Body Image

by Jeffrey W. Hamilton

I never mentioned this, but the day after you left -- when you declared that life was just a game and that it didn't matter to you if you lost -- I was at a used bookstore and saw a small book titled "If Life is a Game, These are the Rules." It was too ironic not to pick it up.

I don't agree with all the ideas given. But some truths were being presented. The very first rule is that you get a body that is yours for your duration on the earth. You only get one. There are no exchanges, no replacements.

It is sad when people can't accept what they have. It would be a perfect body, if I just was thinner, more muscular, had straight hair, had darker hair, had a smaller nose, etc. It is even sadder when people abuse the only body they were given.

The Lord granted you a good, strong, healthy body. He gave you a tender and loving spirit. In many ways, you are like your dad was when he was your age. It grieves me that he wrecked the gift God gave him. I feel sorry for you that you are intent on repeating his mistake.

What is being forgotten is that what you have is only a loan. When you harm yourself both in body and spirit with drugs and other sins, you are destroying someone else's property -- property that you were loaned to make use of for the owner's glory. "For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's" (I Corinthians 6:20).

I wonder at all the good your dad could have done and could still be doing if he didn't wreck God's loan to him. I know he struggles hard to do something with the broken pieces that are left, but I pity the man who might have been and I feel the same about you, my friend, as I watch you ruin your body and spirit. And all for what?