What if the real reason we struggle with health isn't a lack of discipline—but a misplaced priority? Most of us have tried the plans, the programs, the 30-day challenges. We know what to do. But we keep falling short.

Jenny Higginbotham is a personal trainer, owner of the 610 FIT Academy, and host of the Temple Restoration Project podcast. Over 20 years ago, she asked God a simple question: "How do we train our bodies differently in light of the truth that we are a temple of the Holy Spirit?"

What followed was a journey that completely redefined how she approaches health, fitness, and faith—leading her to understand what it means to be strong in the Lord, not just strong in the gym.

Join us for a conversation that will challenge everything you think you know about stewardship, health, and what it means to live by faith over fitness.

Redeem Your Business Today by the Following:

How can we honor God in our business?

Jenny has fully surrendered her business to the Lord—no formal business plan, just daily dependence on His leading. It doesn't always look "worldly successful," but it's built on obedience, not outcomes.

When we stop trying to build something impressive and start asking God what He wants us to do each day, we move from striving to abiding—and that changes everything.

One challenge from today:

Ask the Lord this week: "What's the bigger purpose, and what do I need to do to be prepared for it?" Your health, your business, your body—it's all His, and it's all for a much greater story than you can imagine.

More About Jenny Higginbotham

Podcast: Temple Restoration Project

More About David Schmidt

Free Resource: What God Says About Business: 5 Uncommon Truths for the Modern Business

Subscribe to the RBT Weekly Newsletter for weekly simple, practical, and Biblical steps to help you build a thriving business in a way that honors God.

Newsletter also comes with Bible verses for business success for you to read, apply, and be inspired by.

Book a call: Get Unstuck and Move Forward

Website: redeemingbusinesstoday.com

LinkedIn

Donate to the Show

Mentioned in this episode:

Leadership GPS: Christian Business Coaching

Are you looking to integrate your faith and business but don't know where to start, book a time to discover if Christian business coaching and training might be right for you. If you are dissatisfied with your current rate of improvement, desire a clearer vision of what God says about business, or even what those first steps may look like, let's talk.

Initial GPS Coaching Call

What God Says About Business: 5 Uncommon Truths for Modern Business

If you want to go deeper in your walk with God and integrate your faith and business this is the tool to make it happen. God has laid out the path to success without the regrets and emptiness that come with success the world's way. Download your FREE pdf resource today. A 10-minute investment of your time will return a lifetime of transformation.

What God Says About Business

In 1 Corinthians 3, 16, 17, and then later on in 1 Corinthians 6, 19, Paul talks about your body as a temple of the Holy Ghost, a body, a temple, a place where God dwells. And that is an amazing thought to think about. And the question that comes after that is, so how do I treat my body? We treat our bodies nice some days and not nice other days. so today I brought on Jenny Higginbotham.

who is the host of the Temple Restoration Project. She's also owner of the 610 FIT Academy. And years ago, she asked this question, how do we train our bodies differently in the light of the truth that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit? So Jenny, glad to have you on, welcome today. And before we start, what is one way that you have found to honor God in your business that others may not know about?

Well, I am so glad to be here. Thank you, David, for having me on. And ⁓ as far as honoring God in my business, ⁓ I have fully surrendered it to Him. And for me, what that looks like is ⁓ really taking my hands off of the planning. So I have no business plan. I have nothing. I go listening to Him and that... ⁓

leads me to do it for his purposes. So it's been a really cool journey, but I think that's the biggest thing is there isn't this big plan behind my business. is every day. Okay, Lord, what are we doing today? And sometimes the outcome doesn't look worldly. So, you know, that turns out to be interesting as well.

Sure. And that's very interesting because everybody I talk to, it looks a little bit different. Their business plan or how they follow God or what they do and that's fine. God made us all different. Our businesses are all different as well. So Jenny, give us a little background of how God has led you in the physical fitness world and where you are today and what you do today.

Yes, yeah.

