Treat Your Body As Though It Belongs To God
The way you take care of your body is vital to your true success. However, some people, who are devoted to God in every other part of their life, believe their body is their own private domain and they can do whatever they want with it. But God doesn’t see it that way.
God created your body, soul, mind, and spirit. When you receive Jesus, you are filled with the Holy Spirit. He lives in you, enabling you to fulfill your purpose. Your body is His temple, and God expects you to take care of it in honor of Him. “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17).
Your body is holy because God’s Holy Spirit dwells in you. And God will destroy anyone who destroys His temple. This is serious business.
God also says, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hosea 4:6). I believe we are often sick and dying because we are ignorant of proper body care. Our lifestyle choices and habits take us far away from the life of health and rejuvenation God created us to have.
We suffer in our physical body because we do not live God’s way. We must learn how to take care of our body in order to enjoy the life of purpose God has for us.
Jesus came as our Healer because He knew we would need healing.
We can’t always do everything right and our body often breaks down, but that doesn’t mean we should abdicate our responsibility to take care of our own body.
If you have never been taught God’s way to care for your body, a number of excellent books are available on the subject. Find several of them and learn about a healthy lifestyle that works for you. You must take steps to educate yourself on this. You cannot do nothing and expect to live in good health.
There are many people who know the right way to care for their body but choose not to do it. They treat their body badly and care little about what God wants. This is a destructive path, guaranteed to fail because of flagrant disregard for God’s ways. We can’t keep poisoning ourselves and expecting God to give us the antidote. It doesn’t work that way.
What You Can Do To Take Care Of God’s Temple
Here are some simple yet practical things you can do to be a good steward over the body God gave you.
Think of Your Body as the Foundation of Your Life and Ministry
Present your body to the Lord as a living sacrifice and ask Him to help you care for it in a way that is pleasing to Him. Sickness takes away from your life and the purposes God has for you. If you treat it right, your body was created to be self-repairing. You cannot serve the Lord on earth without it.
Ask God to Show You Where You Need to Have Balance
The Bible says, “The man who fears the Lord will avoid all [extremes]” (Ecclesiastes 7:18 NIV) . Do you work too hard and don’t get enough rest? Do you put food in your body that you know is bad for you? Do you not get enough fresh air and sunshine for eleven
months and three weeks of the year, and then bake in the sun for a week until you are overcooked? Do you drink a lot of chemical – filled, sugary soft drinks and very little water? Do you live life in the fast lane and don’t take time to pray every day? Do you have time for the television but not for the Bible? Do you refuse to exercise because you think you are one of the few who can get away with it? Do you allow yourself to be overweight without considering the consequences? Do you seldom fast and pray in order to break these bad habits?
If you said yes to any of these questions above, ask God to break down the strongholds of bad body care habits you are struggling with. He will do that. You don’t have to face this seemingly overwhelming task alone. God will help you, guide you, and sustain you in the process.
Ask God to Show You if Stress Is Affecting You Negatively
Pray that God will help you to eliminate or handle the stress in your life. Ask Him to enable you to “be content whatever the circumstances” (Philippians 4:11 NIV). Remember that only God is perfect and can make things perfect. We can only do what we can do, and then we have to let it go at that. Don’t let stress bring you to the point of depletion and exhaustion.
Eat Right and Fortify Your Body
You can do a lot to keep yourself healthy by watching what you eat. If you eat badly, your body will break down. God has given us guidelines and foods for good health, and He expects us to be responsible with our eating. Chronic pain and debilitating sickness are not God’s will for your life. Ask Him to show you what you can do to make changes in your eating habits that will promote healing. Present your body to the Lord and ask Him to lead you to the right people to help you (Romans 12:1).
Find the Rest God Has for You
If you are not resting, you are not obeying God. In fact, one of the reasons we don’t sleep well at night is because we are not living His way during the day. He gives us rest when we live His way. Deep, restful sleep is extremely important if you want to have good health. When you are at peace in your life, and you eat good health-filled foods, get proper exercise, drink plenty of pure water, and fast and pray periodically, you will find that sleep comes naturally.
If you are the other extreme and have to sleep all the time, then something is out of balance in your body. God gives us a time to sleep and a time to be awake and active. A body that is healthy does not become confused about this. Also, if you work too hard and can’t sleep at night, then some changes need to be made. The Bible says, “It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows; for so He gives His beloved sleep” (Psalm 127:2). When you are asleep, your body cleanses itself and rebuilds and repairs. Don’t shortchange the time it needs to do that well.
