Transcript

6: Body · Finding God at Work

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(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hi, I'm Chris.
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This is Finding God at Work.
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Just a reminder that Finding God at Work
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isn't just a podcast, it's also an online
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course.
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Check it out at FindingGodAtWork.org.
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Our current series is wholehearted, becoming healthier Christians
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at work.
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And in this episode, we get to the
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body.
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How do our bodies affect our lives at
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work and what can it mean to be
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healthier in our relationship with our own bodies
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at work?
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Okay, so I want to start with more
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of a kind of a prayer exercise.
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Just take a moment right now, wherever you
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are, and notice your body.
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How are you feeling right now?
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Are you in Are you holding tension anywhere
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in your body, maybe in your shoulders or
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in your back?
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How do you feel in your own skin
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today?
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And now I encourage you, if you're able,
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if it's safe, if you're not in the
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car, to take your hand and just put
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it on your heart and breathe in to
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receive the presence of God in your body.
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If it's helpful, you can say, Holy Spirit,
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I welcome you as you take a few
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deep breaths.
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Holy Spirit, I welcome you.
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Holy Spirit, I welcome you.
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Holy Spirit, I welcome you.
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Then when you're ready, you can put your
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hand down and get ready for the rest
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of our podcast episode.
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Now, why do I start there?
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One reason I start there is that if
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you're like me, you forget that you have
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a body half of the time.
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I'm so focused on the ideas I'm thinking
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about or the work I'm doing or the
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people that I'm talking to, I am not
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always super aware of my own body.
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Now, on the other hand, sometimes we can
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be painfully aware of our own bodies because
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of literal physical pain, because of illness, because
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of tiredness, and often because our emotional relationship
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with our body is rather complicated, it can
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be hard to feel comfortable in your own
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skin.
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So all of that baggage, all of our
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history in our own body, all of the
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difficult or beautiful things that are part of
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our relationship with our body, those all come
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right into our work days with us every
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single day.
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Because even if you work remotely, which is
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kind of disembodied, you're still using your body
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to type on your laptop or your computer
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at home, you're still using your eyes to
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look at the screen.
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Your body is always with you when you
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are at work.
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So is there anything that Jesus has to
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say?
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Again, looking at Jesus as our anthropologist, someone
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who can tell us about human life and
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human nature, what does he have to say
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about our bodies and how that relates to
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our work?
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Well, I want to build on the work
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we've already done.
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So we've talked a little bit about our
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thoughts and our feelings.
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Then in our last episode, we talked about
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our heart or will.
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So I want to go to a passage
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where Jesus relates the heart to the body.
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So this is Matthew chapter 15, and Jesus
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has had a conflict with the Pharisees because
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the Pharisees had a ritual tradition of washing
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their hands before meals, and Jesus disciples did
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not always follow this ritual.
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So the Pharisees confronted Jesus about this.
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They had a little bit of a dispute.
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And then there's a follow-up conversation with
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the disciples, and Jesus explains more.
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He says, whatever enters the mouth goes into
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the stomach and then out of the body.
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But the things that come out of a
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person's mouth come from the heart, and these
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defile them.
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For out of the heart come evil thoughts,
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murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.
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These are what defile a person, but eating
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with unwashed hands does not defile them.
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Okay, so what's Jesus doing here?
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He's not just responding to the Pharisees' specific
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contention about this ritual of washing hands.
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He's getting at the deeper issue of how
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do external rituals relate to who we are
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on the inside?
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How do they relate to our heart?
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And so he uses this contrast of what
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defiles a person?
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What can make a person unclean?
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What can welcome spiritual darkness into a person's
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experience?
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And he says, failing to do a specific
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external bodily ritual is not the point.
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The point is, what's in the heart?
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Are they full of lust?
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Are they full of greed?
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Are they full of evil thoughts?
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Those are the things that bring spiritual darkness
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into someone's experience.
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Those are the things that defile a person.
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So on the one hand, Jesus is saying
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we shouldn't exaggerate the importance of the body
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versus this hidden inward life.
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What deeply matters about us is hidden.
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It's not all about external rituals and symbols.
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It's about the kind of person we're deeply
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becoming, and that's hidden.
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It's not as obvious as whether we've washed
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our hands or not.
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But he also talks about a positive relationship
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between the heart and the body.
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Did you catch that?
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He says, but the things that come out
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of a person's mouth come from the heart.
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The things that come out of a person's
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mouth, part of the body, come from the
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heart.
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So he's saying what's in your heart, that
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hidden part of you, will manifest itself in
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the movements of your body, often the movements
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of your mouth, the things that you say,
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but also by implication the movements of our
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hands and our feet, the rest of our
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body, the things that are inside of us
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are expressed through our physical bodies.
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So Jesus as a theological anthropologist is giving
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us a relationship between our inner life and
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our outer life.
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He's saying there's a flow to the human
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person.
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It's first will, then body.
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Okay, now Jesus in this specific passage talks
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about how that can go bad.
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If the will is bad, then what the
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body does will also be bad.
