Our Body, God's Temple

            The book I’m reading on healthy aging devotes an entire chapter to stress and how it can harm our bodies.  We obviously can’t eliminate stress from our lives, but we can modify our stress response. 

            In the two years since my car accident, I’ve kind of taken up meditation.  I say “kind of” because I do it for awhile and then don’t. This morning, for example, I have a sick child home who was well enough to take the laser pointer and shine it on me to make the kittens pounce on me while I was meditating.  It’s hard to focus when that’s happening.

            I’m not talking about meditation in the middle-eastern Buddha sense. I mean mindfulness, where you sit quietly for about 15 minutes and focus on your breathing and the sensation of your body, like relaxing your shoulders. If any other thought comes into your mind, you are supposed to ignore it and go back to focusing on your breathing.  This simply gives me a few minutes of doing nothing, which is so rare in our culture and yet so healthy. Remember the days as a child when  you’d sit on your back porch step in the summer and play with a dandelion, just spending time blowing the seeds across the grass, and maybe watching a bug crawl across the sidewalk?  I imagine that’s close to meditating and some days in the summer I simply sit on our swing outside and watch the birds.

            But this active form of meditation, of making time to focus on your body and your breathing, has really helped me.  Once you capture the feeling of being that relaxed, it’s easy to take a few breaths during the day and recapture the feeling, throughout stressful moments.

            Stress is toxic to the neurons in our brains. It’s a major cause of heart disease, inflammatory disease, digestive disorders, headache and other ailments and chronic conditions.  It can make us tired, dizzy, and achy. Unchecked, it destroys our body.

            If Christ is in us, we need to take care of our bodies, inside and out. It’s a command.

            Here’s a sobering verse:

                        Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you?

            If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.  1 Corinthians 3:17.

            What do you do to keep your “temple” healthy for God?

Beauty

       I'm working on myself this month both inside and out.
  I've joined a fitness club and am doing water aerobics and tai chi in the water. (Fun class!) I'm also reading Dr. Andrew Weil's book on Healthy Aging.

      Let's face it, we're all aging every day. It's interesting because his first few chapters are on ACCEPTING aging and the changes it brings to our body instead of fighting them.
       As for the "inside" I've given up being snarky with my hubby and kids, at least for Lent. I'd like to say I've given up getting mad at them, but it's more realistic to say I'm trying not to comment in a rude way when they I get irritated at them. :-)
        So....working on being more beautiful.  Glad I have the grace of God to help me out! :-)

Being Transformed

And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. – 2 Corinthians 3:18

What reflection do you see when you look in the mirror?  According to this passage, we should see a likeness of Christ.  Beyond the hair and make-up, our faces should glow with the glory of God.  It’s not a physical transformation – it’s a spiritual one.

 I don’t always feel like I’m glowing, but the beauty of this passage is that we aren’t there yet.  We are being transformed – in present tense.   We’re a work on progress.  Isn’t it exciting?

Pondering

We've had a few family crisis this past month so I  didn't get a post up on Monday.  One of my readers (and a cousin!), Jon Ventura, sent me the below write-up and asked me to post it.   I really enjoyed the content and it reminded me to appreciate the little things, even in the midst of what I have going on in my life right now.
        I also think it fits in well with our March topic:  Beauty, Inside and Outside.
Thanks, Jon!

                                                         FORTY

Forty , I have been pondering on that number for several days now. Why? Because my daughter Ann Marie is turning forty March 8^th. As you ponder, several things go through your mind, did I do everything I could in the past forty years to help get through her first forty years?  Did I provide the best guidance?  Did I spend enough time with her?  

A cousin of mind recently wrote a book entitled “ Why is there a Lemon in my Fruit Salad”.  On the cover of the book she has a picture of herself (looks about 40) holding a lemon and a salad. She is wearing an apron covered with the words from Galatians 5 -  Fruits of the Spirit- “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control ”.  She ponders on these words to help her get through life’s difficult moments and struggles   

Then I  pondered in the pew at Sunday morning worship service, Transfiguration Sunday.  This is when Jesus took Peter , James and John up to a high mountain top and where he was transfigured before them. They were so frighten that he said to them “fear not” to assure them.  They were so changed by that experience that they went and literally changed the world,   even giving  their lives so that others would know about the “Fruits of the Spirit”. Paul, the author of Galatians 5,  also had a similar transforming experience for which he gave his life to uphold his beliefs. So what does that have do with forty?  It is said that life begins at forty.  What life?  Maybe a transformed life. A life that does not dwell so much on materials things but a life more in tuned to the Fruits of the Spirit. After all, after 40 years, most of our materials things are worn out and need to be replaced.

Then we have the Sunday’s hymn –( also a song sang at Ann Marie  wedding) “It only takes a spark to get a fire going, and soon all those around can warm up to its glowing, that’s how it is with Gods love once you experience it,  you spread his love  to everyone, you want to pass it on”. March 8^th, spring time, “What wondrous time is spring when all the trees are budding, the birds begin to sings the flowers start their blooming, that’s how is with God’s love once you experience it, you want to sing (joy), its fresh like spring, you want to pass it on.   Third verse  “I wish for you my friend this happiness I’ve found, you can depend on him, it matters not where you’re bound (lemons in fruit salads),  I’ll shout from the mountain-top, I want the world to know, the Lord of love has come to me, I want to pass it on”.

When I wake every morning, I wake up to a sunny morning, a sunrise looking out over the Atlantic Ocean.  It is an original oil painting painted by my daughter Ann Marie, I ponder over all the hours she must have spend painting it (patience)and what inspired her to paint this scene of peace.

 

For year to come, each morning as I view the sun rise,  I will ponder how we will relate to such words as “mountain top, transfiguration, fear not, fruits of the spirit, it only takes a spark, and passing it on”.   

Our Sunday’s response to the benediction, “This little light of mine I going to let it shine”. I pray  my light did so shine and was it the necessary spark.