The first question I ask is, “What are you doing with your thought? Is your thought working out with Truth, or is it absorbed into the physical body?”
And that is the important issue, I believe.
I love to play tennis. But I don’t play for physical reasons. I play for spiritual reasons. I love the challenge, the demand to demonstrate more authority and dominion over the body, figuring out game strategy, the diversity and variety of activity it adds to my life, and the freedom I feel when making progress with my strokes and playing, coordination and flexibility on the court.
For the dedicated metaphysician who happens to love sports, running or working out also, it is crucial to be honest with motives and intents. If the intent is solely physical, focused on sculpting the body, diagnosing, measuring, weighing and recording flesh/mass statistics, then any sense of the spiritual man is going to feel distant, remote, and even absent. These aims are very materialistic.
Man is not in matter. Man is a spiritual idea of God, discovered in divine Mind, not in the flesh.
But if the intent is to glorify God in ways that make sense for you and feel right for your expression of individuality, your exercise routine can be spiritually profitable, for your thought will not be focused on flesh and muscles, but on God’s ideas and qualities and how to better express them.
The Bible commands, “Exercise thyself to godliness!” That’s the best exercise program I know of.
It’s not necessary to have weight-lifting equipment in your home to exercise yourself in a godly way. But everyone has a unique individuality that expresses God in different ways. Some people love to run. Some people love to throw a ball. Some people love to sit and compute. Some people enjoy lifting weights. Some people love to read.
But the bottom line is not what you’re doing with the body. It’s what are you doing with your thought?
Is your thought spiritually improving? Are you growing closer to God? Are you demonstrating more dominion over matter, over the body, over age beliefs? Are you expressing your spiritual individuality better? If the answer is yes, your exercise program is a success.
Very helpful message..thank you. How often we forget just how powerful our thinking is when we are tuned in to God!
Happy new year!
Hi Evan,
A wonderful article posted on Spirituality.com titled, “I Run Because I Can,” beautifully articulates the writer’s pure motivation to glorify God through this talent. Perhaps your readers would enjoy it.
I’ve been a runner for the past 21 years as well, and while I love the opportunity it provides to be outdoors on a daily basis, I utilize my time running to pray for myself and for the world, to commune with God, to hear what He would have me know about any challenges to my peace of mind. I consciously identify myself as spiritual, immortal, unlimited, ageless and free and rejoice in the expression of God-bestowed strength, joy, power, vigor and vitality. I always, always come home spiritually refreshed, grateful and energized. I have found that as my priority is exercising spiritual dominion – my inherent capacity to remain ever conscious of God’s presence, power and goodness, the activity of running serves to demonstrate dominion over the body and glorify God, Spirit.
Thank you! A timely message with the new year here. Since I enjoy exercising, I’ve felt stuck with this subject many many times – your blog has put a new light on the subject. Exercising my thought makes so much sense and a good self-check. I’ll be exercising lots of thoughts today 🙂
As a former competitive weightlifter who still likes to lift weights, I find that I continually have to check my motives, b/c the workout can too easily descend into matter-based activity if I’m not alert. However, even weightlifting can be a mental, spiritual exercise. I find that, even though I’m not as physically strong as my competition days, the mental and spiritual qualities needed to perform today are similar to the ones I used in competition. I still have to focus thought on technique, be courageous, exact, joyful, diligent, flexible and vigorous. Those are mental, spiritual qualities, and focusing thought there makes the activity so much more enjoyable, than if it were a workout to keep a material body fit. It’s a joy to witness and feel the sense of dominion that comes from exercising spiritual qualities in the gym.
Yes indeed — thanks Evan.
What about those who, like me, might be tempted to feel concern or guilt that they aren’t doing more vigorous exercise? I participate in sports activities two or three times a week, but my sport is target archery.
Of course, what matters in either case is that, as you wrote, “it’s not what you’re doing” [or not doing] “with the body. It’s what you’re doing with your thought.”
Thanks again.
Drew
Just yesterday I came across “movement cure” in Science and Health (383:29), and wondered, “what the heck is that??” When I looked it up on google, I see that it is what was originally called exercise in the 1800’s, and it eventually evolved into massage therapy.
MBE for the most part doesn’t talk highly of exercise, unless it is to exercise God given authority, the exercise of divine power, and the exercise of Mind-power.
However, she’s also not a fan of the mind set that justifies apathy, gluttony, and laziness.
Thanks for your post, Evan!
Jo