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But in other passages throughout the Bible, we
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also see that the good thing can happen
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too, that if the Holy Spirit is shaping
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our will, influencing how we choose, recreating us
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from the inside out by God's grace, then
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that goodness and life will then also flow
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from our will to our body.
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An unstated implication of what Jesus is saying
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here is that this is a gift, this
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way of our being coming together where we
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have a will that's hidden, but then expressed
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through a physical body, that is a gift
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of God.
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And even though Jesus doesn't specifically say that,
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he doesn't spell that out in this passage,
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we know that Jesus's ministry comes within the
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stream of the Hebrew prophetic tradition and the
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Torah and the writings of the Old Testament.
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And so when we turn to those writings,
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we see this statement about the body being
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a gift of God again and again.
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One of the characters we encounter in the
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Hebrew scriptures who spent a lot of time
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thinking about these things was King David, and
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he was among other things a poet, and
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he wrote about this in Psalm 139 as
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well as other passages.
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Starting in verse 13, David writes, for you
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created my innermost parts.
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You wove me in my mother's womb.
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I will give thanks to you because I
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am awesomely and wonderfully made.
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Wonderful are your works, and my soul knows
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it very well.
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My frame was not hidden from you when
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I was made in secret and skillfully formed
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in the depths of the earth.
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Your eyes have seen my formless substance, and
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in your book were written all the days
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that were ordained for me, when as yet
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there was not one of them.
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David is using a really amazing layered poetic
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language here to say that there's this secret
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place in the depths of the earth where
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God like weaves the body together.
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But you can see that the import of
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his statement is that the body is full
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of wonder, that it's full of beauty, that
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it reflects the creativity and the care of
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God in a special way.
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The body is a gift.
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Now, the body is a gift not just
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in the sense that God created it, but
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also in the sense that God continues to
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preserve and sustain the body over time.
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In another passage, David is having a conversation
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with a couple men named Rechab and Bana.
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This is in 2 Samuel chapter 4, and
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he's kind of just making an oblique reference
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to his relationship with God.
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He says, as the Lord lives, who has
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redeemed my life out of every adversity?
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So this is David's shorthand description of who
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God is to him.
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Oh, he's the Lord who has redeemed my
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life out of every adversity.
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Now, at that point in David's life, he
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had faced a lot of adversity.
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He had spent time on the run.
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His life had been threatened multiple times.
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He had faced difficulties from animals and from
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people and from various military conflicts.
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So when he says the Lord has redeemed
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my life out of every adversity, he's got
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a long list of adversities that God has
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redeemed him from.
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But that's David's way of thinking.
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It's like, hey, my body made it through
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every single one of those harrowing encounters.
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That was the Lord.
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The Lord was the one who redeemed my
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life out of those things.
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Now, the specific word translated as life here
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is the Hebrew word nefesh.
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And I don't really know Hebrew, but I
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count on the Bible Project guys to know
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Hebrew.
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They have this wonderful video about the Hebrew
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word nefesh, and we'll include a link to
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the video in our associated PDF guide for
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this episode, like we normally do for resources
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like this.
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And in this video, they talk about how
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nefesh, even though sometimes it's translated as soul,
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actually refers to the whole person, including their
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physical being.
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So for example, they cite Psalm 119 verse
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175.
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They say in Psalm 119, most translations read,
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let me live that I may praise you.
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In Hebrew, the poet literally says, let my
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nefesh live that it may praise you.
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By using nefesh, the poet emphasizes that their
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entire being, their life and their body offer
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thanks to God.
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So this Hebrew word, sometimes translated soul, actually
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means all of us, including our body.
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So you might wonder, when we talk about
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our body, and we're looking at Jesus as
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anthropologist, how does this connect to his command
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that we cited from Deuteronomy, then quoted in
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the Gospel of Luke, you shall love the
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Lord your God with all your heart, and
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with all your soul, and with all your
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strength, and with all your mind.
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Well, in that passage, the word translated soul
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is a Greek word that corresponds to that
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Hebrew word for nefesh.
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So ironically, when we look at that teaching
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of Jesus, loving the Lord your God with
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all your heart, and with all your soul,
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and with all your strength, and with all
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your mind, the word that gets us to
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body is the word soul.
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So it might be a little confusing, just
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because of how we use the word soul
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sometimes to mean the aspect of us beyond
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our body.
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But really, in the Bible, it's meant to
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be an integrated whole.
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And so we know that Jesus cares about
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our nefesh, our body, we know that our
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body is a gift.
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And so the question is, how does that
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relate to our lives at work?
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I think there's two things that we can
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say.
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One is that when we view our body,
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our nefesh, as a gift from God, then
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we are able to do our work with
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both humility and dignity.
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Now, why humility?
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Well, if your body is a gift, then
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you can't take full credit for it.
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So just a funny example, in the United
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States, if you're an adult man, and you
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are at least seven feet tall, you have
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a 17% chance of making it into
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the NBA.
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That's huge.
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That's almost one out of five.
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Now, by itself, height is not enough.
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You also have to practice and put in
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the effort and do everything that anybody who
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gets into the NBA does in order to
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get a certain level of skill.
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But you have a huge genetic advantage if
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you're seven feet tall.
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And that's something that's just a gift.
