers
Thank you.  You have served this country well and we are forever grateful.    

Parents, pack your kids lunches...PLEASE!!!!

It has obviously been a few days since my last post.  My last few weeks have been crazy.  Sharon and I are getting ready to move, I had a weekend seminar for my Crossfit Kids certification, and keeping things going for the Crossfit sectionals has been a blast...  Despite all of these awesome things going on there is something that has always bothered me but has come to life a little more and I would love to know how to combat it.

School lunches.  We send our kids off to school under the assumption that they will be taken care of there.  I know that kids will be kids, and they will undoubtedly get hurt at some point, that is not what I am talking about here.  This is about the garbage that they feed our children.  My boys are not in school yet so this is not about my kids but yours might be.  The crap that they are fed is insane, its no wonder our children are getting fatter, and fatter.  Dont get me wrong its not the schools fault, its ours for letting it be there and then taking our kids home and feeding them more crap.  School lunches should be healthy and nutritious, even if its not up to what I would say is healthy but at least what the general consensus of healthy is would be a great start.  They are not even close... Here is two days of school lunch at a local high school that  I work at..

Today’s Lunch:  Nachos, salsa, refried beans, fruit and milk

Lunch tomorrow:  Bosco Bread Sticks, Pizza Sauce, juice, pudding and milk

You have got to be kidding me. This is ridiculous.  All those out there involved in fitness know this is not a healthy life style... I know there may be "other options" out there, but what about the kids who's mom and dad can only afford the basic lunch?  Lets educate people on proper nutrition and maybe when mom and dad get it straight the schools will too.

Final Numbers are in....Sorta....

Well Saturday was it... The 90 day challenge is officially over.  Unfortunately I do not know what my current BF% is right now due to schedule conflicts between myself and my buddy that has taken my BF from day 1, so those results will be in later this week, however what I can tell you is that on Saturday morning I weighed in at 236lbs which I know is not as low as I would have liked to of been but thats ok because I am nowhere near finished... Below are the official before and after pics, let me know what you think and be honest...

BEFORE

       

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

                                      

BEFORE

AFTER

 As I said before this is not the end of my transformation so please continue to check back and see my progress and let me know how yours is going too.

Saturday is the day....

"It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God".
-Mark 10:25 NASB


Wow what bold statement Jesus says here.  Is he saying that it is impossible for a rich man to go to heaven since as far as I know there is no needle big enough for a camel to fit through?  Not at all.  Let me explain, what Christ is saying in this passage is that it is very hard for those who have a lot to give it up for the glory of God.  A poor person or one with very little has nothing so its no biggie to let go and give up yourself for the Lord, but a rich man will have a harder time because he has more.  Look at the parable of the rich young ruler. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark%2010:17-31,Matthew%2019:16-30,Luke%2018:18-30&version=NASB
Now what about this camel and needle thing?  Well back when cities had walls around them and big gates to go in and out of at night the big gates would be locked, but next to the gates in the wall was a small door about the right size for a person maybe slightly larger.  It was used so at night when the large gate was locked people could come and go through it.  This was called in slang terms the eye of a needle.  It would surely be a task to get a camel through one of those thats for sure.  I hope this has shed some light on a great verse any questions please let me know.





This Saturday marks the completion of my 90 day challenge... I know I have made some good progress and I know that I still have a ways to go.  I have not weighed myself in about a month for two reasons.  The scale that I was using was a wrestling scale at the High school that I coach at and it is within .2lbs accurate.  It is no longer there due to wrestling season being over.  The other reason is that I do not want to get discouraged in my last days on the challenge so I thought I would wait.  I will weigh and measure and take pics this Saturday and post them ASAP.  I dont know if I will get them up on Saturday because  I have to leave for KY right after work but for sure by Monday.  Thank you all for your support and encouragement over the last 3 months, and don't worry I will still be eating right and blogging on here with my progress so keep in touch and see if I can get my goal by summer.  I want to be able to work out or go outside with my shirt off and not feel like the fat guy... 

Worth

Where do you find your worth???  Yesterday I heard a really good sermon from a young Pastor at my church.  He explained how when he got engaged and then had doubts he called it off.  It only lasted a couple of days until  he proposed again, she said yes and they are now happily married. That is not the point though.  The point is what happened to him inside those 3 days.  Pastor Adam had come to realize that he was getting his worth from her.  She was filling him up and making him whole, or so he thought.  During the 3 days he realized that he needed to have God fill him up first then he can bring her along for the ride.  


