Our Bodies for Hope
By Mandy Noa
Jeremiah, in his letter to the captives, advised,
“Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters – that you may be increased there, and not diminished. And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive and pray to the Lord for it; for in its peace you will have peace. (Jeremiah 29: 5-7 NKJV)”
I imagine there was a collective fear and uncertainty experienced here. These humans were exiled from home, from safety. And in these circumstances, our human bodies react. In Bessel Van Der Kolk’s Body Keeps the Score, he writes that we tend toward “feelings of fear and abandonment” compared to “exploration, play and cooperation” in the absence of safety. If we have experienced great pain or stress, our bodies are compromised. Van Der Kolk notes those experiences have “robbed [many] of the imagination to make something better.” Especially now, our bodies may be carrying our experience: sleepy eyes, aching muscles, and fluttering stomachs. Now is a time to turn to our bodies and ask – what do I need?
If you follow the psalmist, you’ll notice the connection between experiences, emotions and the body. In joy, the psalmist’s head is lifted, his eyes enlightened, and he has unshakeable energy: “By God, I can leap over a wall” (Psalm 18:29 NKJV). There is peaceful sleeping, clapping and singing. He basks in the safety of the shadow and shield of God. But in fear, “[the] heart trembles and leaps from its place” (Psalm 37:1 NKJV). Grief brings weakness, troubled bones, stumbling feet, and inability to listen and to eat. The psalmist laments with unending tears, groans, and restlessness. His soul is uneasy. He thirsts. He loses ability to speak and remember, while feeling “adrift among the dead” (Psalm 88:5 NKJV). Perhaps this is your present experience.
Our bodies are vulnerable, especially today. With routines dismantled, there is new opportunity to become better attuned to our bodies. In The Inner Voice of Love, Henri Nouwen proposes that
“In Jesus, God took on human flesh. The spirit of God overshadowed Mary, and in her enmity between spirit and body was overcome. Thus, God’s spirit was united with the human spirit, and the human body became the temple destined to be lifted up into the intimacy of God through Resurrection. Every human body has been given a new hope, of belonging eternally to the God who created it.”
Our bodies spur our imaginations. How we use, adorn and care for them shapes our reality. Our bodies shoulder the dichotomy of being both mortal and sacred. I remember my time spent in a tradition singing songs yearning for a new, divine body. But the congregation used their earthly bodies to translate their spiritual experience in the most profound and beautiful ways. Hands, feet, hips, and mouths pointed toward a reality beyond our own, one only experienced through God’s presence. Our bodies take the sacraments. Our bodies shape our worship. In Desiring the Kingdom, James K. A. Smith notes
“To engage in the worship requires a body – with lungs to sing, knees to kneel, legs to stand, arms to raise, eyes to weep, noses to smell, tongues to taste, ears to hear, hands to hold and raise. Christian worship is not the sort of things that ethereal, disembodied spirits could engage in. Just as immaterial ghosts couldn’t have eaten fish with the disciples on the shore of Galilea neither could immaterial creatures worship so richly. The rhythms and rituals of Christian worship invoke and feed off our embodiment…”
One Sunday, at the cue of the Lord’s Prayer, I wrestled with whether my pajama-ed legs needed to leave the couch and stand. This was no sanctuary. No pulpit, only a screen. But I stood. And I was thankful. Thankful to make a motion away from comfort and thankful for the opportunity to stand in unison with the congregation I could not see. Remember the synchronized hum of corporate prayer:
“Our Father Who Art in Heaven,
Hallowed Be Thy Name…”
Maybe it’s more important now than ever to kneel in prayer, feeling the ground beneath us as reminder of God’s steadfast love. And to bend our backs to dig a garden and believe in tomorrow’s fruits. Maybe we nurture our temples a little more by meditating on how it feels. We notice the rise and fall of our stomachs as God’s breath of life flows within us. Maybe we still need to engage in the rituals of worship to remind us of the echoes of hundreds of people kneeling in a stone sanctuary or the sound of mouths opening to praise Him. Or lift our legs in a unified march for restoration. We are still united as Christ’s body.
In the letter, Jeremiah steers the people toward the unnatural. Move, he says – bear, plant, build and seek. This movement of body is a movement of hope.
