Are You Afraid of Aging?

Are you afraid of aging? Many are and billions of dollars are spent on methods of wiping away the years and weight loss. One such commercial gave me a "light bulb moment" recently. I don't even remember what the product was, but a man had lost significant weight and he said, "Now that I have lost the weight, I am a better person." Wow! That hit my consciousness really hard! So how much you weigh determines if you're a good person or not?

For years we have seen our obsession with the physical grow exponentially. Physical fitness - daily workouts, vitamins, organic food - and all the while our bodies keep ticking away in inevitable decline. Each decade brings a new mindset: invincible accompanies us until we turn 30. And then our eyesight diminishes, then the Snap, Crackle,Pop of our knees, and eventually, our minds go. But this applies to the physical, not the spiritual.

It is possible to get better with age! Paul said, "Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day." (2 Corinthians 4:16) I think it goes without belaboring that this is dependent upon our willingness to actively put on the mind of Christ consistently.

Man - and woman - are triune beings - a reflection of The Triune God. We are made in His image in this way. The physical is the least important, so it is at the bottom. Next comes the soul (emotions, will, and mind). At the top is our spiritual. And yet it seems most of the time people are trying to improve the body and the mind!

According to Marketdata Enterprises, the annual revenue for the diet industry was over $30 billion dollars way back in 1990. (It's much higher in 2008, yet our obesity rate keeps rising each year.) And that's just on weight loss! Who knows how much is spent on either products or procedures to look more youthful?