Our Physical Bodies Have Value And Purpose

Feature 1 – July/August 2020 — Grace & Truth Magazine

Our Physical Bodies Have Value And Purpose

Roman Coins
An area of northeast England is famous for the ruins of Hadrian’s Wall, which was built on behalf of the Roman emperor Hadrian in 122-128 AD . During a visit I purchased a reproduction set of Roman coins for a small charge, and they have not been very useful. In fact, I have used them only once, and that was as a visual aid for a Bible study. At the time we were studying Matthew 22:15-22 about the issue of paying taxes to Caesar. However, authentic Roman coins, dug up by archaeologists in their excavations of various Roman settlements, are of great value and make very useful museum exhibits!

“Render To Caesar The Things That Are Caesar’s”
This phrase was the Lord Jesus’ reply to the Pharisees and Herodians who questioned Him about the lawfulness of paying Caesar’s tax (v.21 ESV). The Lord had asked them to show Him the coin used for the tax and to identify the image and superscription on it. These were Caesar’s! The Roman coin, a denarius, certainly had value to the subjects of the empire in those days and served its purpose for trading as well as for tax payments. Yet, the point the Lord made on that occasion was the denarius belonged to Caesar because it bore his image and superscription. Therefore, everyone under his rule was required to give back what was by right his and of value to him.

“Render ... To God The Things That Are God’s”
When the Lord added this phrase to His answer in verse 21, He implied human beings bear God’s image. Therefore everyone must subject himself to Him. It also means that our physical bodies are valuable and purposeful.

God said, when He created Adam, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth” (Gen. 1:26). The Scriptures continue: “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created Him; male and female He created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’ ... Then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” (Gen. 1:27-28, 2:7).

Man was the pinnacle of God’s creation. “You have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas” (Ps. 8:5-8). God valued man as His representative over creation; and man was created for the purpose of bringing glory to God’s name. The psalmist added, “O LORD our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!” (v.9). Therefore, man’s physical body is of great value to God, and it was designed for a special purpose: to bring glory to God, the Creator of everything in our physical universe.

Everyone Is Of Value To God!
In Isaiah, God asserted His rights over the nations. He also declared how He values each individual of redeemed Israel, speaking of “everyone [of Israel] who is called by My name, whom I created for My glory, whom I formed and made” (Isa. 43:7). Their purpose was to bring glory to their Maker. Remarkably, God went on to make a similar statement of the Gentile ruler, Cyrus, and even described his God-given task: “[Cyrus] is My shepherd, and he shall fulfill all My purpose ... to subdue nations ... and to loose the belts of kings ... that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides Me; I am the LORD, and there is no other” (44:28–45:6).1

We Are Of Special Value To God!
In Psalm 139, David confessed that his God – the omnipotent One – was his Maker, who personally made him as an individual. “You formed my inward parts; You knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are Your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. 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” (vv.13-16).

In the phrase “fearfully and wonderfully made,” we realize not only the specialness and complexity of our bodies but also that each person is uniquely made by God. From the words “in Your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me,” we understand God’s special purpose for the exact number of days for our individual lives, from conception to the Lord’s coming or to death! Therefore, like David, we confess, “How precious to me are Your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!” (v.17).2

The Lord’s Body
When the psalmist wrote of God’s book (v.16), he drew our attention to how the Lord Jesus valued His body and to the unique purpose for His incarnation. “When Christ came into the world, He said, ‘Sacrifices and offerings You have not desired, but a body have You prepared3 for Me. ... Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God, as it is written of Me in the scroll of the book.’ ... And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Heb. 10:5,7,10).

In order to be the one complete sacrifice for sin, the Lord’s body was specifically created by the action of the Holy Spirit, who came upon the Virgin Mary (Lk. 1:35). The Lord glorified His Father in His earthly life, which was lived in the power of the Spirit (Acts 10:38). Then He completed God’s will through the offering of His body without spot to God (Heb. 9:14; Jn. 17:4).

Our Physical Bodies
The Lord Jesus said, “My [food] is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to accomplish His work” (4:34). Likewise, we believers should value our bodies as the God-given means of doing His will in our lives. However, in 1 Corinthians 6 there are two additional reasons why we are to glorify God in our bodies. First, our bodies have been bought with a great price, the precious blood of Christ (1 Pet. 1:19). Therefore our bodies have become members of Christ, and they must be used for the Lord (1 Cor. 6:13,15,17,20). Secondly, our bodies have become the temple of the Holy Spirit, whom God has given us, and they belong to Him (vv.19-20).

As a result, 1 Corinthians 6 describes how we must glorify God in our bodies:

• Be righteous in all our actions (vv.1-8),
• Seek first the kingdom of God (vv.9-10; also Mt. 6:33; Rom. 14:17-18),
• Use our Christian liberties properly (1 Cor. 6:11-13, 8:1-13),
• Control our bodily appetites for food, drink and sexual desires (v.13, 7:2-5), and
• Be careful as to where we go and what we do (10:22-11:1).

This list comprehensively covers all areas of our lives on earth – our personal, family, social and church life. Let us pray, like Paul, that Christ will always be honored in our bodies, whether by life or by death (Phil. 1:20).

Practical Issues
Every believer who desires to live for the Lord experiences an inner conflict, which was expressed by the apostle Paul in Romans 7:22-23: “I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in [the] members [of my body] another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.” In Romans 6–7 our bodies are regarded as vessels which are either enslaved to sin or released and yielded to the service of God.

Chapter 6 describes the process by which any believer can transfer their allegiance from whom we may call, “King Sin” to God through three vital steps. Initially, we must recognize we possess a sinful and rebellious nature, the flesh, inherited from Adam (compare 7:14-20 with 5:12). The three steps then follow:

1. Know. We are to know the facts of how Christ, through His death, burial and resurrection, has freed us from the dominion of sin (6:7). These truths are presented in verses 3, 6, 9 and 16 of Romans 6, through the repeated use of the word “know.”
2. Consider. We are to consider ourselves to be actually dead to sin but alive to God in the risen Lord Jesus Christ (v.11).
3. Present. We are to present ourselves to God as being alive towards Him. The members of our bodies then become valuable instruments of righteousness to God (v.13).4

Having decided, based on our appreciation of God’s mercies, to present our bodies as living sacrifices to God, we will then be able to pursue and prove the purpose God has for us in life (12:1-2). Yet, this also involves a constant yielding to His will (6:19) by continually putting to death the flesh through the power of the Holy Spirit (8:13). Our bodies then become fruitful instruments for God as we experience the realities of eternal life (6:22-23)!

The world of sinful mankind is passing away, along with all its evil desires; but whoever does the will of God abides forever (1 Jn. 2:15-17).

ENDNOTES
1. See the book Remembering My Creator Since My Youth by the same author (Crewe, Scripture Truth Publications, August 2014, pp.71-72. Available as paperback or Amazon Kindle eBook, ISBN 978-0901860934.
2. Ibid, pp.96-98.
3. The word “prepared” is translated “framed” in Hebrews 11:3 to describe God’s act in creating the worlds.
4. See also the “armor of light” (Rom.13:12) and “armor of righteousness” (2 Cor. 6:7).

By David Anderson

Follow Him I want to walk with Jesus Christ, All the days I live of this life on earth; To give to Him complete control Of body and of soul.
Follow Him, follow Him, Yield your life to Him— He has conquered death, He is King of Kings; Accept the joy which He gives to those Who yield their lives to Him.—C. Simmonds