The Body is More Important

My body is important

Noticed something for the first time today in Matthew 6:25. Jesus says, “Is not . . . the body more important than clothes?” (my emphasis). Jesus Himself is actually calling my body important. Never really thought about that before. In verse 33, He promises to provide for it. When He walked this earth, He spent much of His ministry healing physical bodies. Sounds as if our bodies matter to Him, as if He has a special affection and purpose for them.

I know the Bible tells us that we’re created in God’s image (Genesis 1:27). But God is a spirit, so I’ve always spiritualized that idea. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the possibility that my physical body somehow represents God.

Rebelling against my culture

As a young Christian, there were times when I was absolutely dogmatic about the unimportance of the body. I’d seen the idolatrous way many believers were bowing down to the god of appearance and I’d gone to the opposite extreme.

Well, not quite all the way to the opposite extreme. I still showered and washed my clothes. I didn’t wear rags everywhere I went. But I chose a less-than-fashionable, easy-care hairstyle and inexpensive outfits. I gave up on makeup, and I went through one period when I no longer shaved my legs even though I wore shorts in the hottest weather. Here in America, that seemed pretty radical. It made me feel holier than the Christian women around me who spent hours doing their hair and faces, and big bucks financing their wardrobes.

Have I ever mentioned that pride is one of my greatest spiritual challenges?

If I’d been honest with myself, I would have had to admit that my response to America’s insane emphasis on appearance is actually more nerdy than spiritual. I’d probably overreact to it just as much even if I wasn’t a Christian.

I don’t really get fashion. My style has always been more practical than pretty. And it doesn’t help that my proportions aren’t what they’re supposed to be for a woman. I’ve got wide shoulders, a long body, and short legs. The latest fads usually look all wrong on me. (Think shoulder pads.)

The negative impact of my church

It also didn’t help that the youth pastors in my church chose the most popular, best-looking students for leadership positions. Not the ones most dedicated to Jesus. The pastors’ hearts were in the right place. They thought that the attractive kids would be more likely to bring large numbers of friends to our youth group. More souls saved. But they weren’t following a biblical model.

Where are those formerly popular kids now? Most of them are experiencing the effects of shallow roots and choking weeds (Matthew 13:3-23). Few of them are still professing their faith. Almost all of them are divorced or have live-in lovers, suffer from poor relationships with their adult children, and appear cynical and unhappy.

They’d had their reward many long years ago in the attention given to them by the youth pastors, rather than storing up treasures in heaven (Matthew 6:1-21). I didn’t know it at the time, but all through high school they were leading double lives. They put on an appearance of obedience while filling important roles within our group, but when no one was looking they were rebelling against God’s commandments in their lifestyles.

I was deeply dedicated to Jesus as a teenage baby Christian. But within my church, I was a nobody. The youth pastors snubbed me in favor of the good-looking kids. The pain that I experienced in my church as a new believer was a powerful factor in turning me away from a biblical view of my body.

My body is a temple

But Jesus tells me that my body is important. Paul even says that it’s a temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19). Sounds mind-bogglingly important when you put it that way.

As I try to grasp this incredible concept, two aspects of the temple come to mind. The first one has always been emphasized by evangelicals: The demand to keep God’s temple pure. During my high school years, this idea was used to support all the rules on how to live. Don’t smoke, don’t have sex outside of marriage, don’t do drugs, don’t get drunk, and so on.

That’s one way that our bodies are important. They should reflect the purity and holiness of God.

But the body is more important than those don’ts. We should also be reflecting His image in our positive behaviors. Treating others with love and kindness and respect. Reaching out to those who are hurting. Being peacemakers. It takes a physical body to feed others with the spiritual fruit growing inside us. By placing all the emphasis on the negatives, my youth pastors failed me in this area, too. They didn’t have, and therefore couldn’t pass on to me, a biblical view of the body.

The second aspect of the temple relates to its physical design. In the Old Testament, God gave David and Solomon detailed instructions on how to build a temple filled with beauty (see “Joy From Sorrow”).

Humans everywhere demonstrate a desire to make their bodies look better. We have a natural tendency to decorate, to bring beauty, to everything within our reach. Just as God does. He wasn’t content to create a practical but plain or ugly universe. By His very nature, He dressed it up in loveliness. We’re imitating Him, acting as His image-bearers, when we care for and decorate our bodies.

So maybe it's okay to wear a little makeup and jewelry and to spend some time choosing outfits that look good on me. Maybe I’m simply enhancing my body as God enhanced His universe. Taking delight in creativity and beauty, as He does.

The challenge is to treat my body as a temple, a dwelling place for the Creator of this vast and beautiful universe, without turning it into an idol. To value it as something important and precious in His sight, but to seek God first and to worship Him alone.