Of Brains-on-Sticks and Precious Jars

I grew up as a missionary kid in Asia, feeling the sun warming my skin (and, yes, sweat trickling down my back), tasting the the sweetness of mangoes and pineapples, savoring the sights of bright pink bougainvillea outstretched against brilliant blue sky and sunsets setting the clouds on fire, hearing the distinctive rustle of palm fronds swaying in the breeze and frogs croaking a chorus in the rice paddies behind our home, and smelling the comforting scent of rice cooking. My senses were gloriously alive, and I reveled in the riot of colors, and sounds, (but not all of the smells) around me. What changed? How did I gradually learn to discount and come to be at odds with this good body God has given me? Or, more broadly, when did the mind and spirit get separated out as “good” and the body somehow labeled as a necessary evil? At what point was it apparently accepted that our minds were more to be trusted than our bodies? Or even, that our minds are our primary means of knowing God?

Photo credit: Rosalyn Otto

A couple of years ago, I began to ask, what does it mean that our bodies are good? And how do I live an embodied faith, experiencing God in my good body? I confess I’m not sure I’d given those questions much thought until I heard Tara Owens make a comment I found both provocative and invitational: “You are not a brain on a stick.” How can a simple statement be so patently obvious and yet so beautifully disruptive? 

Tara’s words launched me on a journey of discovery that continues still. Along the way, I’ve found myself wondering, what did we lose, spiritually, when Descartes famously asserted, “I think, therefore I am?” Certainly, it elevated the rational mind, knowledge derived from thinking and reasoning, seemingly simultaneously invalidating our bodily experience. Did that somehow contribute to the all-too-widespread practice of discounting our bodies? Did it bolster our seeming emphasis on knowing God with our minds? Don’t get me wrong, we are called to know and love God with our minds, but also, as Jesus recalled in His answer to the rich young ruler’s query about the greatest commandment, with our hearts, and our souls, and our strength (Mark 12:30). I find it fascinating that when Paul exclaimed, “I want to know Christ…” what followed was not a list of intellectual principles, but was deeply, intimately, experiential, “...yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,” (Phil 3:10). Paul expressed a longing to know Christ through His bodily experiences! 

I’ve wondered, when did we lose our understanding of the radical significance that Jesus is the Word made flesh? That He “became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood” (John 1:14)? The “flesh” Jesus took on was His body; with all of its human frailties and limitations, it was not inherently bad. And neither are ours! As Don clarified in last month’s post, The Tragedy of Friendly Fire, much harm has resulted from an unbiblical confusion of our flesh, “our instinctive pattern of living apart from Christ,” with our physical bodies. In her wonderful book, Embracing the Body: Finding God in Our Flesh and Bone, Owens observes:

“We’ve been so inundated by creche scenes and angelic-faced Christ-children made of porcelain that we’ve lost the sweat and blood and tears and flesh of that radical entry into our world. … In doing so, we’ve lost a large part of what God brought into our lives that holy night – the redemption of our bodies and a pathway to knowing God intimately within them, just as he came to know us.”

Photo credit: Rosalyn Otto, all rights to image and original oil painting reserved to Dr. & Mrs. Robert Ferris

Christ honored our bodies in His incarnation, and honors them still with His indwelling. If we stop to actually absorb that, it is utterly mind-blowing! Our bodies, rather than obstacles to knowing God, become vehicles of grace – a means of experiencing HIm more fully! 

With that understanding, then, what does it mean that our bodies are the temple of God, and that the Holy Spirit dwells within us (I Cor 6:19)? I have been noticing the care with which God gave instructions for His dwelling place in the wilderness; the level of detail and deliberateness with which all was to be created is impressive. Yet our Creator’s intimate design and intentionality reflected in our physical bodies is far more breathtaking! Truly, our bodies are “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14)! The tabernacle was designed to be experienced with all of the senses: the rich jewel tones of the woven walls and curtains, the beauty of the designs, the scent of the incense and burnt offerings, the sound of the prayers and songs rising from within its walls, the textures of tapestry, wood, stone, and precious metals. Would not our unchanging God create us to experience HIm in and through the living temples of our bodies as well?