Okay, so yes, I am a personal trainer and it was like 20 years ago at least. I've lost count or I've stopped tracking because it's just getting longer and longer. But it was at the beginning when I was opening up my gym or I wasn't opening up a studio. I was just stepping out to train on my own. And I asked the Lord, like, how do you train?

how do we train our bodies different in lie of the truth that we are a temple? And he took me on this really cool, amazing journey and taught me what it means to be strong in him. And so now we're getting ready to open the doors to the Sixth Infit Academy and Training Center where we will combine physical and spiritual truths to help us understand more about who God is and who we are in him.

Is that also going to be a physical training thing as well?

Yes, it's each class will have two components. That's why it's Academy and Training Center because the Lord teaches through the physical, tangible things we know. He teaches the intangible things of the kingdom. So each class will combine both of those components together.

Gotcha.

Okay, yeah, I've heard that before. Yeah, he tells parables and stories of things that are common to the man at that time. So, you mentioned in our pre-call, you talked about faith over fitness. Can you expand upon what you mean by that?

Yes, so on my journey, the Lord graciously gives me bits and pieces as we go. So I come to one level of understanding and he lets me kind of grasp it and then he's like, okay, let's go to the next. And so it actually, the process of learning what it means to be 6'10 fit, which is from Ephesians 6'10, be strong in the Lord and the strength in his might, ⁓ led me for, he led me on a journey of understanding what it means to live by faith.

And so at first it was this, we live by faith for fitness. You know, was trying to figure out how do you word this? How do these two concepts combine? And ⁓ eventually the Lord got me to a place where I understood it as we actually live by faith over fitness, which is interesting because when people hear that, their first thought is, wait a second, we have to exercise, right? Like how could we not?

Exercise. And I think the important thing to understand when you're thinking about living by faith over fitness is that fitness is a system and it's not exercise. It's only attached. The two terms are combined because fitness is the system that uses the body as its strength. ⁓ Exercise is just exercise.

It's just it's movement of the body. It's doing physical tasks. But the system of fitness, the actual definition of fitness is the quality of being suitable or capable to fulfill a particular role or task. So in the world, you have to use your body like if you're only using worldly resources, then your body is the resource and fitness is next necessary. But in the kingdom,

Interesting. Yeah.

when living in Christ, ⁓ our roles and our tasks and our purposes change and Christ is actually the only one that is fit, right? He is the only one of suitable quality, standard or type to meet the required purpose. So now every single thing we do is in Christ and that includes caring for our bodies and stewarding them well. ⁓

Okay, so I like that definition of fitness was suitable for a task. Is that kind of what you're saying?

Yes,

the quality of being suitable or capable to fulfill a particular role or task.

suitable for a task.

Okay, and that's what I asked my question a long time ago when my boys want to start working out. It's like, okay, so what are you trying to work out for? Just to look good? You want to carry a lot of groceries or do you want to pull a wagon or what do you want to? ⁓ I've heard of people who like throw the shot put, you know, they will exercise like this, know, throwing the shot put so those particular muscles can throw it further. You know, so it's what are you trying to do? And I like what you said as far as the faith in fitness putting together.

Yeah.

I've kind of did a similar thing with, you know, trying to look at faith in business. Cause I realized I talk a lot about faith and growing your faith. And I just came to the conclusion that whatever's good for your faith is good for your business too. Because you in your business are a result of how you act, who you are. It's just an exponent of that. Anyway, question for you. So you talk about fitness as a form of living or

Yeah.

more of a lifestyle than here's 15 things, 15 things to do over the next 15 weeks. Why is it important to have that mindset if you want to honor God with your body your whole life?

Well, it's important for us to, like if we're looking at our body as a temple, then everything changes. like, let's say to kind of explain this more, let's look at the definition of stewardship. Okay, because that's kind of in your question, you're like, how do we steward? What is the, why do we need to do this in order to live properly? ⁓ By fitness, the definition of stewardship for faith, right? For Christ would be,

Okay, my body is a temple. It is this beautiful, amazing gift from the Lord. Therefore, I need to make sure that I take care of it by implementing proper eating habits, by making sure I'm exercising and doing all of the things. Now, I know you're like, that is what you need to do with your body. But let's take the definition of stewardship and kind of redefine it by faith.

understanding that Christ is the only one who can meet the required purpose, that can actually do the things that need to be done. So if we redefine it, our body is a temple. It was a beautiful, it's amazing gift. And I know that therefore I recognize that I am weak and that I cannot steward this properly. So in order to properly steward it, I'm going to put it at the feet of Jesus.

and I'm going to ask him to care for my body. And that actually looks completely different. It is a completely different way of ⁓ functioning.

