Thursday, April 12, 2018

The Path of Discipleship - Stewardship and the Body


The attitude about the human body within Christianity has long been shaped by a Greek dualism that separates the body and the soul.  In this image, the body is a troublesome cage that traps the soul until finally the soul is freed in death.  Not only is the soul imprisoned in the body but it also has deal with the limitations, urges and general nastiness that flesh is heir to.  The soul is not hungry; never uses the bathroom; never gets tired or sick; never gets sexually aroused in inappropriate places and does not weaken with age.  If only we did not have to deal with the body, then we could be pure and spiritual people.

                Because of this view, much of Christian practice and teaching has revolved around getting the body under control.  At the extremes this could include severe fasting and self-flagellation.  It is theorized that some of the great medieval mystics had shorter lives because they made themselves sick by denying themselves food, sleep and adequate clothing.  At the time this was seen as faithful living, punishing the body in order to avoid the sins of the body.

                The image of a distinct split between body and soul also gave people a concrete sense of the afterlife.  The body dies and the soul escapes, either to eternal reward or eternal punishment.  It is important to understand the most of the biblical tradition does not hold this view of what it means to be human.  In the Garden of Eden story of Genesis 2, the first person, Adam, is made when God sculpts a body out of the ground and then breathes into it.  To be human, in this image, is to be body and breath/spirit.  Without the breath, the body is just dirt.  Without the body, the breath remains with God.  In the six-day creation story of Genesis 1, human beings (with bodies) are made in the image of God.  It is not the soul or spirit that holds the image of God but the whole package.

                This united image complicates the “What happens when we die?” question.  But if we carefully read the scriptural story, we find that the common image is not disembodied spirits after death, but resurrection from the dead.  Jesus makes a point of showing that he has risen in body, inviting Thomas to touch him, sharing a meal with his disciples.  In Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, he deals with the question of Christians who had died before Christ’s return saying, “For the Lord himself, with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call and with the sound of God’s trumpet, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first.”  To clarify, I am not trying to explain what happens when we die, an event that is still shrouded in mystery while we live.  What I am trying to demonstrate is that the disdain for the body that has shaped much of Christian history was something that developed, and was not part of the original teaching.  We are taught to learn self-control, reigning in urges and obsessions, but we are not taught to reject the body.  Read Song of Songs and try to deny that physical pleasure is a gift of God.

                The way we treat our bodies is a reflection of our sense of stewardship.  I suggest that the body is not testing ground for the soul, a means for God to see if we give in to temptation, but is rather part of God’s gift of being alive.  It is true that bodies do embarrassing things like passing gas at inopportune times and it also true that bodies, especially older bodies, ache and tire more easily.  Yet our bodies in their many and various forms are the means through which we experience reality.  Take a moment as you read this and pay attention to everything you are experiencing right now: the feel of the fabric of the chair on which you are sitting, the low rumble of traffic or voices of songbirds.  Go outside and pay attention to the feel of a soft breeze.  Make a cup of coffee or tea and notice the comfort of a warm mug, the smell and feel of the steam, the taste of a satisfying drink.  Take a deep breath and feel the joy of letting things slow down.  All of these experiences are brought to you by the gift that is your body.

                As a gift of God you have the opportunity to care for your body, to pay attention to what goes into it, to pay attention how it feels.  And as I write this, I am realizing how easy it is to fall into the dualistic language that somehow separates the body from you, as though the body was a pet you have to keep under control.  Your body is essential to you.  Your body doesn’t need adequate sleep.  You do.  Your body doesn’t feel better when you eat better food.  You do.  Doing the things that you know keep your body in better shape: movement, rest and consuming healthy fuel, is about keeping you in the best place to experience God’s gift of life in the present, sustaining you to be God’s creative force in the world, bringing love, hope, beauty and peace into being.

                I should also mention the obvious, the mortality of the body.  No matter how well we take care of ourselves, walking ten thousand steps, stretching, doing reasonable resistance training, eating healthy food, our bodies will age.  As a man in my later forties, I am not as fast as I was when I was eighteen.  The need to look over my glasses to read a thermostat clearly reminds me that I am edging toward bifocals.  This is also part of being human.  The process of living is also the process of dying.

                Yet it is God who began the cycle of birth and death; it is God who sustains it; in our tradition, it is God who interrupts it in Jesus.  We do not know exactly what it means.  Paul speaks of the mystery in the first letter to the Corinthians when he writes, For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality.”  One day our true selves will stand before God, enfleshed in immortality.

                In the meantime, enjoy the gift that is your body.  Care for it.  Move it.  Revel in it.  Eat well.  Sleep well. Breathe deeply and love the Lord. 

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