Again I ask, where do you find your worth?  Is it a job, your family, your stuff?  Or is it in what you have accomplished?  Something to keep in mind; enjoying your job or having a meaningful on is good.  Taking care of your family and being proud of them is not a bad thing, and trying to accumulate a bunch of stuff is neither good or bad, but they all have one thing in common.  They are all temporal.  They dont last, and if this is where you are getting your sense of satisfaction then you are in for a kick in the you know where. If your worth is in your job and you lose your job are you now worth nothing?  NO!  What about your family?  If they leave you or your husband or wife cheats on you does that take away your worth? NO!  These things do not define who you are.  If you are looking for worth in these things you have to turn your focus skyward.(not literally) When I took on the mantle of being a Christian, after years of questions and answers  I know that above all else I am a sinner saved by grace.  I am a child of God.  I am of worth because God finds me worthy not because of what I have done or will do.  My life in Christ is what defines me.  Every aspect of my life has been affected by this truth.  So can yours.  No matter how many times you have messed up, no matter how many people that you have hurt, Christ will meet you where you are and he will take you along and carry you when necessary.  

WOW!!!!

You know there are a lot of different views when it comes to proper eating.  Low carb, low Fat, no red meat, etc, etc....  There is a lady out there that is making some headlines because of her nutrition and fitness success not too mention that her client list has Gweneth Paltrow, Madonna, and who knows who else, but hey the stars use her so she must be good, right?.  Awesome because, whether I disagree with her or not (and I do) she is getting people to at least try to get healthy.  She has people working out 2+ Hours a day, and eating blended fruit and kale mush ohhh and then there is a chicken soup too.  Now thats fine I guess but come on really...?  There is a better more efficient way to do this.  Getting in shape is hard, there is no doubt about that, but it doesnt have to be difficult.  Work out 4-5 times a week really intensely, for a variety of times ranging from 2-20 min + a cool down mobility time for at least 15 min and that will do for the vast majority of humans out there.  Eating is even easier to understand and even harder to put into practice.  Eat meat, nuts, seeds, green veggies, some fruit, and NO grain.  That would be the best possible diet you could do but I understand that most people out there will not be willing to go this far.  Thats up to them.  This will put your body into what is called a ketogenic state.  Simply meaning that your body will now burn fat for fuel instead of carbohydrates.  Fat is your bodies preferred energy source but we typically feed it too many carbs so it just stores the fat.  There are plenty of reasons not to eat grains and other foods that I am not going to go into here so if you have a question please ask... 

The Human Body...

Over the last few days I have been watching and studying more on what the human body is capable of... It is absolutely amazing.  The abilities that God has given to us are in some cases, super human.  There is a man by the name of Dean Karnazes who can run.  No you dont understand he can keep running and running.  This guy could outlast the energizer bunny.  The longest consecutive distance that he has run without stopping is 350 miles... I think they said it took him 80 hrs.  Thats without stopping people.  Here is a link to his site.  I have found a ton of people online that have abilities far surpassing what we would call "normal" human capacity, but it goes to show you that if you are willing to train hard, push your limits, and maybe even get a little help in the genetics department, your ability will be super human.  Stan Lee himself has started a show, or at least he hosts it, that explores this wonderful phenomenon.  Stan Lee's super humans.  It has already featured Mr. Karnazes and many others, such as a guy that cannot be electrocuted, and a guy that can cut a rubber BB in two with a samurai sword.  It was shot at him at 200mph.  Its awesome.  Then if these do not peak your interest I suggest checking out fight science, its another show that tests human performance in other ways...  I guess me being a Crossfitter keeps me interested in all the amazing things the body can do (such as Crossfit), and many other amazing feats.  Check out some of what I have talked about and post comments on here.  I would be interested to hear your thoughts. 

Just finished off a cheat day and am still not weighing myself or doing body fat until the end which is only 14 days away.  I am nervous but thats ok.  I hope my final pics will look better than the first ones, obviously.  April 2nd is day 90, so we are down to the wire... here we go.  Wish me luck.