Most days when I get out of bed I have to move a little slower. You know the feeling – getting the kinks out and stretching the stiffness out of my back and legs. Oh, and then there’s my hips. Sigh. But once I get moving I’m pretty good-to-go.
My massage therapist says I have a lot of scar tissue in my back and hips from battering and abusing my body over the years in various sports. Truth be told, I’m secretly pretty proud of that. Kind of a trophy of my glory days. Oh brother…I’m so full of myself. Old glories hold no hope for me anymore.
Hope begins where your resources stop. In other words…when my body starts breaking down (my resources) then I start putting hope in things that hold more value. If you started hoping before your resources started tapering off…then I’m proud of you. But for those who need poverty to realize their wealth, I think that’s why God allows us to age. There are outward changes going on in my body – but inwardly I feel like I’m as young as I was when I was 18. And a lot wiser. I may be deteriorating on the outside but my innards’ are growing and changing and getting stronger and better with each day.
So this concept of our bodies getting achy and breaking is captured in scripture:
“For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.” ~ II Cor. 5:1-4
The cool news is that like the TV show House Crashers, God sneaks up on us and out of nowhere (and not usually at Home Depot) He promises to come home with us and crash our bodies. And he’s a master craftsman and is gonna finish the job well and our curb appeal – what others see in us – will be the best version of what we could ever be here on earth. I’ve chosen to believe the promise that this ol’ bod will someday be “crashed” and changed into the reality of something also promised:
“Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will give us later. For all creation is waiting patiently and hopefully for that future day when God will resurrect his children. For on that day thorns and thistles, sin, death, and decay (and cancer, and scar tissue, and hate, and hurt, and broken relationships…Kris’ additions) – the things that overcame the world against its will will all disappear, and the world around us will share in the glorious freedom from sin which God’s children enjoy. For we know that even the things of nature, like animals and plants, suffer in sickness and death as they await this great event. And even we Christians, although we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, also groan to be released from pain and suffering. We, too, wait anxiously for that day when God will give us our full rights as his children, including the new bodies he has promised us—bodies that will never be sick again and will never die. We are saved by trusting. And trusting means looking forward to getting something we don’t yet have—for a man who already has something doesn’t need to hope and trust that he will get it.” ~ Romans 8:18-24
So where grace shows up is in the newness of something getting old. A new creation. A new opportunity to be a better version of the old. Personally, I can’t wait to be “crashed”! I’m just hoping its not at Home Depot, cuz that could be awkward.
The Grace That Shapes My Life 