14 day plan

"This is my body"

Day 1 of 14

NIV

Genesis 2:25

25Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

Series Introduction

‘This is my body.’
He said it like you’d offer, Have a piece of bread;
with genteel hospitality but no sacred airs.

Because she’s old, my church has offered that hospitality for a very long time:
‘Here, share my body’.

But throughout the world, where Christians gather, it’s been said for 2,000 years.
‘This is my body.’

Imagine you’re a hungry traveller, a thirsty seeker of truth.
Unburdened of backpack and sweaty cap you elbow up to counter and stool,
swipe back of the hand across a weary forehead and focus on blackboard options of fare.
‘Here,’ plates up the bar tender, ‘This is my body’.
‘And here,’ he motions around his gathered Christ-worshipers, ‘This is my body’.

Let’s chew on a very familiar phrase: This is my body.

Reflection: Body unashamed

Series Introduction: 

‘This is my body.’  

 He said it like you’d offer, Have a piece of bread;  

 with genteel hospitality but no sacred airs.  

Because she’s old, my church has offered that hospitality for a very long time:   

‘Here, share my body’.  

But throughout the world, where Christians gather, it’s been said for 2,000 years.  

‘This is my body.’  

Imagine you’re a hungry traveller, a thirsty seeker of truth.   

Unburdened of backpack and sweaty cap you elbow up to counter and stool,   

swipe back of the hand across a weary forehead and focus on blackboard options of fare.   

‘Here,’ plates up the bar tender, ‘This is my body’.  

‘And here,’ he motions around his gathered Christ-worshipers, ‘This is my body’.  

Let’s chew on a very familiar phrase: This is my body.  

Reflection:

Let’s never get tired of revisiting The Beginning, the poetry of Paradise with glimmers of eternity.  

Picture God’s final flourish that generated the glory-goodness of humanity.

Body: spirit with a mooring; soul with a presence; interior with an exterior; a shelter, a casement, a shell, a chest to treasure and safeguard, a container to be opened and shared, a nest, a home.  

Take a minute to close your eyes and think of ‘home’.   For most people, being at home is comforting. Do you find that too?  Memories of past homes are formative, consolidating. Deeply grounding.   But sharing home—opening our doors to others, is less a universal pleasure.   Home is a reflection of who we are.   To expose ourselves to the gaze/the judgement of others is to be vulnerable.  

I think that’s the case here, in the beginning.   Two people, at home in their bodies: vulnerable to each other, to their creator and to their world.   This is body and this is good. 

Prayer:

Christ-creator, through whom, like whom and for whom we were crafted, we humbly worship you. In the masterful narrative of creation you honoured us with glory and charged us with relationships and stewardship. What a beautifully-wild dance that must have been. ‘Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!’ (Psalm 8:1)

Genesis 2:1-25

1Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.

2By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

Adam and Eve

4This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

5Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, 6but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. 7Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

8Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

10A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. 11The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. 12(The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.) 13The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. 14The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Ashur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

15The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”

18The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

19Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals.

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. 22Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

23The man said,

“This is now bone of my bones

and flesh of my flesh;

she shall be called ‘woman,’

for she was taken out of man.”

24That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

25Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.