Questions, Topics, and Answers With Miangeni Academy (Part 5)

“Is it true that our bodies are wonderfully made?”

Today, we live in a world that causes people to look at themselves and hate what they see.  Our internet, media, and advertisement companies with billboard signs always show us what they think people should look like.  The smooth skin, the perfect hair, the skinny model, or the handsome hunk of man with big muscles.  The truth is God made each one how we are – different!  We were not all meant to look a specific way.  But our societies would have us buy into this idea, and it negatively impacts our young people everywhere.  The message that there is a perfect look to aspire to is causing eating disorders in young women and mental health issues in general among young people.  Striving for the ideal look is exhausting and not what God intends for us to focus on.  God wants us to love who we are and how He made us.  The question for our topic is, ” Is it true that our bodies are wonderfully made?”  Let’s see what the Bible says to us on this topic.

Psalms 139:13-15

“13 For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb.

14 I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.

15 My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.”

Based upon the scripture in Psalms 139: 14, I would say the answer to the question is yes!  Not just your bodies though, but the whole you!  Meaning your body and your very essence as well is God’s creation.  Your essence is that part that makes you, who you are, or what we might say is your spirit or your soul.  We are each one fearfully and wonderfully made!  So we should try hard not to call ourselves names like fat or dummy, and we shouldn’t call other people names either.  When we put ourselves down or put others down, we talk bad about God’s creation.  God made each one of you just the way you are, and He loves each one of you!  God loves you so much He has many thoughts of you.  Let’s look at this next verse in Psalms.

Psalms 139:17-18

^“17 How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!

¹⁸ If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.”

God’s many thoughts of you add up to be more than the sands in the ocean.   Do you know how many grains of sand are in one pinch?  Too many to count them all.  What about God’s thoughts toward us?  Do we know what they are?  Let’s read the following verse in Jerimiah.

Jerimiah 29:11

“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.”

God’s thoughts for us are of peace, not evil, and He knows what He wants to accomplish with our lives.  Even people who might have a disability or something physically different about them.  If you are a young person with a disability or a physical anomaly, don’t let this discourage you.  God loves you as the apple of His eye or the center of His affection, and you are unique and special in his sight.

Dueteronomy 32:9-11

⁹ For the Lord‘s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.

¹⁰ He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.

¹¹ As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings:

If God kept Jacob as the apple of His eye, God wouldn’t do any less for any of us, no matter who we are or what we look like.  Remember Jesus healed the blind man and helped the man who couldn’t walk to walk again?  He saw these men with unique characteristics as worthy of His attention when everyone else rejected them.  People were mean and judgemental towards these men.  They equated the disability of these kind men as punishment for sin in their parents’ lives, but Jesus had only compassion for these situations.  He touched them when no else would, and He heard their voices when they cried out and sent healing at their pleading.  Jesus wanted people to see that these souls were precious too.  They were no different than the others in His eyes.  Let’s consider Bartimaeus’s story.

Mark 10:47

^“46 And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging.

⁴⁷ And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.

⁴⁸ And many charged him that he should hold his peace: but he cried the more a great deal, Thou son of David, have mercy on me.

⁴⁹ And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be called. And they call the blind man, saying unto him, Be of good comfort, rise; he calleth thee.

⁵⁰ And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus.

⁵¹ And Jesus answered and said unto him, What wilt thou that I should do unto thee? The blind man said unto him, Lord, that I might receive my sight.

⁵² And Jesus said unto him, Go thy way; thy faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he received his sight, and followed Jesus in the way.”

In closing, God may not take your disability or physical difference away, but that is ok.  If God allows it to remain, it doesn’t mean you are not whole.  You are still fearfully and wonderfully made, and that part of you that you feel is not so perfect; that is what makes you unique and special.  Remember, God’s goal is to heal our hearts and not necessarily to take away our uniqueness.  But He is faithful and gives us grace for that uniqueness, so our lights can shine brightly for Him.

SBT