I know from personal experience that health can be very challenging for teens to navigate. When I was a sophomore in high school, I developed an eating disorder called anorexia nervosa. As I struggled with this eating disorder, I starved myself and lost several pounds, but the Lord empowered me to recover from it.
Teens often take one of two approaches to health. Some focus too much on their health, leading them to obsess about food and exercise and ultimately develop disordered health-related habits. However, others don’t focus enough on their heath. They might not pay attention to food and exercise because they don’t realize the significance of taking care of their bodies.
While there are countless ideas floating around about what health is and isn’t, only God fully understands what true health looks like. He uniquely created every person—including your teen. Whether they take their health too seriously or choose not to prioritize it at all, you can play a crucial role in teaching them the appropriate perspective. Here are two specific, practical ways you can do this.
1. Encourage Your Teens to Embrace Balance.
At the beginning of my eating disorder recovery, I spoke with a Christian counselor about my struggle. One of the most memorable takeaways of our conversations was the importance of moderation. That really stuck with me because it sounded like such a freeing concept and I hadn’t experienced freedom for such a long time. When my counselor talked about moderation using percentages—choosing to eat healthy foods 80 percent of the time and allowing myself to eat unhealthy foods 20 percent of the time—I wondered, “Is it even possible for me to enjoy ‘bad’ foods like cheeseburgers, pizza, and ice cream?”
It took several years for me to discover it is possible. Now I can have a cheeseburger, a slice of pizza, or an ice cream cone without hating myself for it. I can enjoy foods that my teenage self viewed as “bad.” As I realized that I could enjoy them in moderation, I gained a more balanced perspective on health.
Encouraging your teens to embrace balance means supporting their efforts to eat well and exercise regularly but not scolding or shaming them when they don’t. It means speaking kindly to them and praying faithfully for them as they manage their weight—whether their health professionals advise them to lose, gain, or maintain it. It means thanking God and reminding them to thank God for the unique bodies he’s given them. It means helping them discover healthy foods and physical activities they enjoy but also giving them space to enjoy sweet treats and sedentary activities.
2. Remind Your Teens to Prioritize What God Prioritizes.
It’s almost impossible to keep up with every single health trend. The culture’s standards of what is “healthy” and “unhealthy” change daily—which proves that culture isn’t a reliable source to use in making health-related decisions. While some health advice in social media posts, movies, TV shows, books, and magazines might be true, not all of it is true.
That’s why it’s essential for the Bible to anchor our decisions, including the decisions we make about our health. Scripture doesn’t address specific health-related topics like food groups and exercise routines, but it should certainly inform the way we think about our health. Does our health—eating foods that nourish our bodies and exercising to maintain our weight—matter to God? Of course. But what matters even more is our relationships with him and others.
In Paul’s first letter to Timothy, he notes, “For while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come” (1 Timothy 4:8). So when you talk to your teens about health, emphasize what Scripture says about their bodies, but also emphasize what it says about putting God first in all areas of their lives. Share your thoughts—and invite them to share theirs—on cultural health trends. Demonstrate what it looks like to fully rely on God’s Word by reading, studying, and memorizing it in your own life. Remind them that even though their bodies matter, they’re temporary. And because of Christ’s death and resurrection, they can experience permanently perfect health in heaven one day.
An Ounce of Prevention
Teaching your teens to be mindful of their health is a good thing, but mindfulness can quickly turn into idolatry. That’s one of the main lessons I learned from having and recovering from an eating disorder. My focus on health quickly turned into an obsession with being thin, and over time, I became unhealthily thin. Ready to sacrifice anything—including my faith—to attain the “perfect” body, thinness became my idol. I lost sight of the reason God commands us to not to worship idols. In short, they promise everything but don’t deliver anything.
The prophet Habakkuk cautioned, “‘What profit is an idol when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols! Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a silent stone, Arise! Can this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it’” (Habakkuk 2:18-19).
Ultimately, there’s no magic formula you can follow to ensure your teens will have great health. However, to help them gain the right perspective, show them the importance of embracing balance and aligning their priorities with God’s priorities. They can experience abundant life through Christ, living in freedom from idolatry and choosing to honor him with their health.
Looking for biblical and accessible encouragement for teens? Check out Andrea Lee’s 31-day devotional, Body Image: Valuing God’s Good Gift.