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It's just your genetic code determines how tall
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you're going to be.
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There's nothing you can do to change it.
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And there's nothing that I can do to
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ever become seven feet tall.
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I'm hanging out at five foot seven point
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five for the rest of my life, I'm
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pretty sure, until my spine starts to compress
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when I'm older.
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And so I do not have a genetic
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predisposition to help me get into the NBA,
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nor have I done the work to get
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into the NBA.
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But in whatever job we have, our body
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gives us certain advantages or disadvantages for our
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job.
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So if you're working on a farm and
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you got to unload potatoes from the back
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of a pickup truck, that requires physical strength
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and stamina.
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If you're working on a computer all day,
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you've got to have eyes that can process
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the information on the computer or ears that
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can process it.
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If you're using software for the visually impaired,
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you got to be able to coordinate your
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hands with your keyboard.
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If you're working in an environment with kids,
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you got to figure out how do I
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interact with the kids in a way that's
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safe where they can still hear me, they
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can still see me, but I'm down on
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their level when I need to be.
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Seeing a kindergarten teacher crouch down and tie
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a child's shoelaces without bonking their chin when
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they raise their head back up.
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Some of these are funny examples, but the
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point is all work is embodied.
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That's how it's supposed to work.
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God created us with this capacity for our
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will to express itself in our bodies.
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That's what Jesus is teaching.
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That's what the Hebrew scriptures are teaching.
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When we do something with our bodies to
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accomplish something at work, that's always resting on
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the genetic gift that we can't take credit
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for.
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Yes, we still apply effort and that's good
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to apply effort, but ultimately it comes from
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a source beyond ourselves.
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And so we shouldn't brag about it or
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be so impressed with how good we are
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at our job.
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So when we view our body, our nefesh,
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as a gift, we do our work with
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humility.
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The second thing is we do our work
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with dignity.
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And for this I want to turn to
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a book called The Life of the Body
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by Valerie Hess and Lane Arnold.
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They're workers in spiritual formation and spiritual direction.
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And they know how Jesus taking on a
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body says something about our body.
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Jesus came to earth as a human being
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through Mary's womb.
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That event affirms us in our own bodies.
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He ate, he slept, he walked, he laughed,
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he cried, he touched.
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The concrete reality of the incarnation is its
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uniqueness.
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God as a person here in a body,
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like us, on a physical earth, with us.
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Like other people, Jesus grew from infant to
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toddler to boy to teenager to man.
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He lived and breathed as we do.
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When he died, just as we will one
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day, his body ceased to live and breathe.
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The difference, of course, is that after three
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days he came to life again, resurrected in
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a physical body.
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As with Jesus' body, our bodies will be
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resurrected from the dead.
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That alone, aside from the vast theological impact,
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says something about the body, something that is
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going to be redeemed is worth caring for.
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Something that is going to be redeemed is
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worth caring for.
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When you are using your body in your
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workplace, you are using something that has been
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dignified by the creation of God, by the
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sustaining of God, and by the incarnation of
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God in a body like yours.
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And so when you are sweating it out,
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tossing those potatoes, or rubbing your eyes because
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you've been staring at the screen for a
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little bit too long, or panting after running
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around the recess field with a bunch of
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kindergartners, whatever it is that your body is
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feeling the burn in your workplace, there is
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an inherent dignity to that.
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To using your body, pushing your body forward
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into the effort that's required to get the
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work done, there is dignity in that.
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Your body will be redeemed someday, and it's
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worth taking care of.
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It's worth using for God's purposes.
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We see this in just a subtle way
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in the book of Ecclesiastes.
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This is in chapter 3, verse 11.
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God has made everything beautiful in its time.
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He has also set eternity in the human
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heart, yet no one can fathom what God
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has done from beginning to end.
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I know that there is nothing better for
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people than to be happy and to do
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good while they live, that each of them
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may eat and drink and find satisfaction in
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all their toil.
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This is the gift of God.
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So there's a lot of layers in Ecclesiastes
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we don't have time to get into right
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here, but this particular moment from Ecclesiastes says,
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God has made everything beautiful.
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There is a sense of eternity in our
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experience, and how do we live that out?
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We live it out in our bodies.
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We eat, we drink with our bodies, and
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we do toil with our bodies, and all
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of that is a gift of God.
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And I think we can take those verses
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from Ecclesiastes just at face value.
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They're like, yes, all of that is a
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gift of God.
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That's how he meant for it to be.
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There's inherent dignity in who we are as
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embodied creatures whenever we do our work.
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And it's when we see our bodies as
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a gift of God that we're able to
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do our work with humility and with dignity
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every day.
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Lord Jesus, thank you for coming into our
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world in a body.
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Thank you for dignifying our bodies.
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Thank you for creating and sustaining us in
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the first place as embodied creatures with a
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nefesh and a body and a soul all
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together.
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Show us how to be at home in
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our own bodies, how to welcome your Holy
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Spirit into our bodily experience so that we
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can do our work with humility, with dignity,
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and with you.
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Jesus, do your work in us as we
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do our work with you.
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Thanks for listening.
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Finding God at Work is a production of
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dedicated to forming Christians for mission in everyday
18:21
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