Why is it, I wonder, that there are so many resources available instructing me how to care for my body as Christ’s temple, but so very few about experiencing Christ in and through the temple of my body? And what does that look like, anyway? I’ve found it can be as simple as being fully present in a moment, aware of breathing in and breathing out, my breath, itself, a prayer, and the Spirit within me even closer than my breath. I experience God as I feel the sunshine on my face, and am reminded of the warmth of His face shining on me, as expressed in the Aaronic Blessing (Numbers 6:24-26). I learn His heart as I hear the laughter of a child, feel the warmth of a comforting embrace, gaze on the vastness of the ocean. And I am gaining a new understanding of grace as I accept the frailties and limitations of the specific body with which He has blessed me.

Photo credit: Dominik Scythe (Unsplash)

Those frailties and limitations are a sore spot for me… I suspect I’m not alone. In fact, it seems that in many Christian circles, perhaps in ministry circles especially, we are encouraged and expected to ignore or push beyond our physical limitations. Many times we are even congratulated or respected for doing so! That always ends up being detrimental. God placed limitations all around us in the natural world, boundaries such as where the sea meets the shore, or rhythms of growth and rest, as we see in the seasons, and day and night. How arrogant would it be for us – also a part of the created order –  to assume that we repeatedly can ignore our limitations without it negatively impacting our wellbeing and effectiveness for the Gospel! What if, instead of being frustrated, or ashamed, or at war with those frailties and limitations, we welcome them as friends? Could it be that those limitations are actually gracious invitations to pay attention to our interior world, and to what the Spirit would have us hear? 

This isn’t just hypothetical for me: I have a tremor which developed seventeen years ago, when my late husband precipitously descended into depression. Overnight, I found myself caring for my deeply depressed, completely disengaged husband, interfacing with doctors and insurance representatives for hours upon hours, functioning as both mom and dad, launching a new homeschooling year for our highschooler and two middle schoolers, and attempting to keep a family and household afloat on a fraction of our normal income. Though my husband’s depression improved for a time, I lived in “fight or flight” for well over a decade. My nervous system has yet to fully recover. Yet, as I have begun to accept the truth that my body is good – and not simply broken, that she is my friend and not my enemy, I am slowly learning to live within my limitations. I’m beginning to recognize a more pronounced tremor as my body’s way of telling me to pay attention, to ask, “What do You want me to be aware of, Lord?” Perhaps it’s that I’ve been pushing too hard and need to respect my body’s need for rest. Or maybe it’s a reflection of the stress I am carrying – sometimes even subconsciously – an invitation from Jesus, through my body, to be content with caring and to leave the carrying to Him.  I am learning to thank God for my good body, even the frailties and limitations, because they invite me to get comfortable with dependence on HIm, and to remember who – fully and finally – is responsible for all that needs care and attention. 

Photo credit: Rosalyn Otto

Paul, too, experienced frailties and limitations that he didn’t like and didn’t want. Yet God allowed them to remain, and assured Paul, “My grace is enough; it’s all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness.” We don’t know how long Paul wrestled with God over this, but he came to the place where he was able to say, “I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ’s strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take my limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size … I just let Christ take over!” (II Cor 12:9-10).  I can’t yet honestly say with Paul that I always appreciate my “gift,” but I am growing in that direction as I listen to the Spirit and my good body.  

“We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us” (II Cor 4:7). On my nightstand rests a wooden heart inscribed with the words, “precious jar.” In those two simple words, my husband perfectly captured the paradox of our good bodies – broken and beautiful, frail and limited, yet God’s chosen vessels for dwelling in all of His glory and power in this world.

Written by Rosalyn Otto