The Rev. Carol S. Wedell
January 18, 1009

(Walk around the room and say to various people:  You're beautiful!")

How did it feel to be told you were beautiful -in public - and not by a spouse or parent?  Did you believe that I meant it?  Do you think it's true?  Did you feel left out or even unattractive if I didn't walk up to you?  Are you able to claim your beauty? What if I were to tell you that you are not only beautiful, but that your body is sacred?  Sacred!  Would you believe me?

After Mark and I had been dating for a while I asked him, "Which part of your body are you unhappy with?"  He just sat there.  "What do you mean?" he asked.  "Oh you know, your height or your legs or your hair or whatever.  Everyone has something they don't like about their body!"  At least that was my assumption.  I don't remember a time in my life when I couldn't name several things that I would change if I could.  Nearly twenty years ago, Mark truthfully couldn't name anything about his body which made him unhappy.

I have to tell you, I think he is the exception.  I won't ask for hands, but I know that this isn't just a female issue.  Height, weight (too heavy, too thin), hair or not, skin - you name it.   As a culture, we are obsessed with appearance. "We live in a society where teenage girls in great numbers succumb to bulimia and anorexia, or where they engage in the practice of "cutting" their bodies to relieve stress.  We live in a society where young male athletes (and sometimes older ones as well) feel the pressure to use steroids to make their bodies temporarily stronger, with terrible long-term side effects....We are bombarded by products promising to get rid of wrinkles and gray hair and make everyone look young." (Rochelle Stackhouse, LectionAid, Vol.17. No. 1, p. 33-34).  Mary Pipher, therapist and author of Reviving Ophelia writes, "I've yet to meet one girl who likes her body."

To a greater or lesser extent most of us succumb to the notion that we aren't already beautiful - that we need to do something to make our bodies acceptable to the world around us and even to ourselves.  In every media outlet we are told that we need to get into shape, be tanned, and have the "right" clothes. Our body has to be beautiful, powerful, and youthful - at the very least. If it does not function properly, there are pills to help it along, or parts are replaced.

We can say that true beauty is not external, that it is what's on the inside that counts, but listen to the synonyms that are listed for beautiful:  attractive, good-looking, gorgeous, handsome, lovely, pretty, dashing, stunning.  These don't exactly sound like personality traits!

In the 1960's, the phrase "Black is Beautiful" became popular among African-Americans, who hoped to dispel the widespread notion in western cultures that black people's natural features such as skin color, facial features and hair were inherently ugly.  Because the notion that white features were inherently more beautiful than black features was so instilled within our culture, it even manifested itself within the black community such that folks would straighten their hair or even bleach their skin to be more attractive.  Being lighter skinned or having straighter hair was preferable. 

According to figures compiled by the Essence market research team, (Essence being a style and beauty magazine for African American women), African Americans spend 25 percent more of their disposable income on personal care products than the general population.  And natural hair styles are still considered "somewhat rebellious" or "unkempt" in parts of the United States. (Wikipedia, Black is Beautiful).

But listen to what the psalmist says, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made"- which applies to all people.  And Paul makes an even stronger statement, "do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God"?  Wow. We may feel that our bodies are more like cracked pots. We see too many imperfections to see ourselves as temples!  But Paul will have none of it.  Our bodies are temples - not mere houses, but temples, beautiful spaces created for worship and service.  What does that mean?

Well, for starters it goes completely against the grain of the culture in which we live.  But let's step back for a minute and look at the context in which Paul wrote this.  Paul wrote two letters to the church at Corinth, and of all his writings, these are the two most tied to the specific situations he was addressing.  Paul was writing to the Corinthians who thought it didn't matter what they did with their bodies.  Working from that assumption they believed that any type of sexual behavior was OK.  If it was just their body and not their spirit that was involved, what difference did it make?  While I have am not planning on getting into sermon about appropriate behavior in the sexual realm, Paul's argument goes much further than that.

Paul is clear.  Belonging to Christ includes the body as well as the spirit.  Unlike the Greeks, Paul understood that we were whole people; that body, mind and spirit all go together.  We're finally beginning to understand this in the health fields -all aspects of a person actually need to be considered. 

