Audio Transcript
How do we improve our body shape without getting fixated on body image? That’s a tricky question, and it comes to us today from an anonymous listener, no name given.
“Pastor John, thank you for faithfully teaching God’s word. I want to provide some context for my question. I used to be obsessed with the gym and my appearance, always striving to look better and lift more. I was never satisfied with how I looked and became consumed by it. However, after injuring my knee and taking a break, I realized how much this obsession had controlled me. The injury helped me refocus on treating my body better and moving in ways that support my health, rather than being anxious about my physical appearance. Now I go to the gym about 2–3 times a week with my mom, not to obsess over my looks, but to pursue overall health and wellness.
“My question is, is it sinful to enjoy how I look as I continue this healthy routine? I know it’s good to be healthy, as it gives me more energy and makes me feel better day-to-day, but I don’t want to fall back into obsession or to dishonor God with my focus. I understand he should be first in all things, including my fitness. But if I notice my body changing, is that wrong? If so, how can I turn away from that?”
Well, it’s interesting to me, Tony, that I cannot tell from this question whether this is a man or a woman (and that’s probably a good thing, since I can easily imagine it being either; I really can). So, he or she asks, and here’s the question: “My question is, is it sinful to enjoy how I look as I continue this healthy routine? If I notice my body changing [and presumably in a good way], is that wrong? If so, how can I turn away from that?”
What’s the Issue?
It is significant, I think, that even the world — the God-ignoring, self-exalting world — knows there’s a problem with the wrong kind of love for one’s self and one’s appearance. And we know that the world feels that way because it has created the word narcissism. Here’s the Google definition: “Narcissism is a personality trait characterized by an excessive preoccupation with one’s self, a grand sense of self-importance, a lack of empathy for others, and a need for excessive admiration.” That would include, I think, admiration or preoccupation with one’s body, one’s physical appearance.
“Let’s be more concerned about the health and beauty and attractiveness of our personhood than of our body.”
Now, I’m not saying that this person who asked this question is a narcissist. Not at all. I’m not saying that. What I’m saying is that this is the sort of issue that is very hard to put in a positive light, even among people of the world. What I mean is this: Even if someone said all the right things biblically, experientially, spiritually, in an article titled, “Why I Notice My Body and Like the Way It Looks,” that article is going to sound to almost everybody like there’s something off. Why are you writing an article titled “Why I Notice My Body and Like the Way It Looks”? Why are you writing that? There’s something off.
I think the reason is that the mindset and the intuitions concerning one’s own physical appearance should be an echo of the Scripture, rather than something the Scripture deals with as a direct shout into the valley. So, when you treat an echo as part of the original shout, it starts to sound weird or awkward. Okay, so that’s my take on Why is it so hard to talk about this?
Presence, Not Appearance
What should I say? I think it might be helpful to suggest that there may be a better way to talk about our appearance that doesn’t involve saying, “I enjoy how I look,” or “Is it okay to notice how I look?” Even though both of those sentences might be totally innocent in general, that way of talking is going to go hand in hand with a perception — maybe not a reality, but a perception — that this person is a little excessively concerned about personal appearance, even if that’s not true. So, here are a few suggestions.
Make it your aim (in how you dress and speak and act in public) to be present as a person, interested in others, rather than present as an appearance, concerned about how you are seen. Let’s be more concerned about the health and beauty and attractiveness of our personhood than of our body. That’s the overwhelming emphasis of the Bible.
Second, let’s seek to dress and act and speak in public in a way that puts no stumbling block in another person’s way concerning Christ or the gospel or the church. And that would imply that immodesty should be avoided — that is, anything that would communicate, “Please look at my skin; please look at my shape.” There are clothes that say, loud and clear, “Look at me, and look at me sexually.”
This aim of not being a stumbling block would also imply avoiding slovenliness or being unclean or unkempt where people expect us to be neat and clean. It would imply avoiding styles that — either because they’re avant-garde or old-fashioned — stand out and get praise or criticism. We simply do not want our physical appearance to be the issue, whether stylish or frumpy. We just don’t want to stick out as Whoa, how stylish or Whoa, how weird and frumpy. We want what we say, what we do, what we think, what we feel, how we treat people, to be the main effect of our presence — not the way we look. There’s a way to dress and there’s a way of fitness that says that or says the opposite.
Good Feminine Beauty
It’s pretty obvious today, I think, that from the president of the United States to the news anchor to the movie star, men care as much about their hair and their complexion and their shape as women do. But I do think that history and experience and Scripture all suggest that God (in a natural and good way) has put it in the feminine psyche to want to appear beautiful or pleasing to the eye. Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Esther — all of them are described as beautiful women in a good way, with no criticism (Genesis 12:11; 24:16; 29:17; Esther 2:7).
“Beauty is good, and it should go hand in hand with discretion and wisdom and modesty and character.”
My wife showed me this early on in our marriage — 55 years ago, in the first year: Women regularly comment on each other’s appearance far more than men do. She said, “You do know, don’t you, that most women dress for women, not for men?” I said, “No, I did not know that.” So, I don’t want to say that this God-given aspect of being feminine has to be vain or seductive. It doesn’t. I have seen too many godly, modest women dress very attractively. And by attractive, I do not mean attractive to the lustful eye but to an eye that rejoices in the beauty of modest stylishness, appropriate to the occasion.
This is what mothers should be teaching their daughters (Titus 2:3–5). Oh, please — this is what mothers should be teaching their daughters, because if they don’t, the world will convince the daughters there’s only one way to be attractive: namely, the way the world does it, which is not true.
Beauty of Character
When Proverbs 11:22 says, “Like a gold ring in a pig’s snout is a beautiful woman without discretion,” the implication is that a gold ring is a good thing. It doesn’t belong in a pig’s snout. In other words, a woman’s beauty is good, and it should go hand in hand with discretion and wisdom and modesty and the beauty of character and heart and faith (1 Peter 3:3–4).
So, if I were to make up my own proverb about the average woman — and we have to admit it: Most of us are average, right? That’s what average means. Most people are not beautiful; most people are not handsome. We’re just average. So, how do you make up a proverb for the average woman? I would say that it would go something like this: A wooden ring in a setting of brass and gold is like a woman of average appearance with a character of strength and beauty. I like that. (I know a lot of people have wooden wedding rings.)
If that’s who you are, or you’re the corresponding man, be thankful. Do your exercises, eat right, dress simply, and then forget about yourself in the service of others for Jesus’s sake.
