Beautiful Freedom
How the Bible Shapes Your View of Appearance, Food, and Fitness
Endorsements
To be a modern woman is to struggle with how we look. We’re confronted with images of beauty, ideas about what to eat, and our own internal struggles with our bodies. In Beautiful Freedom, Stacy Reaoch diagnoses and gives the solution to our ever-compounding struggles with body image. If you think you’re immune to this, Stacy shows how it impacts everyone. But even more helpfully, she points to the path towards freedom—where we see everything we have as a gift from God to be stewarded for his glory.
— Courtney Reissig
Author of Teach Me to Feel and Glory in the Ordinary
A heartening and fundamental guide for anyone battling the relentless pressures of modern beauty and health ideals. Beautiful Freedom is bursting with Bible-centered wisdom and highlights Christ’s love for us. More than insightful information, this book is a soothing balm, offering real hope and freedom that is only found in Jesus Christ. I pray that God will use this book to remind the church that true beauty and freedom are ultimately found in him and not the fleeting standards of the world.
— Portia Collins
Host, Grounded podcast
Young or old, thick or thin, mostly satisfied or perpetually frustrated by what you see when you look in the mirror: whoever you are, you need an embodied theology, a grid for thinking about your body and beauty that is more than skin-deep. In her thought-provoking book, Beautiful Freedom, Stacy Reaoch will help you see yourself through the lens of God’s unchanging word. In seeing his heart rightly, you’ll finally be able to see yourself and your body choices with hope and freedom. You’ll want to share this book with every woman you know.
— Erin Davis
Revive Our Hearts; author of Fasting and Feasting and Beyond Bath Time
I felt like Stacy was writing directly to me. I see myself in the stories she shares about herself and other women trying to balance attitudes and actions around food, exercise, and aging. Discipled by the world, I find myself falling into deep snares in each of these areas. But Stacy’s wisdom, shaped by the word of God, provides a clarion call back to what’s genuinely good, beautiful, and true. This is a book I will be sharing with my friends at the gym and at church, and my own four daughters. How I long for us all to view our bodies rightly! Beautiful Freedom will help us get there.
— Jen Oshman
Author, Enough About Me
Many today are turning new attention to our bodies and the very practical issues of exercise, aging, and what we eat and how much—but few provide deeply Christian counsel. Stacy Reaoch knows the perils of our pendulum swings between apathy and obsession, but even more, she wants to help readers to find not just ‘balance’ but deep and enduring joy in Jesus, with genuine love for others. She sees these important issues in light of our ultimate reality, which enables her to meet our pressing need for wisdom, rather than scratch the itch for quick and easy answers.
— David Mathis
Executive Editor at desiringGod.org and author of Habits of Grace
Christian women are not exempt from cultural pressures around aging, appearance, and beauty. Stacy Reaoch offers biblical wisdom, truth, and encouragement that soothes the soul of any woman who is stressed out over how she looks, how she should exercise, or what she should eat. This book offers sweet relief and poignant reminders that the most beautiful things about us are not external but eternal.
— Heather Creekmore
Host, Compared to Who? podcast
When You Don’t Know What to Do
Lately it seems like there are multiple situations that I’m unsure which way to go.
What Is “The Abundant Life?”
The trials of this life wean us from the world and teach us that our only true satisfaction will be found in God.
A Way of Escape
In all honesty, sweets can be a big temptation for me. It seems like whenever I start to feel overwhelmed with life or stretched too thin, I’m drawn to the kitchen.
Letting Go
Taking our daughter to college is a significant way that God teaches us to trust Him.
Loving Your Neighbor Amid Crisis
A pandemic can breed selfishness in all of us. We run to the store to stock up on essentials: toilet paper, bread, meat, milk. We go to great measures to protect and provide for our loved ones. But how much of this falls into the realm of survival of the fittest? Are we only thinking of ourselves or do we consider the needs of others? I’ve struggled with the balance between protection and sacrifice.
Quarantine Thoughts
It seems unreal that one week ago life was normal. Kids had school, musical practice, sports and playdates. I went to the grocery and found plenty of toilet paper. But in a matter of days, everything came to a screeching halt.
The First Empty Nest
Parenting is a series of letting go, a series of trusting God with the children he has given us.
The Joy Of An Unhurried Life
A week away without the demands of life causes me to reevaluate my priorities. It makes me see the need for rest, the need to quit scrolling and have my full attention on the precious people God has given me to do life with.
Tuning Into Titus 2 Through The Airwaves
Sometimes God provides friendship and mentors through the most unexpected ways.
Insomnia - His Strength In My Weakness
My constant prayer to sleep through the night causes me to lean into the promises of God like nothing else. In the midst of my bleary eyes and lagging body, I’m pushed to rely on the Lord for strength.
When Resolutions Seem Daunting
Setting up new goals and resolutions for myself sounds daunting. Instead, I’m focusing on the simple everyday faithfulness that God desires me to have.
Through The Eyes Of Gratitude
Gratitude changes the lens with which we view life. Our joy is made full in trusting that every detail of our lives has been filtered through God’s loving hand.
The Blessing Of Affliction
Perhaps the sweetest gift of affliction is learning to lean on Christ all the more.
When God Changes Your Plans
Parenting is a series of of sacrifices, of laying down our rights for the good of our children. My mornings of solitude are being replaced with history and Latin and math lessons. But it will be a sacrifice worth making.
The Battle With Being “Good Enough”
Do you ever struggle with feeling like you’re not good enough?