We live in a compartmentalized society. It is considered wise to keep our lives and our thoughts in seperate containers. Seperate church and state. Family and work don't mix. The physical and the spiritual are not supposed to impact one another. I have bought into this thinking in many little ways.
One of the big ways I have bought into it is in my body image. I have believed that what I think about my body does not matter to God. God is concerned with the heart, not the body. Right? Well...my body is the temple of God. Doesn't that matter to Him? I don't think He cares if I have a perfect figure or clear skin. But, does He care if I honor my body? Does it matter to Him if I loathe my reflection?
Yes, I think it does matter to Him. You know what else? I think that most women focus on what they dislike about their appearance. I have talked to many friends about this lately. Every one of them could tell me what they disliked about their body. Many of their complaints centered around weight and the desire to airbrush one location. My five year old came home and asked if she could get highlites in her hair. She's five. She said that a girl in her kindergarten class got them and she wanted them too. I said no. My four year old told me that she wanted to wear makeup to school all the time because it makes her prettier. I said no.
Here's what I know intellectually and am wrestling with emotionally: the images I see on television and in magazines are not real. I am created in the image of God and I believe that embodies the physical too. Why can't I live like I believe it?
Do you think about this stuff too?
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Waiting to Dance
Dancing in community
I am a wife, mother and friend. But above all, I am a daugther of the king seeking to please Him through this dance called life.
Waiting to Dance
Rhesa
About Me
- Rhesa Higgins
- I am a minister's wife, a mother to three, and a proud ACU grad!
How this dance works...
I will post once a week on this blog to discuss with you how my dance is going. I hope that this will become a conversation about each of our dances. Won't you join in?
Dancing in community
1 comment:
I think about this all the time b/c as a professional photographer, I have people ask if I can photoshop their bellies out of pictures. There are some things I can do like remove a blemish, soften under eyes, etc.
I cannot however, change what people actually look like. The saddest part is that my photography is usually wedding photography. It is sad that many brides are thinking of this instead of excitement of the day, the beauty of the covenant, on and on and on it goes.
Personally...being delivered from this has been one of the biggest blessings of my life. That was almost 10 years ago. I will say that after the third baby, thoughts of frustration concerning my body have come around again, but in the name of Jesus, I don't accept them.
I should work out and not eat crazy stuff. God does care about my physical body and my spiritual body, but most of all He loves all of me. Madly. I just have to remember that.
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