PRAYER AND MY BODY.
I am a ‘new earth’ person. The concept of the coming new creation plays a decisive role in my life. I even wrote an entire novel imagining this situation. Just Google: “Bert Hielema, Day without End.”
However, becoming a New Earth inhabitant is not an automatic matter. And, sorry to say, admission is restricted. There are people who believe in universal salvation, which assumes that everybody will be saved. Some clever folk have calculated that about 70 billion people have been born over the millennia. Today the world really cannot support the near 8 billion of its current customers. They only exist because they (we) are using much of our children’s inheritance, leaving only a ravaged and depleted earth.
Why only a limited number? Jesus’ words come to mind, ““For many are called, but few are chosen.” (Matthew 22: 14.)
Of course, being a sort of Calvinist, I know my Bible and I know my doctrine. Romans 4 tell me that we are saved by grace through faith, but James 2 unambiguously makes it plain that “What good is it if a person claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save?”
And here comes my premise: our saving act starts with our personal living habits, especially since, as I keep on repeating, we live in the last stages of a disappearing world. This past Sunday morning, when my driveway was too icy to go to church, I read this quote:
“Disturbance seems constant now, and everywhere at once. How to describe this time when the world has slipped its moorings? Democracy fragile and cracking, a global pandemic that could well be the first of more to come, a warming world. It feels as if we are living amid a great unraveling, a time when our lives are being stripped and harrowed over and over. Humanity has been kicked out of the nest of the Holocene, where we’ve evolved over the past ten thousand years, and though some say we’ve begun the Anthropocene, I tend to favor E. O. Wilson’s locution: the Eremocene, the Age of Loneliness. In the midst of so much coming apart, I wonder, where is home? Where is our unshakable core, that place beyond which no harm can reach?”
That cry cuts me to the heart: “Day without End”, seems to be God’s greatest secret, the place where REAL life is lived, the life we are intended for. That’s why prayer is both personal and cosmic, constantly involving being in touch with creation, which I see as a form of prayer. Of course, if we think that we go to heaven, then loving the earth is not a priority, however, if we confess that our destination is a renewed earth, then life takes on a different dimension altogether. Then prayer becomes practical, influencing all our actions, because I sincerely believe that this present life is a proving ground for the REAL life in eternity, especially now when Climate Change starts to bite and endangers us all. That’s why our first responsibility is to our own body, God’s personal gift to us, and, according to the Bible, the temple of the Holy Spirit, thus HOLY.
The times, they are a’changing.
A Tale of Two Cities comes to mind, which opens with, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity”. It is plain that ‘Gone is the best of times; gone is the age of wisdom; gone is the epoch of belief’. Left is “it is the worst of times”, evident in climate change; left is “the age of foolishness”, plainly visible in ‘perpetual economic growth’ in a finite world; left is “the epoch of incredulity”, witness the worshiping of Donald Trump.
I read last week a line that stayed with me: “I have two health providers with me all the time: my right leg and my left leg. That’s why I walk every day.
What does ‘pray without ceasing’ mean?
1 Thessalonians 5: 17 tells me that we have to “Pray without ceasing!”. Of course, we have to pray for our loved ones, but prayer is more than a personal matter, prayer is also active, also planet related. Action is prayer as well, because we constantly have to ask ourselves whether this or that act benefits or harms creation: is this car trip really needed? Is that food good or bad? Does this light need to be on? We constantly must ask ourselves whether our actions are good or bad for creation, and beneficial for us. That’s why walking, all exercise is an action akin to prayer, is one of the conditions of gaining eternal life, is, as the Bible Book James claims, ‘to be among the good deeds’ we have to do. “Love your neighbor as YOURself”, is one of the two laws upon which eternal life depends. Of course, the other is “Loving God through his creation”.
Barring unforeseen conditions or impossible obstacles, we are responsible for keeping our bodies healthy and in good shape. For most of us there are no real impediments not to walk, the simplest form of exercise. More body movement, and healthy eating habits, are among the keys to the Kingdom to come. We reflect the divine image. That is no idle talk. Colossians 1: 15 -20 tells us that Jesus Christ is the human image of the invisible God. He, Christ, was the first human being, not Adam or Eve or whoever: He is “The firstborn of all creation!” If the Scriptures are correct, then by Jesus, the Christ, the first-born as a human being, all things – Ta Panta – came into being. No wonder that we human beings are so smart: we have Jesus as our model, whether we believe in him, or not! And we have to imitate him in our entire life, because he taught us how to live, and that to the full. Here is the full Colossians text:
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
For a healthy – Christlike – body, more movement, less bad food – preferably no meat and alcohol (even though Jesus’ first miracle was making water into wine, when wine was the national beverage, not water), because walking, running, any exercise, stimulates blood movement and widens the arteries, preventing clots, and stimulates the brain. Think of body movement as a form of prayer: it enhances our physique and so honors our creator. Also, anything that makes creation more beautiful, whether through art work or gardening, through poetry or prose, through music or dance, is a tribute to the creation, for whose restoration Christ died: John 3: 16!
Yes, I am a ‘new earth’ person. The concept of the coming new creation plays a major role in my life. I even wrote an entire novel imagining this situation. Just Google: “Bert Hielema, Day without End.”