The Bodies We Are--August 16, 2022

The Bodies We Are--August 16, 2022

"'Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food,' and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us by his power." [1 Corinthians 6:13-14]

We don't merely "have" bodies; we are bodies.  I don't know that we spend enough time or thought considering what that means, honestly.  But the apostle Paul has thought this through, and he makes for a good conversation partner as we do the same.

In a culture of utter disposability like ours, we tend to think about "having" things without being any obligation to those things we possess.  If it breaks, we can always get another one, rather than fixing it.  If it goes out of style, we'll donate the old one to a thrift store like Goodwill and feel justified in getting a trendier model because we've been oh-so-charitable with the ones we don't want any longer.  If we just want another of the same thing we already have, there are stores in town and online that offer a seemingly infinite supply and selection.  In other words, a culture of bottomless consumerism [like the one in which we live] actively teaches us not to bother with taking care of things we own, because it is often cheaper, and usually easier, just to get a new one.

I confess to you that this is a perpetual struggle in my household, not only for myself, but for kids who are aware, thanks to the internet, of an endless stream of messages targeted at them and selling them on the next great thing, the newest trends for the next season, the latest thing you are "supposed" to want, and the lie that they'll at last be truly happy once they get whatever it is they are being sold.  When there are ads offering them the latest stuff, YouTube celebrities whose whole gimmick is centered on buying stuff and talking about what they've bought, and online video games that have built in stores for buying upgrades and accessories to improve your gameplay, it is really hard to convince anybody why it is worth it to take care of what you have rather than always striving after more.  

For adults the sales pitch is much the same: "Why try and fix the old lawn mower, when you can just buy a new one--after all, you've had the old one for a while..." or "Once you've paid off that last monthly payment for your car, it's time to start salivating over the next one you'll want to replace it with." Or the endless stream of notifications available to you with apps on your phone to tell you about the newer, bigger, or fancier houses available in your neighborhood.  All of those messages reinforce the same damnable mindset--you are under no obligation to take much care for the things you possess, because they are just "things" you "have," which you can easily get rid of and replace.  "Nothing is permanent," the wise voices of philosophy and spirituality remind us; but in a culture of decadent consumption like ours, that truth is always followed up with a sales-pitch: "but you can always get another when you get tired of what you've got."  Yes, they will even try to persuade you that people are disposable and interchangeable goods in the market.

When we treat our bodies as possessions--as things we "have" rather than a part of who we are--it is very easy to have the same outlook.  My possessions, I am told, are mine to do with as I please, and nobody can tell me to take special care of what is mine.  In a culture of "negative" freedom [like we talked about in the previous verse back on Friday--the "You can't tell me what to do" kind of "freedom"], you must treat it as your sacred right NOT to take care of what is yours if you choose not to, and nobody can compel you otherwise.  Sure, you can say it would be a good idea for me to get an oil change for my car, but it's mine and you can't tell me what to do with my stuff.  Right?  Well, a culture of consumption teaches us the same thing with our bodies--they're our possessions, and so my "right" to trash what is mine is more important than my responsibility to be a good steward of what is in my possession.

Don't believe me that we're caught in that kind of culture?  Listen to the manufactured outrage any time some public official talks about publishing nutritional information on the menu at your local fast-food place.  Listen to the outcry when leaders insist on school lunches having a certain amount of fruits and vegetables [that are not ketchup].  Listen to the refrains of "I can do whatever I want--it's my freedom to eat five Big Macs if I choose to, because I'm the only one who has to live with the consequences of my actions, and it's my life, thank-you-very-much."  Look how viscerally folks react to the idea that we actually do have obligations to care for these bodies we both possess and, in a real sense, are.

And that's just it: as long as I can tell myself that my body is just one more possession alongside my piles of stuff-I-still-like and stuff-I-am-throwing-away-in-order-to-buy-new-stuff, I will bristle at the notion that I bear responsibility for how I care for my whole self, including how I use my body.  But when I am reminded that our bodies are first and foremost God's creations, and that I do not possess exclusive authority over my body nor anybody else's, I can no longer treat these limbs, organs, and systems as disposable or replaceable. I am compelled to see my calling to be a steward--a caregiver and caretaker--of what I have and what I am. I don't mean that to sound like we all have to practice spartan or puritanical diet and exercise regimes ["Physician, heal thyself," right?], but I do mean to say that the ways we use, care for, and inhabit our bodies changes when we no longer think of them as consumer products.  

In a culture that seems bent on making everything, ourselves included, into one-time use commodities, maybe the most revolutionary thing we can do in this day is to start treating ourselves, our bodies, our neighbors, our relationships, and even our possessions, as things worth keeping and mending. When they tell you, "Just throw it away and get a new one," rebel a little and try fixing it.  When they say, "Nobody can tell you not to eat five cheeseburgers at once," maybe stop and as, "But is that good for me, and for the person I am becoming?"  And when you hear, "It's just casual sex--it doesn't have to 'mean' anything," ask whether you are being baited one more time into treating other people like disposable goods.

To be the voice that doesn't just throw things away when you get tired of them, or bored w with fixing them, that might just be the radical thing the culture around us needs to hear.

Lord God, make us to be good stewards even of our selves.