“For it was you who created my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I will praise you because I have been remarkably and wondrously made.” Psalm 139: 13-14
Isn’t it funny that when we look at babies we easily use all the above words? We look at a new baby and declare them perfect, we can’t imagine criticizing anything about a newborn. We see infinite hope and possibility. Words like wondrous, miracle, extraordinary, and marvel roll easily off our tongues, and we mean every one of them.
But give these same babies a decade or so and the vocabulary changes dramatically. The same body that was described as a wonder is now openly criticized for being too fat, too thin, legs aren’t long enough, hair isn’t curly or straight enough, on and on it goes. Criticizing and altering our appearance has become so mainstream that it’s hard to avoid it in most conversations.
As a culture we are obsessed with appearance and youth. We have more services and products available to us today than ever before. People with enough money can so alter their appearance as to be totally unrecognizable from what they were created to be.
Which is why reading Psalm 139 is so good for us, it reminds us of the intentionality of God in creating each one of us. And because of that intentionality, there is a responsibility on our part.
“God formed us as He wants us to be, and we must accept His will no matter how we feel about our genetic structure, our looks, or our abilities.”
(Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary)
Have you ever stopped to consider that your looks, your physical makeup is actually part of his will for you? That maybe some of your limitations were created for a purpose and that your part/my part is to accept them with grace and to proclaim with your life that it’s grace that sustains you in those limitations? This by no means is a free pass on taking care of our physical bodies, we are called to steward them just like we’re called to steward our possessions. What I’m talking about is the difference between worshiping our physical bodies and neglecting them altogether, and in between those two is acceptance and respect.
In Psalm 139:15 the CSB uses the word formed, but in the KJV it is the phrase, “intricately wrought,” which, according to Wiersbe, is translated “embroidered” in Exodus. This particularly spoke to me because one of my favorite hobbies is needlepoint. Needlepoint canvases are often hand painted. This is a painstaking process because the people stitching follow the painted design meticulously in order to get the finished product to look like the intended design. Needlepoint is a labor of love because it takes time, sometimes a long time, to finish a canvas.
Imagine that I gave you a needlepoint pillow that I had worked on for months. Most likely you would thank me and, if you knew anything about needlepoint, you would feel touched that I would take so much time to make something for you. But what if, upon giving it to you, you said; “Thanks, but I don’t know why you used that color on the background, and I think you should have used a different kind of thread over here on these flowers. You got most of it right but if it were up to me, I would definitely have made some changes.” As the creator and gift giver, I would be appalled. I would also be hurt.
When God formed you in your mother’s womb, he deliberately chose all of your parts. He expertly wove them together for a specific purpose and then, he gifted you this body and this life.
God wasn’t concerned with cultural acceptance when he created you, because all the way back even before your conception, you already had the only acceptance that will ever matter, His.
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