Muscle Memory of the Soul--January 21, 2022

Muscle Memory of the Soul--January 21, 2022

"But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act--they will be blessed in their doing." [James 1:25]

"It's like riding a bike." You know that saying, I'm sure.  You've heard it a million times, and you've likely used it a million more.  It's our shorthand for talking about those skills that come back to us, even after not using them for a long while, because the knowledge for how to do them somehow resides deep within us. Even if we can't intellectually explain how we know what to do or how we rediscover those skills that are buried and waiting to be dusted off again, it's like our bodies know, even without consulting our brains.  Your legs "remember" how to pedal, and your hands "recall" how to use the handlebars to steer, and--voila!--you are riding a bike again, even if it's been a long time since you were on one.

In fact, that experience can feel so much like your body is actually remembering that we sometimes call this phenomenon "muscle memory."  It's when we learn an action so thoroughly and repeat it so often that our bodies can do them without our consciously thinking about it anymore.  And it's true of riding a bicycle, playing a musical instrument, typing at a keyboard, or playing a sport. It's true of every time I watch my daughter do a cartwheel, and she tells me she just "knows" how, since she's had the practice of doing gymnastics, even though it boggles my mind to see her do it so seemingly effortlelssly. There comes a point when you can stop thinking about how you are doing something, and you find that you are just... doing it.  It's like the knowledge is inside you, like our bodies themselves have the skill within them.

And for pursuits like those, from music to athletics to typing to carpentry to bike-riding, that's really the goal, isn't it:  to internalize the skill to the point where you're not looking at a book or an instruction manual any longer, but can just use that skill like it is the most natural thing in the world for you.  The goal is for muscle memory to allow you to ride without having to tell yourself, "Left pedal, right pedal," and for your hands simply to know where the keys are for a C-minor chord, or your fingers to perform the trill at the end of a Baroque composer's flourish.  It's not reckless or random action, but we do it without having to stop and think about what we are doing, either, because the awareness is in our bodies themselves.

That's how James thinks of the life of faith, too.  The goal is that we become people who so internalize the cadences of God's Reign that it becomes a part of us. It's for us to become so in tune with the movements of the Spirit that Christ's kind of love has the feel of muscle memory for our souls. James imagines the way of Jesus guiding our movements like an eight-year-old girl fearlessly doing backflips across her living room floor because it seems like the most natural thing in the world for her to be doing.

That's who I want to be.  Don't you?

I want to be the kind of person who sees the customer ahead of me in line at the grocery store when they are panicking with embarrassment when they realize they won't have the money to pay for all they have laid out already and then to help cover the costs for them.  I want to be the kind of person who can tell from a friend's social media posts that they are really struggling, and then make the effort to reach out to them. I want to be the person who can take the criticism of others because I'm willing to hear the truth, even when it means admitting where I've messed up, and I want to be the person who is brave enough to tell the truth, too, even when it is costly.  I want to be the sort of person whose face naturally becomes a welcoming smile to new faces, whose words make strangers feel welcome, and whose presence in the room makes others feel at ease.  I want to be the kind of person who doesn't need a bracelet to remind me to ask, "What would Jesus do?" because it's become like second nature to strive to be in tune with his mission.

That's what James is after here.  He wants us to be people who can follow after Jesus like we are riding a bike--that is, to be people who know it in in our bones, rather than constantly having to check with a book or a hymnal or a script to know what to do.  Like any kid on a bike will confirm for you, you don't have to be able to understand the physics of momentum or calculate your velocity in order to ride.  You just have to know the feel in your legs of putting one foot forward and then the next, and let your muscle memory carry you from there.  James wants us to be people who don't need to consult the bicycle instruction manual every time we want to get on our ten-speed, but can ride freely and naturally because our bodies know how to show love for neighbors without having to have a Bible study or a church meeting about it first.  James wants us to know the freedom of having so internalized the love of Jesus that it prompts the way we care for others, take additional steps to attend to their needs, open our eyes to see the folks we might otherwise overlook, and to do all those things with the joyful movements of a kid who knows how to do front handsprings.

So, like any of those skills, the way to build the muscle memory is to keep at it.  We practice the way of Jesus, and we repeat it, and we practice it again, until it becomes a part of us.  Until our bodies know that love. 

How will we practice the way of Jesus today?  Let's get to it.

Lord Jesus, teach us your way, not merely in our heads, but with every movement of these bodies, and in each action we choose with these minds.