Botox, Dieting, and Plastic Surgery

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - A couple of related emails came in recently.

00:00:06.760 | One woman writes in to ask this,

00:00:08.040 | "Pastor John, in a culture obsessed with diet,

00:00:10.360 | "nutrition, health, and weight loss,

00:00:11.640 | "and with different information coming from every side,

00:00:13.560 | "how can we care for our bodies to the glory of God

00:00:16.200 | "without making them an idol?"

00:00:18.200 | And Becky writes in to ask,

00:00:19.160 | "Pastor John, what does the Bible say

00:00:20.760 | "about plastic surgery and Botox?"

00:00:23.760 | - Well, that's a great question on how to find,

00:00:28.000 | I think it's right to say this,

00:00:29.600 | find the middle way between idolizing the body

00:00:34.600 | and neglecting the body.

00:00:36.560 | And here's a good place to start, maybe.

00:00:39.360 | A massively important text on the body

00:00:42.920 | and God's view of it and importance of it.

00:00:46.960 | This is 1 Corinthians 6, 19.

00:00:49.720 | "Do you not know that your body is the temple

00:00:53.080 | "of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God?

00:00:56.400 | "You are not your own.

00:00:58.680 | "You were bought with a price.

00:01:01.360 | "So glorify God in your body."

00:01:04.520 | So five massive statements that should blow us away

00:01:09.520 | concerning our own bodies.

00:01:14.400 | God is in your body, the Holy Spirit.

00:01:18.440 | Number two, God, put God in your body.

00:01:23.160 | You didn't absorb him in some natural way.

00:01:25.980 | We have the Holy Spirit from God.

00:01:28.920 | Three, your body does not belong to you, therefore.

00:01:33.840 | Four, your body was bought by the blood of Jesus.

00:01:38.840 | Five, you exist in your body to make God look glorious.

00:01:44.960 | I mean, that is a, you could write a book on that.

00:01:49.120 | It's just glorious theology of our bodies.

00:01:53.000 | And I think every man and every woman should meditate

00:01:56.580 | on those statements concerning their body.

00:02:00.220 | When it says glorify God in your body,

00:02:03.820 | it means use your body in a way that shows

00:02:08.860 | that your body is not your God.

00:02:11.500 | Use your body in a way that shows

00:02:13.300 | that God is more precious than your body.

00:02:16.940 | Paul said, one of my favorite texts,

00:02:19.620 | he built Christian hedonism on it, is Philippians 1:20.

00:02:23.300 | It's my eager expectation and hope

00:02:25.840 | that Christ will be magnified in my body,

00:02:29.100 | whether by life or by death.

00:02:30.700 | So he wants while he's living,

00:02:32.120 | his body to be an instrument of magnifying God.

00:02:36.140 | And when he dies, he wants to die well with his body

00:02:39.320 | so that people can see that his treasure is Christ

00:02:42.960 | and not his body and its health and its life.

00:02:47.880 | So we need to give enough attention, I think,

00:02:51.200 | to our bodies so that we keep them fit for Christ

00:02:55.700 | and serviceable in his cause.

00:02:59.120 | And we may need to give our bodies to imprisonment

00:03:04.120 | or whipping or execution or death

00:03:07.480 | to show that Christ is more precious than the body.

00:03:10.800 | So there is a middle way of eating and exercise

00:03:15.280 | that doesn't fall off the horse

00:03:18.240 | on the side of neglect of the body,

00:03:20.620 | as though it were worthless,

00:03:22.520 | or the side of idolizing the body as though it were God.

00:03:26.680 | It just keeps us healthy with a kind of what I would call

00:03:30.760 | maybe undistracting attractiveness.

00:03:34.840 | Like when I think about,

00:03:35.840 | should I comb my hair in the morning?

00:03:37.040 | Well, yes, because if I walk out and it's all knotted,

00:03:40.640 | people will be distracted from me.

00:03:43.520 | They will be thinking about this stupid forgetful hair.

00:03:47.700 | So there's a kind of undistracting attractiveness

00:03:52.120 | that doesn't call excessive attention to ourselves

00:03:55.760 | and distract from our personhood.

00:03:58.680 | And that middle way of simplicity shows

00:04:01.600 | that God is gloriously satisfying

00:04:04.880 | and certainly way more satisfying than wrinkle-free cheeks

00:04:09.080 | or smooth thighs or flowing hair

00:04:13.160 | or whatever it is that is causing us to lose sleep at night

00:04:16.400 | and making us go towards some kind of temporary fix

00:04:19.560 | that is probably out of place

00:04:21.760 | for a person who's really content in God.

