The Stewardship of Our Bodies, part 1

After meeting my wonderful husband-to-be, I was convicted about the stewardship of my body.  By this I mean treating the body I've been given as though it were mine, especially in regards to the sin of gluttony.  America is very decadent and every luxury is at our fingertips.  The waistline of the average American has been getting increasingly wider.  So much so that bus seats, subway seats, hospital wheelchairs and beds, and the like have been modified to contain our expanding derrières and bellies.  

What about the cry during the feminist movement that essentially proclaims, "let's take back ownership of our bodies," with the rise of birth control and abortion.  "It's a woman's right to choose what she should do with her own body," they say.  It's a woman's right to choose unprotected, promiscuous sex and the consequences of pregnancy thereafter.  After all, it's her body.

For believers, we must cry out against this with an emphatic, "NO!"  These two Scriptures are what convicted me most.

All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable.  All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything.  Food is for the stomach and the stomach is for food, but God will do away with both of them.  Yet the body is not for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord is for the body.  Now God has not only raised the Lord, but will also raise us up through His power.  

Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?  Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute?  May it never be!  Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her?  For He says, "THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH."  But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him.  

Flee immorality.  Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.  Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. 

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

This passage is specifically referring to sexual immorality among members of the Body, but note the principles Paul states:

1. The Lord is for the body; the body is not for sinful purposes.
2. As the believer is joined to the Lord, so his/her body is joined to a perfect, holy, righteous Lord Jesus Christ, we are one spirit with Him.
3. Our bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit.  It is where God dwells.  
4. We do not belong to ourselves because Christ purchased us from the power of sin by the blood of His cross!
5. Everything we do with our bodies should glorify and honor the Lord. 

Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 

1 Corinthians 10:31

Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.

Colossians 3:17 

There is no sinful purpose for which I can allow my body to willingly undertake after receiving the conviction of the Holy Spirit, whether that be birth control, gluttony, bodily mutilations like excessive piercings, etc.

This is the second passage in the following chapter that continued to convict me about claiming ownership of my own body.

The husband must fulfill his duty to his wife, and likewise also the wife to her husband.  The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; and likewise also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.

1 Corinthians 7:3-4

So now I understood that as a believing single person, my body belonged to the Lord and as I was about to be married, and now am, my body belongs first to the Lord and second to my husband.  No where have I found that my body belongs to me and me alone, although I am completely responsible for the things I do with and to my body.

Therefore, I could not honor God through my body by eating whatever and however much I wanted.  I was not an overly obese person (I weighed about 185 pounds) and I still exercised about 3 times per week.  Eating the entire bag of Tostitos lime tortilla chips and the entire jar of salsa is not honoring the blood which bought me.  Nor eating any other sweet, salty, cheesy, gooey, chocolatey, crunchy substance without restraint until my stomach told me, "no more" is not God-glorifying either.

After the Holy Spirit convicted with the Truth of God's Word, I began to look at everything differently and realized that I needed to change my eating habits and lose weight for the glory of God, my Father.