Paul placed value on the body.  The body is important because it reflects the health of our souls.  The radical statement that Christians bring to the world is that bodies matter -- we can't somehow separate our bodies from our mind or our spirit.  Our bodies are not terrible prisons to be escaped as the Gnostics believed, but sanctified temples where God has chosen to dwell.  If we believe that - that God's Spirit dwells in each of us, how can we be anything except beautiful?

Tomorrow we will celebrate the life of Martin Luther King, Jr. who understood that concept well.  He also understood that if it is true for me, then it's true for you - no matter your skin color or anything else. Racism says that the spirit cannot dwell in bodies of a particular race or color, that some bodies could never be the temple of God's Spirit. Martin Luther King challenged that assumption, and acted on the belief that all people were to be treated with honor and respect - including their bodies! In his Nobel acceptance speech in 1965 he said, "I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits."  Body, mind, spirit - all together.

Some of us may have physical bodies that win beauty contests; most of us won't.   But as one of my high school friends said a couple of years ago, "You know, I always thought that there really were people who had perfect hair, skin, bodies, etc...Then one day I sat in the airport and watched a group of people getting off the plane.  And do you know what I realized?  They were all average looking, just like me."

Part of the difficulty that some of us have believing Paul's message is another message that parts of the Christian Church have passed down. Throughout the centuries portions of Christianity have taught or implied that the body was "dirty" and to be "controlled." Too often the church has, at best, been squeamish or embarrassed about the body.

For those of us brought up with healthy doses of modesty and guilt it's easy to think of the body in such a way.   Many of us carry around negative images of our body that began long ago in our childhood, that we have not been able to shake. It's hard to see yourself as beautiful - inside and out-when you've heard a different message for too long.

I think the larger issue for most of us is compartmentalizing the different aspects of ourselves - and the body is the first to be disconnected.  The most recent edition of Horizons, the magazine published by Presbyterian Women is entitled Sound Mind and Body.  One article quotes a young woman's response to a recent survey.  She says, "I love the Presbyterian Church because I finally found a community where I don't have to check my brain at the door....but now I realize it's my body that is not welcome...why can't church engage all of me?"

When Paul tells the Corinthians that their bodies are Temples - housing the Spirit of God within them, he is acknowledging that we are whole people.  The interconnectedness between our body, mind and spirit make it difficult to speak about one aspect of ourselves without acknowledging the impact of the others on who we are and what makes us whole and healthy.

So if we really are temples that carry the very Spirit of God, what does that mean for how we act - what we do and where we go?  To be sure, it means that we honor and respect our bodies.   Most of us know the list that our doctors or other health practitioners would give us:  exercise, eat right, don't smoke. There is no question these things are good for our bodies.  The problem is that when we disconnect the body from the mind and spirit, we are still doing these "healthy" things to make ourselves look better, to be more attractive, to look younger, to meet the standards of our culture.

Paul is adamant.  If we are to honor our bodies and treat them as Temples of the Holy Spirit, we will do many of those same things.  But the purpose of taking care of our body is entirely tied to our Spirit.  We want our body to be strong and healthy so that we -body, mind and spirit - will be more able to worship God and serve others more fully. They all go together.  Paul reminded the Corinthians of this 2000 years ago and the reminder is every bit as relevant today.  Our firm commitment to physical, mental and spiritual wholeness requires a lot of effort.  But can we doubt that it is worth it?

As Christians, we believe in a world where bread and wine may be something more than just sustenance for the body. In this sort of world, what we do with our bodies, what we mean by what we do, is of no small import.  If we are Temples of the Holy Spirit, then where we go, God goes.  What we do, God does. People followed Martin Luther King, because he embodied in word and action the faith.  He spoke eloquently, prayed fervently, and quite literally put his body on the line.

Can you claim your beauty?  If we are still caught back in trying to measure up or fit in, or meet some kind of illusive cultural standard, which is based simply on externals, then few if any of us will be able to say with confidence, "I'm beautiful!" 

But if you and I can remember (and remind each other) that we carry God's Spirit within us, then our bodies become instruments that can be used to serve as Jesus did.  How could we not acknowledge our beauty, and the beauty of every person we meet?

"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you were bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body."