More Self-Help?

“It is the Spirit that gives life. The body is of no value for that. But the things I have told you are from the Spirit, so they give life.” John 6:63

There is no end to self-help aids. I can develop a muscled physique with one method, with another, I can eat like cave men. I can order books to enrich my marriage, to cure my neuroses, or have eye-popping sex. I can learn to talk to dogs, translate birdsongs to English, and create the most manicured garden in my neighborhood. Pay your subscription to Self-Help Magazine, read and take its articles seriously, and you will end up having the life you always dreamed of. You will have shapely calves, a full head of hair, close nearly every sale and buy houses for pennies on the dollar.

Before sounding too cynical, I suppose I should note that not every self-help suggestion is a scam or unhealthy. But I do wonder if they are wrongly focused. Even the Apostle Paul suggested that physical exercise contributes “somewhat” to a healthy life. But he adds that true contentment must take a longer view than merely what happens in this physical body. Because the Christian understands that our “self” lives beyond the life our fleshly abode, too much focus on “getting it all” may cause us to miss something of greater value.

Jesus made an outrageous statement, if He was merely another spiritual guru. He tells us that His words bring life. As I understand it, the original Greek would be something like this: “It is My words, and My words only, that give life.” It is as if He italicized “My”.

In a single verse, Jesus equates His words with the Holy Spirit and He tells us that they both give life. The “flesh” or the “body” do not count for anything. It is not as if He is saying we should ignore our bodies; but think about it. If Jesus is indeed the Son of God, and is God Himself living in human form, it makes sense for Him to say “the body counts for nothing.”

Our body, if we are a first-world person, have good DNA, have a good diet and stay active, may live into our 90s. But none of that is guaranteed. Even if we were to avoid every possibility of accidental death, these bodies can give out within months of a diagnosis of cancer. Even if the body lasts nine or 10 decades, in can be hindered by accidents or disease as well.

My own brother-in-law James hasn’t has suffered from paranoid schizophrenia for nearly 35 years now. At the age of 60 he has little comprehension of what we would call the “real world”. He hears voices, is wary of any strangers, and trusts hardly anyone besides his sister, my wife. We have been blessed to have professionals and a handful of others who have been willing to enter into his life as far as he will allow.

While in prayer the other day I found myself weeping for James. I have my own mental battle with depression, but I can still experience and deal with daily life. His life is a world created by misfiring neurons in his brain. I didn’t despair over his “salvation” so much as I thought how little meaning his life must seem to have. From the Christian view, every life has meaning; all have been created in the image of God. Yet, measured by experience or productivity, some lives, on the physical level, can bring us nearly to despair.

I have been thinking about world poverty a lot recently. Some families spend their entire day finding water sources and then transporting that water back to their dwelling. It is not so much that they miss the leisure of a good round of golf or a couple of hours taking in a movie that grabs our hearts. From a “first world” view, we have a difficult time envisioning a life whose every moment is given over to simple survival. Even more startling, some of us go on “survival weekends” as a matter of enjoyment.

Then we hear Jesus tell us “the body means nothing.” With the full collection of Jesus’ teaching in view, we know He is not dismissing the importance of the body, or saying we should not care for those whose life barely supports a physical existence. I think His words have much to say to us moderns who pride ourselves on every new discovery we conjure to try to make our lives more productive or less difficult.

What if we took Jesus at His “word”? What if we began to take everything that Jesus says seriously? We just can’t say we admire His life and consider Him a great spiritual leader when He says that life itself is bound up in His words, and His words in particular. We do not have the luxury of seeing Him as “one of many”. And, Christian, we don’t have the luxury of trying to put our North American Fundamentalist English-Speaking Modern First-World spin on everything Jesus says.

His words only increase my compassion for people whose bodies are worn down by life itself. But they also give me hope that, apart from the struggles of the handful of decades we get in this body, there is something beyond this physical realm. It means there is life to be experienced “here and now” while living in the body; deeper and richer than we often think. And, it means that beyond the spectrum of time, life continues past the expiration date of the bi-pedal robe of flesh we inhabit.

I’m not sure what conclusions I draw from all that; but for some reason these words of Jesus seem to raise my compassion and inspire hope. If you haven’t done it for a while read only the Gospels and consider: What does it mean that only the Spirit gives life, and that life is expressed in Jesus’ words in particular?