When we consider strength, why would the talent of strength be important?
Picture this: You have given one of your friends a rare and costly plant as a gift. With it, you have provided instructions on how best to take care of the plant. Your friend assures you that this gift means a lot; and yet, when you see him, he neglects the plant, does not water it and keeps it in the dark. Eventually the plant mostly withers away. Startled, your friend comes to you, begging you to help him fix the plant, maybe give him a new one. He wonders how this could have happened to the plant.
Does that story not sound ridiculous? And yet a lot of us are doing exactly the same thing with our gift, our health.
“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” 1 Corinthians 6:19
This verse, which we all know very well, reminds us that our bodies are a temple. And not only that, but also that our bodies do not belong to us. Our health and our bodies are ours only as long as the Lord sees fit. And if we choose to disregard our health, are we really making the best use of the gift God has given us? If we choose to ignore a proper diet and exercise are we not completely disregarding the gift God has given us? Do you know that a lot of the Bible characters actually exercised a lot? I will name a few:
Abraham: All the walking he had to do when God asked him to move.
David: Fleeing from Saul. Living in the mountains.
Paul: All the walking he had to do during his mission trips.
I will focus now on the life of the Apostle Paul. Stanford University developed a site that allows you to calculate the time and cost required to travel by road or ship around the Roman world in A.D. 200. It takes into account a lot of factors like ancient sea routes, based on historical sources and wave height.
The apostle Paul went on three missionary journeys from A.D. 46 to 57, travelling around much of Asia Minor and Greece. In A.D. 60 he was also taken to Rome. This site allows you to calculate how long these journeys would have taken in pure travel time (excluding time spent at each destination).
First Journey: 1,581 miles. 53 travel days.
Second Journey: 3,050 miles. 100 travel days.
Third Journey: 3,307 miles. 92 travel days.
Rome: 2,344 miles. 36 travel days.
Now, these are just the travels he did by boat. We know from the scriptures that he did a lot of walking as well. Do you think that Paul would have been able to complete all these trips and do all that walking had he not been in good health? And the same goes for us, how can we be expected to glorify God and do the work He has given us if we are not healthy?
“Strength is a talent and to be used to glorify God. Our bodies belong to Him. He has paid the price of redemption for the body as well as for the soul. . . . We can serve God better in the vigour of health than in the palsy of disease; therefore we should cooperate with God in the care of our bodies. Love for God is essential for life and health. Faith in God is essential for health. In order to have perfect health, our hearts must be filled with love and hope and joy in the Lord.” –Christian Service, p. 115
It is my wish and prayer that we realize how great a gift our health is and that we do our best to take care of it. Amen.
Nidia Romero