Recently, I sat across from my client, a forty-something young professional woman dressed in a flattering cap-sleeved top, black pencil skirt, bare legs, and black pumps. I admired her beauty and classy choice in clothing. At this point in the spring I was surprised by how nicely her legs were tanned and noticed what a nice complement her clothing and jewelry were to her skin tone and haircolor-a thought I have almost every time I see her. She was explaining her recent struggle to feel good about herself and her perspective that she wanted to accept the body God intended her to have. She went on to say that she just needed to be able to "slim down" in order to do this, which required changes in eating habits, exercise commitments, and attitude. I excitedly agreed with her desire to accept the body God gave her. It seems that almost every woman I've had the privilege of speaking with has had some version of this same problem, a battle with body image. The problem in what she was saying is that the body God intended her to have was likely the one she walked in with today. What if God's desire for her is to accept her body as it is right now, instead of waiting to change this or that before accepting herself? This, I believe, is as true for her, as it is for you, me, and everyone else. We are to responsibly care for our bodies, our temples of God, which includes healthy lifetstyle habits AND a loving attitude toward our body. If we wait to feel satisfied with our bodies before accepting and loving them, we commit a host of sins...among them are diminishing the value of Christ's sacrifice to redeem our lives (and bodies), distrusting God's intention in the design of our bodies, ungratefulness for God's design for our bodies (which for most of us includes a mostly functional body that blessses us with the ability to live a full life), idolizing approval or success, trying to usurp control over our lives from God, and having an attitude that criticizes the handiwork of God by saying his creation is not good enough for us.
The truth is, that until we love our bodies enough to treat them well, we are usually unable to produce healthy and long lasting change in them. This highlights the need to accept and love our bodies as they are now, BEFORE entering the process of changing them. Sound backwards? Most people say so. But if we are working to change our bodies so that we can love them, we will always fall short. Changing for the wrong reasons creates too much pressure and internal resistance to succeed. Changing for the right reasons-because we love ourselves and our bodies and want them to be healthy and treated with love and respect-becomes a journey in freedom and joy, rather than the chains and bondage most of us feel when we're on a "diet." More importantly, God is interested in the shape of our heart more than he is the shape of our body. He desires for us to challenge the sins in our hearts, and be reconciled to Him, which is more likely to produce change in our bodies if/when it is needed.
The radicalness of the gospel is radical when applied to body image, too. If our greatest mission on earth is to love God and love others, how does that look when it comes to our bodies? I'm pretty sure it doesn't look like endless efforts at one diet after another, beating up on ourselves for missing a work out, or comparing our appearance to that of God's other children. If radical is our example, we should strive to be radical, too. Let's LOVE our bodies, and change because we love them. Let's ACCEPT ours and each other's bodies, and stop comparing among ourselves. Let's boldly reach out and show the love of God in the shape of GRACE, regardless of the shape of our body. This is my prayer for you and for me.
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