Body Building

By Rev. Gusti Linnea Newquist


Ephesians 4: 1-16
John 6: 1-15


Did you know that most Olympic-level endurance athletes burn through calories so quickly that they resort to consuming massive quantities of junk food just to make sure they have enough fuel in their system to power through the main event?

No kidding. It’s really true.

According to Dr. Michael Joyner, who studies the super-metabolism of super-athletes at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, the Olympians we will be cheering on in the next two and a half weeks can burn through 20 calories in a single minute. A single day’s workout can burn up to six thousand calories! Meaning that our beloved American swimming champion Michael Phelps, for example, must regularly eat three fried-egg sandwiches, a five-egg omelet, a bowl of grits, three slices of French toast, and three pancakes with chocolate chips . . . for breakfast! . . . just to keep his body energized. How’s that for some loaves and fishes!

(Okay so maybe after yesterday’s performance, he should cut back on a pancake or two . . .)

Most of us are not Olympic athletes . . . but the incentive to eat massive quantities of junk food . . . or to look good in a Speedo . . . might inspire us to start some body building in the next few days. Am I right? Which of course would go the same direction as New Year’s Resolutions once we realize Olympic athletes train upward of six hours per day . . . for twelve years of their lives. Most of us can’t even carve out the recommended thirty minutes of exercise per day! What are we to do?

Well there is good news, my friends. Recent research by Dr. Glenn Gaesser, who directs the Healthy Lifestyles Research Center at Arizona State University, has concluded that just ten minutes of exercise per day . . . repeated three times a day . . . can have the same benefit as one thirty minute session per day. Which means the point about building up the body is that we “just do it” . . . one small step at a time . . . over and over and over again.

Which leads me to the apostle Paul in our Ephesians text this morning, turned-personal-fitness-instructor, “building up the body of Christ” in 1st century Ephesus.

Of course the kind of body building Paul is more about a metaphor than it is about athletics . . . maybe . . . And the kind of body building Paul is talking about is actually a team sport, not an individual one. And the kind of body building he is talking about focuses on a community of faith, and not a nice set of abs. But does it not take just as much discipline to build a community of faith as it does to compete in the Olympics? Paul thinks so. At least when it comes to the Ephesians.

Most of the Ephesians are non-Jewish Gentiles newly converted to the faith, unfamiliar with the rich heritage of the Jewish tradition so central to the life of Jesus and his earliest followers. They may not understand the legacy they are joining . . . at least not as much as others in the community who are very familiar with Jewish law. Those long-time members want to keep the familiar structure, and they expect the newcomers to follow more of the tradition they have inherited. And of course the newcomers have bold new ideas and can’t understand why it takes so long to implement them. And they have to keep practicing the building of one body together . . . over and over again, as time passes and new members come and go. Because new members come and go and come and go over and over and over again. How can they get this hodge podge mix of believers to be one body, one spirit? How can they equip the saints to build this new body together, with Christ as its head—joined together in peace, living up to the life to which God had called them?

One option for Paul the personal fitness trainer would be to channel the first century version of Jillian Michaels . . . you know, the rock hard, tough love, no complaints task-master who used to work with The Biggest Loser reality TV show? She got right in their face, didn't she? Keep running, keep sweating, don't even think about quitting, we have a goal to reach! Maturity into the likeness of Christ! Hurry up, Ephesians! Get to work! Go, go, go!!!

That’s one option for building of the body.

But I think Paul is a bit more like Bob Harper, the quieter, kinder, compassionate personal trainer, nudging his parishioners to do the thing they have already said they want to do. I mean, Paul does tell the Ephesians to be “humble, gentle, and patient, accepting each other in love,” right?

He uses the sort of do-it-for-me-if-you-really-love-me approach: I'd be so proud of you, friends in Ephesus, if you would just pull out your running shoes once or twice a week, do what you can, eat one less brownie . . . even a little bit of exercise is better than nothing, I know you can do it. I'll be right here with you . . . just don't give up when it's hard . . .

In case you haven’t noticed, your Pastor Gusti has been vacillating between these two approaches in this past year of transition at Madison Square. Because are we not also our own hodge podge of believers uniting together as one body, one spirit, “making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace”? What we have been doing together is a little bit like training for a distance relay race. The kind where we’re all on the same team and we just run for the love of running . . . passing the baton to our fellow worshipers . . . speaking the truth in love about what brings us to this race . . . and what keeps us on the field through thick and thin.

There are those among us who joined the team back in the days of Bill Lytle . . . running our hearts out in response to his call to mission and his commitment to serving “the least of these” in San Antonio. And there are those among us who came running alongside the ministry of Ilene Dunn in her clarion call for lgbt justice and her love of the life of the mind. And how many of our children and youth grabbed hold of the baton from the witness of Kenny Davis . . . and loved the creativity of Linda Charlton whose legacy of liturgical art is with us to this day.

And then there are the brand new members who have come in just this past year . . . yearning for a place that will receive all of who they are . . . and trusting that someway, somehow, this place really means it when it says “welcome home.” This is the wonderful mix of saints at Madison Square . . . coming into the unity of one body . . . speaking the truth in love to one another . . . building itself up in love . . . (and not just in brownies!)

Surely we are equipping the saints at Madison Square for some body building in this Olympic summer! But you know, it's an interesting word in Greek, the one we translate into English as “equip.” katartismos It's the same word you would use to describe setting a bone after it has been broken.

And isn’t that also what the ministry of God at Madison Square has been about all along? Don’t we bring our broken bones and our broken hearts to this place of healing and hope . . . trusting God will heal us even stronger than we were to begin with? That, too, is what it means to build up the body. Yes, it’s about adopting a new exercise plan as a community of faith, growing together in maturity, and spiritual discipline . . . adjusting, healing, trusting each part of the body to do its own work to make the whole body grow and be strong with love. But it’s also about sharing the broken parts of ourselves with one another . . . and trusting God to set things right. It is something we choose to do; it requires effort; but as each of us makes that choice and effort, as each of us grows into the likeness of Christ, we are joined and knit together by every ligament, and the entire body grows together.

It is still an organic, dynamic, prophetic body of Christ into which we have been called here at Madison Square Presbyterian Church. And each of us has been given grace upon grace according to the measure of Christ's gift for building up the body, whether we want to hold on to the best the Madison Square tradition has to offer, or whether we are new to the tradition but inspired to live it out in new and fresh ways. Whether we are ready to run the race with fresh new sneakers . . . or whether we have some broken bones we need to offer for healing. Some of us are apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, but all of us—every single one of us—is a minister of the gospel, building up our part of the body in service to the whole.

So, my friends, it's time for us to recommit to some body building here at Madison Square, as we gear up for the next phase of this team sport we call the church. We have a brand new body to build together, with Christ as our head, trusting Christ to knit us together in love to serve one another and, indeed, the world.

May it be so for each one of us, and for all of us together. Amen.