Our Integrated Selves
Over the past few Wednesday nights we have been wading into some of the percolating cultural issues (abortion, euthanasia, and gender confusion) seeking scriptural guidance both for understanding how to think about these topics and how best to respond.
One of the main lenses we have been using for scriptural understanding is that of soul-body integration. Throughout the scriptures we see the presentation of humanity as an integrated whole: body, soul, spirit (cf. Genesis 1:26–27, Psalm 32:2–3, Psalm 44:25, Psalm 63:1, Proverbs 4:20-23, John 1:14, 1 Corinthians 15:12–13, 20–21, among many others). Each aspect of who we are is to be celebrated, not denigrated. Practically this means we can not separate our physical bodies from our personhood (i.e. sense of self). In week 1, we saw how this separation has disastrous consequences when applied to abortion or euthanasia. If we allow for this separation, we find the leeway to kill a body because they are not yet, or are no longer, a "person". This past week, we noted how this idea of body-self separation figures prominently into much of the gender confusion as well. When we isolate who we are as a person apart from our bodies, our biological sex, etc.. we fail to recognize the beautiful unity of who God made us to be. This idea of soul-body unity is a foundational truth woven into creation, reaffirmed in both the incarnation and resurrection, and will be fully realized when Christ comes again and restores all things.
While this is objectively true and provides a backdrop for the Biblical understanding of preserving life, straightening out gender confusion, informing our sexual preferences, etc... it remains a fact that we live in a fallen world where confusion is real, life is hard, and the way forward often seems fuzzy. Part of what we have been grappling with is how do we as a church balance truth and grace in dealing with friends, family, folks in our Christian circles, as well as outside of those circles, who are struggling. This past Wednesday, we spent a little time in John 4 looking at Jesus' encounter with the Samaritan woman who came to draw water at the well. She was a woman who was in many ways an outcast, on the fringes of society, yet Jesus dealt with her in a way that saw her, gave her dignity and allowed her to reckon with some hard truths in her life. In his dealings with the woman, Jesus not only called her to leave something behind, but he invited her to something better, a life filled with truth and grace. It is an incredibly attractive approach and one that we would do well to live into.
The call for the church to be the church may feel like a tall order in the 21st century amidst the backdrop of these thorny cultural issues. But as we will see Sunday in Ephesians 1:15-23, Paul earnestly prays for Christians in the 1st century to grab hold of the truths about God and leverage them into a life that is lived confidently and convincingly. This really is an incredibly encouraging chapter of scripture!
If you missed our time together Wednesday, or want to take a deeper dive into what we discussed, we recommend this resource from the Evangelical Association of the United Kingdom call Transformed. In addition to helpful testimonies and clear teaching, there is a great bibliography for those wanting to go deeper still.