Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.
- 1 Corinthians 6:18-20
But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
- John 2:21
And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
- Ephesians 1:22-23
In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
- Ephesians 5:28-33
May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is the new creation.
- Galatians 6:14-15
Boilerplate
I’m Harold Dykstra. I’m retired, but I go to food bank distributions all over Tracy and talk to people that need someone who will listen to their story. My time is well spent. A police lieutenant suggested that I write down the conversations that I had with an angel. I did not know she was an angel at the time. The angel, for a little over a year, indwelled a life-sized posable action figure my children bought me, so that I would not be perceived as travelling alone. And in a way, she was training me for what I do while talking to the needy. She probed my heart to find out what I believed and how I express love for others. She changed my life. Since she was a doll that had come to life, we came up with the term ‘other living.’ She was not a human, an animal, or even a plant, but she was definitely living, and very vibrant. Oh, excuse me, angels have no gender, but the angel indwelled a doll named Bountiful Babs. After seeing the angel in that form for over a year, I cannot see her in my mind in any other form.
This Week’s Question
In the last episode, Babs introduced me to John Downing. She wanted him to become my friend. In the course of a Bible Study, John accepted Christ. I don’t know if that was what Babs had in mind as being the ultimate goal, but in the end, John became a Christian and we might even keep in touch.
This week Babs was not in any of the usual places when I got back from another successful sales call. She is usually ready to go out to dinner. She either waits in the lobby of the hotel, or she waits in the breakfast area. She is usually reading her Bible or talking to someone. If not there, she might be in the room. When she was not in those places, I went to the hotel guest laundry room. Maybe someone was using the washers and dryers, and she was just now getting our laundry done. Please, do not think me as chauvinistic. She volunteered to wash clothes during the week, but I washed clothes on the weekends if we were not driving both days. I even did some laundry during the week if the sales call only took a few hours. We worked out our limited chores, but even the laundry room was empty.
I went to the front desk. Babs had not left to walk around the neighborhood, but they heard from someone that a woman with superhuman endurance was on the treadmill.
I found her in the exercise room.
Babs said, “I was visiting someone in the breakfast area this morning, Harold. They said that I should go to the exercise room and walk until I had worked up a good sweat. I have been on this machine for five and a half hours, and I have not started sweating. How long does it take?”
I nearly burst out laughing. “Babs, I can break into a sweat just thinking about getting on a treadmill. I would think that most people would be sweating after about thirty minutes or even less. But to answer your question, I think you need to do as many people suggest, get off the vicious treadmills of life. Slow down, Babs. Turn the machine off and come to me. I will hug you and explain.”
She did so and I whispered in her ear. “Sweetie, you are ‘other living.’ Have you ever sweated? You told me that you are anatomically correct in every way, but maybe that did not include sweat glands. You were getting the hotel staff worried. People were thinking that you might be a superhero or something.”
Babs giggled, “Like an angel or something? Harold, you must be kidding!”
Note: She did not confirm nor deny.
We went out to a nice restaurant, and all she wanted was a small salad. She had been on the treadmill for hours and all she wanted was a small salad. Something was awry.
When we got to our Bible study corner of the hotel room, I asked, “Why are you on this health kick today, Babs?”
Babs said, “There was this woman in the breakfast area who was preaching about how we needed to exercise. She asked how much exercise that I performed each day, and I had to admit that I did some walking and that was it. She told me that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and that if we have a poor working body, we cannot serve God to the best of our abilities. So, I asked her how much exercise I needed, and she said that I should start each day on the treadmill and stay there until I sweat. Like I told you, it had been five hours, and I was not tired and I was not sweating.”
I asked, “Can I say something that the health obsessed person did not say?” Babs nodded eagerly. “The verses in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 is always quoted by these people while ignoring 1 Corinthians 6:18. We should abstain from sexual sin, sexual perversion. The Apostle Paul says that all sin outside sexual sin is a sin outside the body. But sexual sin is a sin that is within the body and the Holy Spirit resides there. Now, does that change your attitude about the only verse that they quote?”
Babs scrunched her nose. “Hmmm. I have never done a sexual sin. But doesn’t it make sense that when we are healthier, we can do more for God?”
I shrugged, “That gets away from the verse that they quote to just common sense, but if you see the exercise people, they preach exercise and they do exercise. But how many hours are they consuming each day in the sickness of trying to trim one or two pounds from their already trim body. And I have seen some very powerful witnesses for Jesus in the hospital. The person may be sick. They may have little chance of living for very long, but they have a smile on their face, and they do not talk about exercise and exercise alone. They talk about Jesus who gives them an inner Joy that shines from every muscle of their torn bodies.”
Babs had a tear in each eye. Babs said, “You have broken me again, Harold. I am leaking. But you are talking about your wife, aren’t you?”
