Body Image

Stop for a minute and think about your bodies…Look at yourself and then think about what thoughts came into your head? Are they critical? Are they negative? Are they prideful?

King David stopped and thought about his body and wrote Psalm 139. In verses 13-16 he says,

Psalm 139:13-16
13 For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them. (ESV)

David thinks about his body and acknowledges that GOD created him in his mother’s womb. But what does this mean for us? The truth is that God, the creator of the heavens and the earth, knew each one of us and loved us before we were even born. He personally shaped our personalities and our bodies! God created each one of us, giving us the specific hair color, body type, nose shape and eye color that HE wanted to give us. This truth touched David’s heart and caused him to stop and praise God declaring, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works, my soul knows it very well.”

These verses are very convicting for me and probably for many of you. I doubt there are many women reading this that look at their bodies and begin praising God. We usually switch back and forth between two extremes. Some of us look at ourselves and despise our bodies and desire a different frame. We dwell on everything we dislike and dream about how we would look or feel if we had a new and improved body.
OR, we move over to the other side of the spectrum when, on occasion, we actually approve of our bodies for a moment and then we are given over to vanity and pride. We see someone heavier or older or “less attractive” and we compare ourselves and think, “well, at least I don’t look like that!”

Neither of these attitudes give glory to God as our creator. David’s example teaches us to give glory and thanks to God, who carefully and lovingly made us. This truth changes everything! This is our identity: We are children of God in the bodies that he has given us to use as instruments of worship.

So my question for all of us is this:
“What would it look like in our lives if we remembered, as David did, that God knit us together?”
Would it change our thinking about our bodies? Would this truth change the way we take care of our bodies?
My prayer for myself and for all of you is that we will begin to have our thinking transformed. That God would show us through these verses that He lovingly gave us our bodies to use to worship and praise Him. That by God’s Word our minds would be renewed so that we will believe the truth that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. And then rise up like David and praise God for the bodies that He created for us!