🌿 When I Realized God’s Boundaries Were Protecting Me

How my health struggle led me to rediscover the wisdom behind God’s commandments

Mar 20, 2026

Illness forced me to slow down—but it also led me to rediscover wisdom in Scripture that I had overlooked for years.

There was a season when my health began to deteriorate in ways I could not explain.

At first it seemed manageable—fatigue that lingered longer than it should, digestion that felt unpredictable, a body that no longer seemed to cooperate with the rhythms of life the way it once had.

But slowly, those small things began to add up.

What I thought were minor inconveniences became something heavier.

I eventually reached a point where I realized I could not simply push through it anymore. My body was forcing me to stop and ask deeper questions.

And in that season of frustration and searching, I found myself returning to Scripture with a different kind of attention.

Looking for God’s Wisdom Again

When your health begins to fail, you start asking questions you might have ignored before.

Why is this happening?
What am I missing?
What needs to change?

During that time, I began praying simple prayers:

“Father, show me what I need to understand.”

And slowly, the Lord began guiding me in ways I did not expect.

Some of the answers were practical—rest, stress, and rhythms of life. But one area He continually brought to my attention was something we all encounter every day:

Food.

Rediscovering God’s Instructions

As I read Scripture more carefully, I started noticing something I had overlooked before.

God had given His people detailed instructions about how to live—including what kinds of food were healthy and what kinds were not.

For years I had thought of those passages as something distant, part of ancient Israel’s story rather than something relevant to modern life.

But as I studied them more closely, I began to wonder:

What if those instructions were not arbitrary?
What if they were protective?

That question led me to begin studying both Scripture and the science behind nutrition more seriously.

What Scripture Says About Food

As I began reading more carefully, I realized the Bible actually speaks quite specifically about what God designed for human nourishment.

From the very beginning, God describes the foods He intended for people:

“And God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.’”
— Genesis 1:29 (ESV)

Later, when God formed Israel as a people, He gave more detailed instructions about animals that were considered clean and those that were not. These guidelines appear in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14.

For example, Scripture explains:

“Whatever parts the hoof and is cloven-footed and chews the cud, among the animals, you may eat.”
— Leviticus 11:3 (ESV)

Animals that did not meet those conditions were considered unclean for food. One of the examples specifically mentioned is pork:

“And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat any of their flesh.”
— Leviticus 11:7 (ESV)

For many years I had read passages like these as something purely historical—rules that applied to ancient Israel but had little relevance to modern life.

But as I studied both Scripture and the science behind nutrition, I began to see something I had overlooked before: these instructions often align with what we now understand about health, disease, and the way certain animals carry toxins or parasites.

It began to change how I saw those passages. Instead of feeling like restrictions, they began to look like wisdom.

Disclaimer: I know sincere believers interpret these passages differently, but studying them helped me see something I had not considered before—that God’s instructions often carry wisdom that protects human health in ways we may only fully understand much later.

Learning the “Why”

As I continued searching for answers, I began studying both Scripture and the science behind nutrition more seriously. During that time my friend Janet Davis, of The Biblio Bridge, came across a book that helped connect many of those dots for me:

The Biblio Diet: Live Long, Master Metabolism, Reduce Pain, Fight Depression, and Conquer Cancer with Healing Secrets from the Bible by Jordan Rubin and Dr. Josh Axe.

The book explores the scientific reasoning behind many of the dietary patterns found in Scripture. It explains how certain foods the Bible warns against—such as pork and other animals described as unclean in Leviticus—can carry higher risks for parasites, toxins, and inflammatory health problems.

Reading it helped me see something important.

God’s commandments are not random restrictions.

Often they are protective boundaries designed to guard human health and flourishing.

Long before modern science understood many of these things, God had already spoken about them.

You can explore the book here:
👉 The Biblio Diet by Jordan Rubin and Dr. Josh Axe

God’s Provision Through the Earth

As I spent more time tending the garden and thinking about the way God designed food to grow from the earth, another passage of Scripture began to stand out to me:

“You cause the grass to grow for the livestock
and plants for man to cultivate,
that he may bring forth food from the earth.”
— Psalm 104:14 (ESV)

There is something beautiful in that picture.

God designed a world where nourishment comes from the soil—where seeds grow into plants, plants become food, and the earth itself participates in sustaining life.

The garden began reminding me of that truth every day. When you plant a seed and watch it slowly become something that feeds your family, it changes the way you see provision. Food stops feeling like a product and begins to feel like a gift. Something provided, not merely purchased.

And that realization deepened something else for me.

If God took such care in designing the way nourishment grows from the earth, it makes sense that He would also guide His people in how to receive it wisely.

His instructions were never meant to take life away.

They were meant to protect it.

Seeing Boundaries Differently

This realization changed the way I viewed God’s instructions.

For much of my life, commandments had felt like rules to obey. But as I began learning more, I started seeing them more like guardrails.

They were not given to burden people.
They were given to protect them.

Just as a loving parent sets boundaries to protect a child from harm, God sets boundaries to guide His people toward life.

The more I understood that, the more those instructions began to feel less restrictive and more compassionate.

A Continuing Journey

My health journey has not been perfect, and I am still learning along the way. But that season taught me something I had not fully understood before.

God’s wisdom often reaches into very practical areas of life.

How we rest.
How we care for our bodies.
Even what we choose to eat.

When we begin to see God’s guidance through that lens, His commands no longer feel like limitations. They begin to look like acts of love.

A Bridge to Sunday

That realization is exactly what led me to the next article in the Grace That Transforms series.

This Sunday I’ll be exploring something that Scripture repeats often but we sometimes overlook:

God’s boundaries are not meant to restrict us.
They are meant to protect us.

And somewhere between the soil of the garden and the pages of Scripture, I began to see that God had been guiding His people toward life all along.🌿📖🤍

Blessings,

— Constance

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