Get Regular Exercise
We don’t feel well when there are toxins in the body. One of the greatest advantages of exercise is that it frees the body of toxins. A lack of exercise can be the cause of lack of sleep at night. A lack of sleep doesn’t give the body time to cleanse and repair itself. We have to use the body God gave us in order to stay healthy. When it doesn’t have enough activity, the cleansing and building process cannot happen fully. When it comes to exercise, don’t do nothing.
Observe the Sabbath Day of Rest God Commanded Us to Take
If God took a day of rest for Himself, and He said that we should as well, I think we should trust Him on that (Exodus 20:8-10). Take that day once a week and don’t work, don’t worry about your bills, or think about what needs cleaning or fixing, or be consumed with all
the obligations you have to fulfill. Spend that day with the Lord so He can refresh you. Spend time at church or with your family, take a nap, or eat a meal with friends. Take a break from your daily schedule and spend time doing what you enjoy. Whatever you do, include God in it. The Sabbath day is a reward for your body, mind, soul, and spirit.
Thank God for the Gift of Your Body
Don’t criticize your body for what it won’t do, can’t do, or doesn’t want to do, but instead thank God for what it can do. Thank God that you can see, hear, talk, move, walk, or whatever it is you are able to do.
Give up the attitude that says, “This is my body and I’ll do what I want with it.” The truth is, you were bought by the suffering and blood of Jesus. You are a clay pot that God has filled with His Spirit and uses for His glory. “We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us” (2 Corinthians 4:7). Be grateful your body can be used for the glory of God and cooperate in keeping it well.
What God Can Do To Help You Care For Your Body
Here are some things God can do to help you be a good steward over the body He gave you.
God Can Answer Prayer
Jesus said that whatever we ask in His name He will do for us (John 14:13). Don’t try to care for your body without His help. Pray about every aspect of it. Ask Him to show you what to do and enable you to do it. Ask God to help you stay well.
God Can Do Miracles
Jesus is your Healer. And He will do miracles of healing in response to your prayers. But that doesn’t give you permission to not care for your body. (More about this in chapter 21, “Trust in Your Healer.”)
God Can Give You A Heart Of Peace
Your peace comes from God, and you should seek Him for it. Peace is healing and rejuvenating, and it will greatly affect your health. “A heart at peace gives life to the body” (Proverbs 14:30 NIV). Ask God to help you learn to live in His peace.
God Can Bless You When You Walk His Way
As you take steps of obedience with regard to body care, God will bless the steps you take. “Blessed are all who fear the Lord, who walk in his ways. You will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours” (Psalm 128:1-2 NIV). A big part of prosperity is enjoying good health.
When you ask God to help you properly care for your body, He will open your eyes to anything you might have been doing wrong. “The Lord gives sight to the blind” (Psalm 146:8 NIV). He will show you the steps to take. Serve Him by doing what He says.
Always remember that your body is the Lord’s. Have respect for it out of respect for Him. Love your body because you love Him who created you.
Prayer Power
Lord, I commit my body to You as the temple of Your Holy Spirit. Teach me how to care for it properly. Show me how I should eat and what I should avoid. Take away all desire for food that is harmful to me. Give me balance and wisdom. Help me to purify myself from everything that contaminates my body and spirit out of reverence for You (2 Corinthians 7:1).
Enable me to live Your way so that I can dwell in the peace You have for me. Show me where I allow unnecessary stress to rule in my life, and help me to take steps to alleviate it. Teach me to simplify my life so that I can live better and healthier. Enable me to rest at night, as You created me to do. Make my heart to be at peace so that my body is rejuvenated” (Proverbs 14:30 NIV).
I pray You would enable me to “make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts” (Romans 13:14). Help me to exercise as I should so that my body stays cleansed, active, and strong. Where I have long-entrenched bad habits when it comes to proper care for my body, I ask You to reveal them all to me and enable me to take the necessary steps to get free.
Help me to love and appreciate my body and not be critical of it. Enable me to choose life (Deuteronomy 30:19). Even though my flesh and heart may fail, You are the strength of my heart forever (Psalm 73:26). Enable me to go from “strength to strength” (Psalm 84:7).
In Jesus’ name I pray.
Word Power
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.
Romans 12:1 NIV
I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Psalm 139:14
Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
1 Corinthians 10:31 NIV
He will die for lack of discipline, led astray by his own great folly.
Proverbs 5:23 NIV
There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.
Proverbs 16:25 NIV
