Faith Embodied: Glorifying God with Our Physical and Spiritual Health

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you, Cynthia Ruchti, for being a friend, mentor, editor, and agent extraordinaire.

INTRODUCTION

INCARNATIONAL HEALTH

Most of us treat our bodies as separate entities from our spirits, related in only minor ways—if at all. We worship on Sunday mornings, then gorge on an unhealthy lunch afterward. We watch our favorite Netflix guilty pleasure in the evenings, then switch to saying our nighttime prayers. If we are ambitious, we do our devotions and exercise in the morning, but rarely simultaneously. They’re separate, unrelated activities, aren’t they?

Have you ever tried listening to worship music while you exercise? Not the slow, heartfelt songs that touch your heart and bring you to tears at the end of a set but the upbeat melodies that inspire dancing and hand clapping. When I do this, it produces a synergistic effect. Running on the treadmill makes the lyrics come alive, as if I’m raising a hallelujah to the heavens. Hearing the perfect cadence of drumbeats among thoughtful words allows more emotional—and physical—weight to be lifted. When we live as if our physical and spiritual health are deeply and richly connected, both are strengthened.

Though we may separate the body and the spirit, ministry and medicine have taught me the two are inextricably tied. Illness, disease, and accidents invariably affect our spiritual health. The reverse is also true. Spiritual health has a direct impact on physical well-being.

I am a scientist, a researcher, an academic, and a pastor. It is not often that a career path leads from pediatrician to epidemiologist, to public health officer for the CDC, to college professor, to senior pastor. That’s an odd constellation of specialties, and you might wonder how I balance the different priorities of those disciplines. Can pastors trust medical research without compromising their faith in a healing God? Can scientists and physicians study the intricacies of the human body without losing an expectation for the miraculous and supernatural?

These questions are the point of this book. I believe my unusual career path was ordained by God so I can speak into the intersection of faith, medicine, and public health. My faith in Christ is enhanced, not diminished, by what I know about science and medicine. My medical and public health experiences are enriched by my foundational trust in the God of ages, the creator of all we know and have yet to discover about the human body.

Years of study and experience have taught me that the gap between physical and spiritual health is imaginary. One of my congregants suffers from chronic pain. No moment passes without sharp tingling sensations pulsating throughout her body. Though the suffering is constant, some days are worse than others. These are the darkest hours, when anger, bitterness, and resentment fill her heart. Nothing can be said to soothe her mind. In those moments, the anguish of her soul reflects the pain in her body. Just as my practice of adding worship music to exercise enhances both physical and spiritual health, so illness and disease can magnify spiritual malaise.

The interrelatedness of body and spirit is at the core of God’s design for us—the concept of incarnation, a word we typically associate with Jesus’ inhabiting human form. We don’t worship a disembodied savior or a set of spiritual principles for right living or bettering our relationship with God. We worship Jesus, the eternal Son, who became human in every way we are. Jesus took on flesh, we’re told in the Bible (John 1:14). He inhabited every cell of human being, saw through human corneas, touched with fingers covered in human epidermal tissue, walked on feet with the same twenty-six bones, thirty-three joints, and about 120 tendons, ligaments, and muscles that yours and mine have. Jesus was incarnated in a human body for the highest and holiest of purposes, winning our hearts and paving the way for our salvation.

Then when Jesus returned to heaven, he sent his Spirit to inhabit us. When we acknowledge Jesus as our savior and lord, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in our whole selves—including our corneas, joints, tendons, and skin. We offer these things to him as we love, serve, and honor Jesus. In him we live and move and have our being, as the book of Acts tells us (17:28).

Through the power of the Holy Spirit, we are united to Christ. Just as the branches are part of the vine (John 15), we are linked to him. We join in his life, death, and resurrection. We live incarnationally¹ when the Holy Spirit acts in our unified bodies and spirits to worship and connect us to Jesus, the Incarnate One.

When we worship incarnationally, we allow our God-designed bodies—from our major organs and systems down to the finest microscopic details—to do what the Spirit came to do: guide, steer, remind, lead, fill, fulfill, love, teach, inspire, speak, and worship purely. We are as divinely infused by the Spirit of God as the babe in a manger, who grew up, served, sacrificed, hung on a cross, and rose to new life. When we make incarnational health decisions, we think about the ways our physical health influences our spiritual health, and vice versa. We stop pretending that the things we consume, the ways we use our bodies, and the things we do to take care of ourselves have nothing to do with our relationship with God.

What do we overlook if we fail to use our God-created eyes, ears, noses, mouths, and hands as instruments through which the Spirit can interact with and impact our world? What do we thwart if we fail to care for and protect our vision, our breathing, or our ligaments for the full time God allots for us here on earth? What do we miss if we assume an injury or illness evaporates God’s purposes for us rather than finding new ways in the intricacies of God’s marvelous creation to do what his Spirit instructs?