Yes, because as Paul says, when I'm weak, he is strong. We don't want to be weak, we want to be strong. ⁓ So how does that fit in to us exercising? Like if I want to have a good, healthy body, and I'm a temple of the Lord, what am I working out for? What does that look like?

Exactly.

Well, I think ⁓ an important thing, I'm all about redefining things over here. One important thing is for us to reorganize our priorities. ⁓ We tend to focus on the physical, right? Obviously, because it's right in front of us. Like we can feel when we're not eating healthy. We feel the effects of that. But what is true health? Is true health

Okay.

eating vegetables and exercising or is true health being in right relationship with God, right? It's being in right relationship with God. And who is God? What does it mean to say Yahweh is my God? It means that He is your provider, your protector, His presence is with you. And so we want to get to the same outcome. We know we have to move our bodies. We know we have to eat healthy.

Gotcha. Yep.

But really we need to shift our attitude, we need to shift our mindset ⁓ into kind of more of a kingdom mindset, understanding that the physical priority of health is really just something pointing us to how important it is to be healthy in your relationship with the Lord. And so to answer your question, to exercise is really to surrender and

It is asking the Lord every day, I need you to move my body. I need you to show me what I need to do. And for me, the way that it has really played out is he is leading me towards doing less things out of convenience and actually using my daily routine to trust in him more and to do harder things so that I don't have to spend all of my time.

in the gym and I can actually spend my time doing other things. And that's kind of part of the deal with the Academy is we really want people to come here to learn about who he is and for their lifestyles to become more active so they don't have to be in a gym more. ⁓

Because if you go back 200 years ago, mean 150, we labored as a society, we labored, we did things, we worked, and we're not sitting at a desk looking at a computer, things like that. And so that's kind of what you're encouraging people to do, to make things, not make their life harder, but basically get physical activity into the natural things that you do during the day. Is that what you're saying?

We did. Yes.

Yeah,

Yes,

but I encourage people to do it with the Lord. I think the biggest thing to understand is you're a temple. You are a dwelling place of God, right? And so with that in mind, He is with you all day, every day. So we don't have to just have a conversation with Him in the morning during our quiet time and read some scriptures and say, okay, Lord, I'm going about my day. I want to make sure I met with you.

He goes on your day with you and he gives himself to you ⁓ and he wants you to abide in him. And that abiding is talking to him, asking him questions, learning from him all day. And in that process, he actually guides you to do things and to move more. And he kind of takes over the care of your

I know on the surface, it's like, wait, I don't know how to implement this, but it's one of those things that we just have to ask him, what does it look like, Lord? What does it look like for you to be the one guiding me every moment of every day? And so it's actually him who's moved me to do things harder. Like the other day, I was carrying in this big load of clothes. ⁓

and I'm on the fifth floor and I just felt the Lord be like, you know you could take the stairs. It's like, wait, what? But there's an elevator right there. And I mean, my heart was beeping as I got to the top. So it's things like that. It's listening, listening for what he's nudging you to do.

Right there.

Okay, so are you gonna be training people how to lift weights or how to think like what you're saying there or a little bit of both then?

It's going to be a little bit of both. ⁓ I will coach people how to hear the Lord more in their daily life, how to lean on him more from moment to moment. That's foundational. And then ⁓ as far as in our studio, we will have what is called a 610 fit foundations class. And that works posture, balance, breathing, stability and core, which all have ⁓ spiritual teachings, right? Our posture. ⁓

Physical posture is just the representation of the posture that we need to have before the Lord. ⁓ Our posture before the Lord has everything to do with our souls, though. It is to be positioned humbly before Him at His feet, right? In humility. And the actual definition of humility is to be dependent. And so pride is independent. So if I'm learning to take care of my body apart from who I am in Christ, I can only be building pride.

not humility. I need the Lord to cover me in His humility to allow me to bow down and to be dependent on Him for all things. I mean think of Jesus, think of His relationship with the Father. He did nothing apart from the Father, so why do we think we can do anything apart from Him? Right? It's everything. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, well, he had a close connection too, but he had a longer

relationship. But yeah, I get it. Yeah.

