Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.”
NL Daily Devotion for Friday, May 19, 2023
by R. M. Fergus, Clergy Stuff
This is a nuanced concept. Many have taken it to mean that anything bodily, fleshly, is against God. Not so! And, I believe, not what Paul is saying at all.
In fact, Jesus was fully human—embodied—and therefore had to address the needs of the flesh. Moreover, God’s decision to become embodied in this way was a profound statement of love for humanities physicality. There is no dichotomy between the spirit and the flesh—one is not superior to the other, nor can they be separated. Our humanness is both fleshly and spiritual at the same time. And that is a beautiful thing—a divinely ordained thing.
The distinction Paul is making here isn’t between the two aspects of our humanity at all, but rather about where we invest our time and energy in our day-to-day life. If we are ruled solely by our desires for security (i.e. money, possessions, power) or food or sex or altered states of consciousness, most of us are going to fall off the beam a bit. Paul is calling us to set our minds not on merely satisfying our base instincts, but on the things that nurture us on an emotional and spiritual level, which is above all the loving and holy relationship with God into which God calls us daily. We still need to love our physicality and care for our bodies, but tending to our spiritual needs actually makes loving and caring for our bodies easier and more joyful and makes us far less likely to devolve into trying to satisfy our instincts in harmful ways.
Once again, as with so much in our faith, this is a “both/and” rather than an “either/or” concept.
Do I separate body and spirit in my understanding of spirituality? Or do I care for both as a single whole?