Not only are incarnational health, worship, and living possible, they are God’s good design, and he is waiting for us to fully embrace them.

CORRUPTION OF GOD’S CREATION

But before we jump farther into the concept of incarnational health, we must look at its inverse. If we believe God designed our bodies carefully and called them good, then why do they seem to be constantly failing us? Why do they break down over time? Why are they susceptible to invasion by corruptive outside forces? What is the role of illness, disease, and aging in our lives?

Though we were designed to glorify God, sin often stands in the way. Since the fall, the wages of sin are death. Paul shared this reality in his letter to the Romans: Sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned (5:12).

From the dust we were formed, and to dust we will one day return. Choices made at the garden of Eden ensure it (Genesis 1). Across the globe, violence leads to murder, and wars bring death. Pandemics infect millions of people, and hundreds of thousands die. At the microscopic level, infectious diseases and chronic illnesses destroy our bodies. Let’s look specifically at how cancer twists God’s good design into something horrific and life threatening.

Normal cells grow, divide, and die when signaled to do so. Each cell plays an intricate and vital role within our organs and bodily systems. When functioning correctly, cells fulfill their roles without disturbing the work of other organs. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul likens biological organs to roles within a church. Just as every organ is essential to a healthy body, each person is vital to a flourishing church. The foot, for example, cannot say to the hand that it does not belong to the body.

Yet that’s what cancer does. It disregards the role of other cells. When cancer takes hold, cells no longer act in unity. Instead, they live autonomously with no regard to the healthy structures surrounding them. Cancer results in cells refusing to die when they are supposed to, dividing uncontrollably, spreading to surrounding tissues, and eventually forming malignant tumors.

Blood cells, skin cells, bone cells, muscle cells, and nerve cells were fashioned in unity. Each was created to live, function, and work in harmony with one another. Yet cancerous cells act in self-interest. They do whatever is beneficial for their growth and self-preservation. With time, they invade neighboring organs and destroy surrounding tissues. As you can see, there’s an analogy in how these biological processes play out and how spiritual corruption can occur within the body of Christ.

How, then, should we understand the roles of illness, disease, and aging in God’s created order? Protestant Reformer Martin Luther once said, We would like to be rid of all our infirmity which, to our superficial conception, appear to be a great hindrance to doing useful things, and yet it is most questionable if we should bring forth any fruit unto God without them.² If Luther believed illness yields blessings, how do we explain his actions of healing during horrific plagues? In his opinion, disease was neither God designed nor God caused but permitted by God according to God’s purposes.

In contemporary times, theologian Leonard Sweet views sickness and infirmity as a power hostile to God that destroys life.³ Yet Sweet believes suffering can sanctify our actions, cultivating compassion and empathy for others in this broadly evangelical perspective. For him, restoration and flourishing are not necessarily seen in perfect health and well-being but are found when humanity embraces its God-given roles—including healing. Sweet is careful not to attribute the wreck of well-being to a single cause—divine command or satanic powers or punishment of sin. In doing so, we simply allow people to avoid what nature, science, medicine, and religion offer for restoration.⁴

There is no easy explanation for the ravages of disease. We can be confident that illness, sin, and death were never part of God’s plan for Adam and Eve. But because of their choices, consequences remain for all humanity. Nevertheless, like other forms of suffering, illness can foster perseverance, development of character, and hope in the Lord (Rom. 5:3–5). In a world where these awful things exist, we can take up God’s call to live incarnationally by making good incarnational health decisions for ourselves and others.

TENSION WITHIN INCARNATIONAL HEALTH CHOICES

What do I mean by incarnational health decisions? Through illness, aging, pandemics, and natural disasters, we have countless opportunities to respond in faith, whether through the food and drink we consume, the images we see, or the voices we listen to. Each of our choices provides a chance to worship incarnationally, both individually and collectively.

These decisions provide an opportunity to glorify the Lord while standing against the corruption of sin. In Romans 11:36, Paul affirms the centrality of God in all creation, for from him and through him and to him are all things. He is the source of our existence, the sustainer of our lives, and the goal of our work.

Incarnational health decisions present innate tensions. First is the idea of sanctification of the body—the process of being made holy. A natural tension exists between making choices that preserve our bodies as pure, healthy, and blameless and succumbing to the desires of our flesh. A second tension comes from the call to sacrifice our broken vessels for the sake of others. Will we surrender our bodies for the spiritual, mental, and physical health of others?

First Corinthians 6:19–20 teaches us that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit; therefore we should glorify God with them. Paul explains that these jars of clay are to be preserved as pure, undefiled temples of God. This includes fleeing from sexual immorality, the lust of the eyes, and temptations of the heart. When we commit adultery with our bodies, we deconstruct the natural relationships intended for our spouses. More important, we destroy the unity inherited from Jesus as members of Christ.