Yeah, but we're called to

abide in Christ just like He did the Father and that abiding is what is important and Scripture says, you know, the body is for the Lord and the Lord is for the body and like that is just something really cool to ponder with the Lord.

Yes.

Yes, and like

you said, the stewardship. How do you steward it? What do you do? ⁓ So if we look just at the health, you're talking about spiritual side, the health side. ⁓ Just at the health side, what benefit does that have to do with people at work? If I'm sitting at my computer all day, what benefit am I gonna get from moving around and exercising more?

Well, your body is going to to feel better, right? You're going to have movement. You're going to be healthier. You're going to have more focus. ⁓ You're going to be able to do the things that you need to do because nutrients, movement, all of those things fuel our body to be able to focus and to implement different tasks and things. And you're just going to feel better, right? You're going to wake up in the morning and you're going to feel like doing what you need to do. But ⁓

It's hard to speak of it apart from doing it with the Lord because at the same time, He wants to be our fuel. He wants to be the one that gives us the energy to do the things that we need to do. really the health and okay, let's look at it. Let's look at it like this. Let's think of eating. Okay. So ⁓ to eat healthy, right? Would just be to go eat fruits and vegetables and

all of the things that you need to eat for your body to be healthy, right? Those things are gonna fuel you for work and they're gonna fuel you to do the things that you need to do ⁓ and have the energy for work. But a lot of times what we're doing in that process of trying to eat healthy is we really want to eat the things that are unhealthy, right? The hamburger, the French fries, the pizza. We're kind of fighting this battle inside of us.

And what really pleases us is to eat these things that actually would make the body feel bad, right? Because they're not good for you. But we know that to be healthy, we need to eat things that are good for us. The way that the Lord wants us to adjust our thinking. And he gave me a little saying, it's not about the food, it's about the attitude, right? So it's changing. It's asking the Lord to help our delight.

be in Him and for what He gave us. So if we can come to the feet of Jesus and say, I want you to be my provider and I want to delight in the things that you've given me, will you please change my desires? Now, He's doing work inside of you to change the desires so that you actually enjoy the things that He's gifted you for your body, the fruits and the vegetables.

And no longer are we struggling with this hamburger and the pizza and all of the thing, because we want to be closer to the Lord and we want to eat the things that he provided for us. And now that brings into the workspace a whole new vitality, ⁓ because now your desires are lining up with the desires of the Lord. And then that begins to snowball into other things in the workplace.

Sure. I never thought of it that way. Because I I talk a lot about habits and change your habits and doing all that, but just say, hey, God, why don't you just help me? Just help change my desires so I desire the good things versus the bad things. Is there any other little simple steps we could take to move that direction?

Well, let's look at briefly, since you brought it up, habits, right? Habit development, there's actually a way to to develop habits that is associated with fitness. And then there's a way to develop habits that is associated with faith. And if you the best place to find this is if you actually look and I have it open in Romans 7, 18, where Paul's talking about the behaviors that he wants to do.

Yes.

Okay.

he can't do and the behaviors that he doesn't want to do, he does, right? He's talking about habits. And what does he say? At the very end, in verse 24, he says, So I think understanding that when we need to change habits, the way that we're used to doing it is by developing self-control, right? But self-control is a fruit of the Spirit.

This is something we get from the Lord. So when we have a habit, even eating healthy or whatever it is, ⁓ we have to come to the Lord and ask him to give us the self-control to do this, to give us the strength to do this. And at that point, you're actually surrendering any strengths you've built up to try to build this habit into your life. And so sometimes it looks like you're going backwards. All of sudden,

You're like, wait, I can't eat healthy at all now. And that's because the Lord has stripped you of the strength that you've built up in your flesh. And it's in that space that you sit really vulnerable and exposed before Him, asking Him to give you the strength. And that is a period of waiting. And then He comes in and He delivers you and He gives you the strength and you move forward. And so it's just rethinking.

the way we do things and recognizing that we're not learning to be strong, we're actually learning to be weak and wait on the Lord. And so, if you decide to venture forward and be like, what is this lady talking about? I'm going to give this a go and I myself am going to ask the Lord, how do I train my body different in light of the truth that it's a temple? ⁓ Recognizing that what you're going to actually be doing is learning to be weak.

things are going to be stripped from you and it's going to feel disorienting and odd, but soon the Lord shows up and all of a sudden you realize His strength is very real and powerful in your life.

