"And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry." Luke 4:1-2
You always hate to feel like you might be insulting God in the words that He conveyed to this world, but the last statement of those two verses previously quoted sure seem to call for a, "Well, duh!" Who wouldn't be hungry after not eating for forty days? And if you'd like to call me a blasphemer or something like that, feel free. Sometimes the Holy Spirit simply seems to say that which is so obvious, but maybe, just maybe, He knows what He is doing.
This is an interesting thought to me, though. The last week and a half in my life have been fairly physically challenging. Now, I've had physical challenges before. Training for a marathon and half marathons would be some of those times. But during the last week and a half, I've had a daughter who hasn't been sleeping well, a wife who hasn't been sleeping well, with both of them battling various illnesses. Not to mention that last week turned out to be one of those weeks where things seem to snowball on you. You never feel like you're going to get caught up. And then, when you get home from work, you have to help take care of things around the house because the two ladies aren't feeling up to snuff. And then, you only get about 5-6 hours of interrupted sleep before you get up and do it all again.
I'm very thankful that God made my body and spirit as resilient as He did. Other than a general weariness and perhaps a minor headache or two, I pulled through remarkably well. With the two ladies on the mend, it seems like they are pulling through, too. And with a couple of nights of much better sleep all around, we might be turning the corner.
But that has gotten me to thinking. How far is it that we have to go until we become absolutely physically exhausted. I don't mean tired, but we still could keep going if we had to. I mean, getting to the point that your body simply refuses to allow you to get up and do anything. I know it's possible, because people have died from physical exhaustion before. (And I should throw in, I'm looking strictly at dying of physical exhaustion, not from something, say like dehydration, that comes because you wore your body out, but from truly just working it or demanding too much of it.)
Jesus endured 40 days without food. He was hungry at the end of them. I've heard some put forth the thought that this is one way that the Bible is not inerrant. There are those who would say that the body would physically shut down after 40 days of no food. Now, I might agree if it's a body that has been used to getting three square meals a day for most of the lifetime. But for someone who probably lived through a lot of times of hunger and want, it doesn't seem quite as much of a stretch to endure that long.
Two final thoughts before I bring this to a close. First, since Jesus is not only God, but a truly perfect, sinless human being, is it even possible for something like physical exhaustion to kill Him? I believe very strongly that the statement, "Jesus gave up His spirit," is the only way Jesus could die, because nothing in this world could possibly kill Him. So from that standpoint, 40 days of hunger are just that, hunger.
Second, what if our human bodies are truly capable of so much more than what we give them credit? God created us with both remarkable strength and terrifying fragility. I've seen people bounce back from the toughest of injuries, and I've seen people's bodies lose the fight over something that seemed relatively minor. But who is to say that God hasn't, in the creation of our bodies, actually created something that has far more strength than what we ever could imagine? It's an interesting thought, especially when we find ourselves in those wearying, wearing times of life.
You always hate to feel like you might be insulting God in the words that He conveyed to this world, but the last statement of those two verses previously quoted sure seem to call for a, "Well, duh!" Who wouldn't be hungry after not eating for forty days? And if you'd like to call me a blasphemer or something like that, feel free. Sometimes the Holy Spirit simply seems to say that which is so obvious, but maybe, just maybe, He knows what He is doing.
This is an interesting thought to me, though. The last week and a half in my life have been fairly physically challenging. Now, I've had physical challenges before. Training for a marathon and half marathons would be some of those times. But during the last week and a half, I've had a daughter who hasn't been sleeping well, a wife who hasn't been sleeping well, with both of them battling various illnesses. Not to mention that last week turned out to be one of those weeks where things seem to snowball on you. You never feel like you're going to get caught up. And then, when you get home from work, you have to help take care of things around the house because the two ladies aren't feeling up to snuff. And then, you only get about 5-6 hours of interrupted sleep before you get up and do it all again.
I'm very thankful that God made my body and spirit as resilient as He did. Other than a general weariness and perhaps a minor headache or two, I pulled through remarkably well. With the two ladies on the mend, it seems like they are pulling through, too. And with a couple of nights of much better sleep all around, we might be turning the corner.
But that has gotten me to thinking. How far is it that we have to go until we become absolutely physically exhausted. I don't mean tired, but we still could keep going if we had to. I mean, getting to the point that your body simply refuses to allow you to get up and do anything. I know it's possible, because people have died from physical exhaustion before. (And I should throw in, I'm looking strictly at dying of physical exhaustion, not from something, say like dehydration, that comes because you wore your body out, but from truly just working it or demanding too much of it.)
Jesus endured 40 days without food. He was hungry at the end of them. I've heard some put forth the thought that this is one way that the Bible is not inerrant. There are those who would say that the body would physically shut down after 40 days of no food. Now, I might agree if it's a body that has been used to getting three square meals a day for most of the lifetime. But for someone who probably lived through a lot of times of hunger and want, it doesn't seem quite as much of a stretch to endure that long.
Two final thoughts before I bring this to a close. First, since Jesus is not only God, but a truly perfect, sinless human being, is it even possible for something like physical exhaustion to kill Him? I believe very strongly that the statement, "Jesus gave up His spirit," is the only way Jesus could die, because nothing in this world could possibly kill Him. So from that standpoint, 40 days of hunger are just that, hunger.
Second, what if our human bodies are truly capable of so much more than what we give them credit? God created us with both remarkable strength and terrifying fragility. I've seen people bounce back from the toughest of injuries, and I've seen people's bodies lose the fight over something that seemed relatively minor. But who is to say that God hasn't, in the creation of our bodies, actually created something that has far more strength than what we ever could imagine? It's an interesting thought, especially when we find ourselves in those wearying, wearing times of life.
No comments:
Post a Comment