Last week, I got off work a little early and decided to hit the gym for a late-night workout. Little did I know that God would use this simple task for my sanctification...
After a long, grueling (okay, maybe not grueling, but it felt like it) 30 minutes on the Elliptical machine, I settled onto a mat to work on my abs. Mid-crunch, my eye caught a girl who was working on a machine a few feet away from me. Without hesitation, I began to size her up and contemplated how my body compared to hers. I noticed the muscles in her legs, her size, and... as she turned around swiftly, I saw her child-like face. She couldn't have been older than 16 or 17. Immediately, I felt a piercing in my heart and under my breath said, "I hate my flesh... and I hate YOU, Satan!"
The one thing that I know I want to do with my life is work with young women, to counsel them and to love them and to be a part of the healing process that inescapably every woman must go through to get to her Divine Romance. Here, at this gym, I had the perfect opportunity to get to know this girl and to try to form a bond, one that would hopefully lead to a conversation or reflection or something that would point her to my Jesus, whether she already worshiped Him or not. But no, my flesh wouldn't have it. Instead, I was comparing myself to her, further reinforcing what she was probably told everyday: that her value and identity would be found in her body.
In doing this, I separated myself from her, wanting good for myself rather than for her. In doing this, I built a wall up around myself... because that's what sin does. It separates.
This experience lead me running full speed to God's Word and it was no coincidence that my Bible study's scripture memory verse for that week was Romans 12:10,
"Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor."
As 1 Corinthians 6:19 would tell us, our bodies are a temple of God. So, it is good to work out and to be healthy for this purpose. It is good to do cardio exercises and to decrease your fat intake for the purpose of protecting your heart. It is good to stop drinking sodas and start drinking milk, and to start lifting weights to increase your bone density for the purpose of preventing Osteoporosis. It is good to replace your sugary foods with fruits and vegetables to decrease the risk of Diabetes and to fight cancer... if your purpose for doing these things is to worship God more wholly with your body.
As a woman, I feel the temptation daily to use my body for things that are not worshipful to my God, and I see it all around me. I recall a difficult conversation I had with a friend a while back: I felt a burden to confront her on the way she dressed because it fed my desire to compare my body to hers and I could clearly see that it was causing our brothers to stumble. At the end of this conversation, she shamefully looked up at me through brokenness and said, "I just wanted him to notice me."
Our bodies were NOT created to be used as leverage over our brothers and they were NOT created to be the center of attention. Our bodies were made to aid our souls in experiencing and worshiping God, and in pointing others to Him, not to ourselves. That, my friends, is called idolatry.
In the beginning, God created woman for man, not to feed his sexual appetite, but to help him as he walked with God in the garden (Genesis 2:20). And her purpose was defined immediately when he named her Eve, which means 'the mother of all living (Genesis 3:20).' You see, as women, we were made to reflect our Lord by giving life with our bodies. In fact, I believe the most beautiful women I've ever seen were pregnant. Pregnant women glow, radiating the life inside of them, protecting it and nourishing it and loving it. They look so... alive. This is what her body was crafted for, and that purpose-fulfilled look on her face shows it. This is natural, beautiful, and yet, I don't covet her or compare my body to hers. No, I just enjoy her beauty, which gives life to peace, hope, and inspiration inside of me. Do you see the discrepancy here? It is not supposed to be a natural thing to compare our bodies to other women. We were all created to be beautiful for the purpose of pointing to the Giver of Life.
Let's consider our Lord, the One that God sent to the earth to be an example for us. In Mark 7:31-37, He healed a deaf man with His hands. In Matthew 20:32-34, His touch gave sight to those who could not see Him. In Luke 22:19, He broke bread to represent the breaking of His body, and distributed it out to His disciples. In each of the four gospels, we see that His body was bruised and beaten. His body shielded ours from the blows of God's indignation toward us and as His blood poured out from the open wounds in His skin, cleansing grace and love poured out onto us. On the cross, His body was naked, open, vulnerable. His arms stretched out, not keeping any of Himself from us. On the cross, we see Jesus' body, the perfect Lamb, given to God for His worship and our salvation. He used His body to worship God and to serve us. What greater example do we need to see the purpose for our bodies?
What happens when we see Jesus' body?
"But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." -2 Corinthians 3:18
What should happen when others see our bodies?
"...Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body." -2 Corinthians 4:10
Romans 12:9 tells us to let our love be pure and genuine. 2 Timothy 2:22 tells us to flee youthful lusts in order to call on the Lord with a pure heart.
This is a daily struggle. Every morning, we must look into our closets and make the decision to dress in a way that would aid our brothers in the battle over their flesh, in a way that our Father would be pleased with. Every day, we must look at other women through the lens of pure love, with the knowledge that they could be God's precious daughters. We must decide not to draw attention to our bodies, realizing that this only deepens the wounds that God intends to heal.
No comments:
Post a Comment