Five Stones: The Essentials of Manning-UpSample

Stone 2 – Be Strong: Train Your Body.

“Be strong.”
1 Corinthians 16:13. NLT

We have lost our masculinity because we have misplaced our physicality.

When Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians, the women were mostly dominating the church. In this final chapter, the apostle was calling up the men of the church to show some strength. Physically, these Greeks might have been well conditioned, as their culture would admire them for. But spiritually, they were weak. Today, things are not much different, except that most men in our time are in fact physically weaker as well. A lot of our muscles are literally for show, not strength. As a result, many men in our generation have also become weak-willed individuals.

So much so, that some men don’t even take care of their bodies at all. And since we don’t sweat out our stress and push our bodies’ limitations anymore, we don’t have the resilience to endure trials and tribulations like the men of previous generations. Or, our bodies eventually get conquered by our daily stress, because we don’t condition them well enough with daily exercise. As Jim Rohn put it, we should take care of our bodies, since it’s the only place we have to live. In Gospel terms, Paul would also say that our bodies, which are part of God’s creation over which we are stewards, are His temples that must be treated well and consistently cared for (1 Corinthians 6:19).

Men are physical beings in need of doing physically productive and active things. Otherwise, our physicality will lead us into the temptations of passivity and pleasure that break men, instead of living in the redemption, restoration and refreshment intended for us. Training hard and working out, working with our hands and being outdoors, going up against the elements, running up and down hills, hiking through forests or climbing walls and canyons can be wonderful for both the soul and the body.

In today’s reading, we see that David was not a soldier yet, but he was already trained for battle by his experiences in the wild, where he had previously taken down bigger adversaries than himself. How many teenagers do you know who run after and kill both lions and bears, nearly barehanded, to save their pets? So, for David, Goliath was simply his newest round of target practice. David was physically well conditioned for the calling on his life. Are you?

When David stepped out to face the giant, he was fit, ready and skilled for this battle. Yes, he had immense faith in God, but we tend to forget that David was physically prepared as well. Like an athlete, he could trust that God would grant him success on game day, because he had already put in the discipline and long yards in the pre-season training. He was physically trained to also be spiritually useful. David was strong enough to serve his purpose well enough.

His physical training was just another part of his training in Godliness
(1 Corinthians 9:24-27; 1 Timothy 4:8).

Maybe the other question is also whether we train our bodies out of selfish ambition to improve our own image, or rather from the selfless attitude of building discipline and character into our lives to become wholesome men of God? Are we using our strength to puff up our own egos? Or are we equipping ourselves to be ready and able to truly serve and protect others from a place of God-given masculinity? All the while breaking a sweat, instead of being broken by stress.

Meditations on Manning-up:

- What motivates, or demotivates, you to physically maintain your body?

- In which ways have you thought about the spiritual importance of your physical wellbeing, if ever?

- How can you implement physical training and discipline into your life as part of godly masculinity?

- What do you need to pray for today?