I nodded. “And she would find the other Christians in the hospital ward and two became three and they were singing praise songs together. When I would meet a new nurse that I had not met, she would ask why these people with a death sentence were so cheerful. I said they would be cheerful too if you knew, that is the nurse knew, that tomorrow I may open my eyes to see Jesus smiling down at me. You do not have to make exercise a prerequisite for the day. And you are ‘other living.’ Maybe exercise shortens your life. Maybe you are eternal, regardless of your body shape. Maybe you exercised too much.”
Babs looked worried. “Did I? 1, 2, 3. I don’t know. Wait, Harold, you didn’t sing along.”
I shrugged, “You threw me off when you asked the question and then sang I don’t know to your own question. If we start messing with our traditions, I do not know where we are going, Babs.”
We stared at each other for a few seconds. Babs broke into laughter first.
Babs said, “But then, where else does it talk about the body being the temple?”
I smiled, “All four gospels speak of the temple being destroyed and it will be rebuilt in three days. The synoptic gospels speak of the cornerstone that was rejected, but in John’s Gospel, in the second chapter, John clarifies that when Jesus said that He would rebuild the temple that they destroy in three days, He was speaking of His body. Jesus would die and be resurrected in three days. But Paul is talking about our bodies staying away from sexual sin in 1 Corinthians, for, as a church, we are the body in its fulness of Jesus on this earth, from Ephesians 1:22-23. So, now the metaphor gets a little muddy. Is our body the temple or is our church the body? Both.”
Babs asked, “But did the woman this morning have a biblical point?”
I snickered, “In a way that she would probably least admit, yes. In Ephesians 5, Paul says that husband and wife should submit to one another. Then, the wife should submit to the husband specifically. Some versions say the word ‘obey’ which the woman this morning – I did not meet her but from what you said – she would probably refuse to obey her husband.”
Babs scrunched her nose, “Oh. But where does taking care of the body come in?”
I sighed, “When Paul drives the point home that the husband should love his wife in a deeply meaningful way, Paul reminds the husband that they have become one flesh. The husband feeds his own body and cares for it; the husband must do the same for his wife. That does not say ‘spend three hours doing exercise.’”
Babs snarled, “It was over five hours, and I only stopped because I obeyed my travel buddy.”
I laughed, “Okay, we are not married, but I love you enough to ask you to get off the treadmill. No greater love hath no man shown than to pull the plug on the treadmill.”
Babs gasped, “They wrote about treadmills in the Bible?”
I burst out laughing, “Babs! You have read the Bible in at least a dozen translations. You know it doesn’t mention treadmills, but I just said that like it might sound in the KJV English.”
Babs gave me a dirty look and folded her arms. “Men!”
Then her face softened. Babs moaned, “Harold, now I’m hungry. I only had a salad tonight. Sure, ‘other living’ do not need to eat, but I am used to eating more than a salad!”
I smiled, “Remember Galatians 6:14-15, Babs. The one thing we should be concerned with is our new creation. Yes, doing some exercise is nice. Eating the right food is nice. But for the human who loves Jesus, learning more about Jesus so that we can be prepared for the next life is the most important thing. … Oh, if you are really hungry, I have some sandwich crackers with cheese and some with peanut butter next to my underwear in the dresser drawer.”
Babs giggled, “I knew you were holding out on me. Cheese, please!”
I huffed, “Do you not have a getter yourself? I told you where they are.”
Babs sighed while doing a fake fanning of herself with her hands, “Harold, I may be ‘other living,’ but I am a lady. And ladies do not go into men’s dresser drawers to rummage through his under garments for a morsel of food. Besides, I would have to walk right past you to get to the dresser.”
I grumbled, “I do not understand ‘other living,’ but I am thinking that you are only a lady by accident of the female body was the only one available to indwell.” But I got up and got her two packets of six sandwich crackers each. Oh, how it hurt, for I liked the cheese ones better myself.
Credits
All these conversations remind me of my conversations with my wife. We would talk about anything and everything. And most of the time, it sounded like a discussion in a Sunday school class.
For the record, I never caught my wife on a treadmill or elliptical while we were travelling, for my work or vacation. But we usually got sandwich crackers for the road, a quick snack so that we did not have to stop and a late-night snack if the urge hit. They were usually devoured by the grandchildren when we stopped by.
And “Getter” is defined as a part of the body, non-descript, that can get something as easily as I can go get it for you. You know, when you really want to be lazy. The question usually was “What is wrong with your getter?”
And a note about the odd used words in the title. How can an angel that is indwelling a life-sized poseable action figure, which was supposedly designed after the “perfect” body, tone anything?
Soli Deo Gloria. Only to God be the Glory.
Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley 
Leave a comment