00:04:25.820 | So people can tell, can't they, Tony?

00:04:29.320 | People around you, it seems to me,

00:04:31.560 | can tell if you're focused more on the inner person of beauty

00:04:36.360 | than the outer person of beauty.

00:04:38.440 | 1 Peter 3, "Don't let your adorning be external,

00:04:42.280 | "braiding of hair, putting on of gold jewelry,

00:04:45.020 | "clothing you wear.

00:04:46.480 | "Let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart

00:04:49.260 | "with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit

00:04:52.580 | "that is pleasing in God's sight."

00:04:54.840 | I think there's an application of that for men,

00:04:56.880 | even though it's written for women,

00:04:58.360 | that both should focus on the inner beauty

00:05:02.420 | of godliness and holiness

00:05:04.640 | rather than the external beauty of our bodies.

00:05:09.400 | I don't think Christians should be very impressed

00:05:11.720 | with our bodies.

00:05:12.720 | I love C.S. Lewis, and I think he's quoting

00:05:15.160 | some medieval person who called his body brother ass,

00:05:19.240 | which is to say, yes, he's serviceable,

00:05:22.320 | he's not very impressive, he's loyal,

00:05:24.920 | he does what he has to do, he gets me where I need to go.

00:05:27.600 | I'm just not real impressed with my body

00:05:30.120 | any more than I am with my donkey

00:05:31.840 | because 98% of the people in the world look ordinary,

00:05:36.200 | and if they don't look ordinary now,

00:05:37.560 | they're gonna look ordinary real soon.

00:05:39.840 | They're gonna get wrinkled, they're gonna get old,

00:05:41.960 | they're gonna get bent over,

00:05:43.320 | and all that they thought was what they had worked for

00:05:46.120 | is gonna go away, and the most voluptuous female body

00:05:50.040 | you have ever seen in your life

00:05:51.680 | is gonna be ashen-faced in a coffin before she knows it,

00:05:55.560 | and then where will be all the investments

00:05:58.680 | in that temporary outward beauty?

00:06:01.320 | So maybe just a couple of last thoughts.

00:06:05.600 | I'm thinking of this for women who may be single

00:06:08.120 | and may want to be fit and attractive for a man someday

00:06:12.720 | if God would be pleased, and I would just say to them,

00:06:16.440 | if a man doesn't want a woman's good soul

00:06:21.440 | more than a woman's good body,

00:06:23.880 | he's not the kind of man you want.

00:06:26.800 | So don't pour all your energies

00:06:29.840 | into trying to get his attention

00:06:32.280 | to the very thing that is to be secondary in his affections.

00:06:37.280 | And the second thing to close with maybe is

00:06:41.680 | God knit us together in our mother's womb.

00:06:45.000 | He really made our basic structures,

00:06:47.320 | and there's some of 'em you're just not gonna change.

00:06:49.920 | The kind of hair you got, the kind of nose you got,

00:06:51.880 | the kind of hips you've got, the kind of height you've got,

00:06:55.600 | the kind of complexion you've got,

00:06:57.000 | these are things that are just given

00:06:59.480 | with our God-given genetics,

00:07:02.520 | and therefore it really is a matter of trust, isn't it?

00:07:05.200 | Do we trust him?

00:07:06.040 | Did God blow it with me?

00:07:07.480 | Did he make a mistake with me?

00:07:09.440 | God doesn't make mistakes.

00:07:11.880 | So let's all present our bodies

00:07:15.280 | with all their pluses and minuses

00:07:17.040 | as a living sacrifice, acceptable to God.

00:07:20.480 | This is our spiritual worship.

00:07:24.360 | Yes, it is.

00:07:25.200 | Thank you, Pastor John,

00:07:26.040 | for listening to this podcast.

00:07:27.160 | Email your questions to us

00:07:28.240 | at askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org.

00:07:30.320 | You can visit us online at desiringgod.org

00:07:32.160 | to find thousands of books, articles, sermons,

00:07:33.880 | and other resources from John Piper, all free of charge.

00:07:36.720 | I'm your host Tony Ranke.

00:07:37.560 | Thanks for listening.

00:07:38.520 | (upbeat music)

00:07:41.100 | (upbeat music)

00:07:43.680 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Botox, Dieting, and Plastic Surgery

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