So you're still establishing a habit. You're just asking God saying, I need your help, help me out. then, yeah.

It's a surrender. I can't

do this. And if you don't do it, I'm not gonna be able to do it.

That's a hard place to be and that's not something that we're taught in every day, right? Just do it. I mean, that's like Nike's thing. I say just lay on the Lord.

Yeah, sometimes, yeah, yeah,

wait on the Lord. But there's also element in the scriptures where Paul talks about, he doesn't say, here's the five steps you go to do it. He just says, do it. He just says, do this and then say, okay, I don't need a book. Just tell me how to have self-control. You just start submitting yourself to the Lord and you're going forward.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yes. And it's in that space, the Lord is going to to actually start to train you and teach you. And so like for me, ⁓ there are times that I'm going really strong and really good, even as far as my business too, because this really plays into my business. I'm going good. I'm doing all the things. I'm like, OK. And then all of sudden I wake up one morning and I'm like, OK, I'm full of anxiety.

I don't feel like I can do this anymore. What are we doing? And the Lord's like, I just took a little of my strength from you because you need to have some awareness and remember some things and we're learning some things. And so in that space, I have to surrender to what he's teaching me. I have to yield and know that in time he's going to give me that strength back. And it's really there that we learn who Yahweh is and we learn to trust him.

in our weakness that he's going to deliver us and that he will show up and fulfill his promises. But nevertheless, it is a really hard space to be in.

Sure. It's

interesting you keep coming back to the whole thing of you have to be in a close relationship with God. It's not a talk to him one time a week or anything. It's a close relationship day by day because he leads you and he leads you and he leads you and you have to be there to listen to him. ⁓ Jenny, you've said a lot of things, great things today. We are going to start wrapping up here, but before we do, do you have a final parting word of challenge to my audience today?

I think I just want to challenge everybody to ask the same question that I did. I know when we hear this, it can sound really confusing and that is just because we are so used to the way that we function in this world. But ⁓ I think the important thing is to remember that we are continuing the story of God's people and we have purposes that are so far outside of what we could

ever imagine and in order to step into those we have to learn to live by faith. And we're following up the Hebrews 11 Hall of Faithers and we are being trained by the Lord to run the race that is set before us. So Elijah's coming with the baton, are we going to be able to take it? And so we got to shift out of the mindset that this is all about our health and physical well-being.

our businesses, our body, and everything is the Lord's and it is for a much greater purpose. So I just hope everybody can ask the Lord, what's the bigger purpose and what do need to do to be prepared for that?

Very good. It's interesting when you look at Hebrews 12.1, know, setting eyes on, know, laying aside every sin and encumbrance that so easily besets us. It's not just sins, it's other things that tangle us up as well. ⁓ So yeah, everything needs to be taken care of.

Yeah, that actually the word there when you the phrasing in Hebrews 12 one when you look at it at the Greek it is actually the sin and it's unbelief. So we're learning to lay down unbelief for belief. So belief doesn't just start when we ask Christ into our heart and we believe what he did for us on the cross. It is a way of functioning. It is the process of letting him perfect our faith and that's what it is to

to live by faith.

Hmm, very good. Well, Jenny, thank you so much for your time and encouragement today around this. And friends, if you're looking to go deeper or want to learn more about Jenny and her academy and the 610 fit, ⁓ check out the show notes for some links and sites and information, contact information with her. And if you enjoyed this episode, please leave a rating and review, subscribe and sign up for our newsletter and also get a verse of the week that you can be challenged from. And finally, remember your business represents the great God you serve.

So build a business worthy of God's name and in a way that honors Him.