When my husband asked me to be a guest blogger on his site I was excited and nervous, but before I ramble on I will tell you a little bit about myself and the topic I would like to discuss. My name is Heather Cotner and I am the wife of David Cotner III (Lead Pastor of Prairie Flower Baptist Church), mother of two wonderful children, and a Health and Fitness Coach through Beachbody! After getting married, I was able to carry out my passion of helping others through nursing for about four years. I enjoyed being able to be with people on their best and worst days, help teach others how to live healthier, and be able to grieve with people who had lost loved ones.

After leaving a job in nursing to become a stay-at-home mother, I still had the passion of helping others. So I decided to become a Health and Fitness Coach through Beachbody while still doing the most important work of raising my children. Now many of you may think that fitness is just physical, but I would beg to differ and say that there are a lot of similarities between physical and spiritual fitness.

In I Corinthians 6: 19 it states, “…your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God…”. So, if you are a born again believer, you have the Holy Spirit indwelling you and you should do everything you can to take care of the body that God has given you. Thus, taking care of yourself is not just physical, but also spiritual. That is to say, because the Holy Spirit lives inside of you, you should want to take care of your physical body by eating well and exercising just as you should want to learn more about God and His Word and be spiritually strong.  No one is exempt from taking time to care for their physical body or exempt from having a relationship with God through prayer and daily devotions.

Another similarity between physical and spiritual fitness would be the aspect of daily commitment.  Just like you never reach physical perfection (on earth of course) you will never reach spiritual perfection either.  Daily you have to choose to make healthy choices when it comes to food, exercise, and taking care of yourself; just as daily you have to choose to take the time to pray, do your devotions, and have a relationship with God.  Just like eating one healthy meal doesn’t make you skinny, and eating one unhealthy meal doesn’t make you overweight; in the same way, one prayer and devotional reading doesn’t make you righteous – it is a daily commitment to pursue!

Balance is also key! No matter what age you are, what profession you are in, what hobbies you have (or don’t have), everyone needs to have balance in their lives. Balancing your physical life would mean not working out continually all day every day and allowing yourself to enjoy the sweets every now and then.  There is also balancing that is done in your spiritual life.  Yes, you probably don’t have the time to read your Bible for 10 hours a day and pray for 5 hours a day, but there is time that you can set aside to have your quiet time with God and pray.  There are also other times throughout the day to say a quick prayer and refocus your life around God’s perspective instead of your own.

Lastly, I will talk about how both physical and spiritual fitness will change with time and age.  Usually when you are young, you have the ability to do some crazy workouts with your body and push yourself to your maximum potential, but with age one usually has to tone down the workouts and do things less physically demanding.  But with spiritual fitness it is usually the complete opposite! With time you should be increasing in your fitness instead of decreasing.  What I mean by that is usually when you just start out as a Christian you are learning, and your knowledge base is quite weak, but with time in God’s Word and a daily relationship with Him your faith should grow, and so should your knowledge of His Word!  The key word here is “should”.  Bottom line…just as your physical fitness may change with time so should your spiritual fitness.

In I Timothy 4:8 it states, “For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.” People around you may see that you are physically fit, but what they can’t see is if you are spiritually fit.  Yes, you should take the time to care for your physical body through healthy eating and exercise, but you should not let that overtake working out and caring for your spiritual fitness.  Increasing in your knowledge of God’s Word, praying, and having a daily walk with Christ should be the motivating factor for your day which will benefit you not only today but also in the life to come!