In recent months, I have seen a deluge of advertisements from gyms and personal trainers. Each person pictured shows us what a beach-ready body should look like. Each of them is forty years younger than me and their pictures seem to boast of ten percent body fat or less. Each displays a beautiful six-pack of abs, perfectly tanned bodies, and smiles with perfectly straight, sparkly white teeth. If I join their gym, I can look the same way!
As we say in the south, “It a’int never gonna happen!”
About a decade ago, I used to say, that when standing in front of a mirror and looking at my side view, it looked like one biscuit had popped out the package of canned biscuits. I am not personally admitting to anything, but it is possible to graduate to two or three biscuits! In the mirror, I see a woman with lots of white hair staring back, or new lines appearing on my face. At age seventy-two, this is not the body I signed up for!
Society tries to press us into a beauty mold of what we each must look like. We are to work hard on the hair, the face, the body, the clothes, and the teeth. This is what you should be striving to accomplish.
I actually believe those things are important. We are to take care of the physical temple with which God has blessed us. I exercise several times a week, and I am working on healthier eating. Truthfully, I will never look like the model on the billboard and trust me – I never smile, showing my sparkly white teeth, when I lift weights or spend thirty minutes on a bike or an elliptical machine.
I am now endeavoring to allow God to post a proper billboard in my mind. Every day, I need to see God’s billboard for it will teach me not to focus on the flaws I see, but to focus on thanks for what I do have at age seventy-two. If I only see the flaws, based on society’s billboard, I will never feel good enough.
Today, I give thanks to God. I have breath in my lungs. My heart continues to pump oxygen-rich blood through my veins. My legs work when I get up in the mornings. My husband and I can still take care of ourselves and remain independent. I can still get on an airplane and travel a thousand miles and speak God’s Word for a weekend. My lips can still give God praise and share the Good News of Jesus Christ. I can see laughter lines around my eyes and thank Him for the fun times I have experienced over the years.
My plan is to continue exercising for my physical health, but even greater is that I want to exercise daily a heart of thanksgiving for what God has given me. How about you? Who will take a thirty-day challenge and join me in thanking God every day for what we do have? Mark the date – May 21, 2024, and each day thank God for breath, a new day, family, and a host of other things that are so easy to take for granted. This week, try being grateful on purpose – and see how that changes your life. Write it down. Repeat it often. Thanks be to God!
“It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to the Most High. It is good to proclaim your unfailing love in the morning, your faithfulness in the evening.” Psalm 92:1-2