Yet not only do adultery of the body and perversion of the heart threaten the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. Conscious and unconscious decisions can also derail how we embody Christ. Seemingly innocuous images from social media can hijack our minds and steal our hearts.⁵ Soon they become obsessions beholden to the neural circuitry within our brains. Instead of being witnesses for Jesus, we reflect whatever our eyes focus on.

That is the draw of sin and a tension in incarnational health choices. We feel a subtle urge to take another bite even though our bellies are straining against our belts. It’s far too easy to drink more wine while our judgment is a little less than sensible. Some would say overindulgence is what makes us human: to eat, drink, and be merry is what gives meaning to our lives.

The earliest monastics understood these dangers all too well. They chose to live ascetically in the wilderness and later in monasteries. In radical acts of self-deprivation, monks and nuns embraced poverty, chastity, and obedience. They left the trappings of the world to focus on communion with the Father in heaven.

But many Christians would argue these monastic choices were not incarnational, they were isolationist. Instead, we should sacrifice our lives for others so that they might experience Christ. This sacrifice presupposes the ministry of presence that Jesus modeled in life and death. When others distanced themselves from the sick and ill, he healed the blind and deaf. While religious laws recommended quarantine from the ceremonially unclean, Jesus reached out to touch lepers and bleeding women.

Following this model, Christians since the Cyprian and Antonine plagues of the first and second centuries have chosen to be vessels of healing for those in need.⁶ During the bubonic plague, Martin Luther exemplified this sacrificial love. Instead of fleeing the Black Death in his hometown of Wittenberg, Luther and his family chose to stay and minister to the dying and sick. He reasoned that those at death’s door needed a doctor and a shepherd to comfort their souls and administer sacraments and last rites.⁷

Centuries later, believers like Kent Brantly willingly risked exposure and death in treating highly infectious ebola patients. Brantly even returned to West Africa to treat more dying patients after he recovered from the disease himself.⁸

Why would he choose this path? Because the Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep, according to John. He calls each of us to lose our lives for his sake, to pick up the cross and follow him, and to define love by giving our lives for others. Each of us is invited to follow Jesus wherever he leads, even to Calvary. Sometimes incarnational health means taking steps to preserve our well-being. Other times it means setting our well-being aside for the sake of others.

CREATION IN THE IMAGE OF GOD

How do we reconcile the preservation of our bodies as holy and blameless with the call to sacrifice these earthen vessels for others? At the heart of this dilemma are the beauty of creation, the sanctity of life, and the call to glorify God.

All lives are sacred. Genesis teaches us that we are made in the tselem and demuth of God to worship him. These Hebrew words are usually translated into English as image and likeness. From the Latin imago Dei comes the image of God.

What does it mean when God says, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, as recorded in Genesis 1? According to John Piper, Humankind was created to be a graphic image of the Creator—a formal, visible, and understandable representation of who God is and what He’s really like.⁹

As a graphic image of the Creator, our bodies, minds, and souls should be transformed daily to reflect the Father. The fact that we represent God should influence how we see ourselves and others, even in a fallen world. No matter how severely our bodies are ravaged by disease or our relationships are marred by sin, we are created in God’s image. We should view every organ, sensory adaptation, and musculoskeletal function with a sense of awe and wonder. Every person, relationship, and connection must be given respect and dignity.

We may never know the extent to which the human qualities used to describe God are literal or analogical. Still we can say with confidence that our capacities were created in his image. Heartful passions and desires allow us to love deeply. Beautiful minds consider the complexities of nature and science. Hands and feet are meant to engage in meaningful labor. Our organs provide a window to our creator, who is all powerful, everywhere present, and all knowing.

Healthy choices affirm the handiwork of God within our bodies. They engage different parts of our bodies (cells, tissues, muscles, bones) and different senses of our organs (sight, hearing, smell, taste). In doing so, they move us one step closer to the garden of Eden, where once we perfectly reflected the glory of God.

Our bodies’ intricacy is astonishing, from invisible microscopic cells to large muscles that allow us to walk and run. This intricacy speaks to the inspiration of an awe-inspiring Creator, who formed our inward parts and knitted us together in our mothers’ wombs (Ps. 139:13). King David writes that we are fearfully and wonderfully made (v. 14). We were created with a heartfelt interest in great reverence, unique and set apart for God’s purposes.

As image-bearers, we were made to glorify God. In fasting, prayer, and meditation, we worship him. But running, walking, and swimming were also designed to give glory to the Lord. When we realize that God created exercise as a way to redeem our bodies for his purposes, we see the gym and pool in a different light. Instead of perfecting our bodies for the sake of others, we reflect the image of God so that others may worship him.