Lean Not
A somatic look at Proverbs 3:5-8
Tuesday afternoon, I spent an hour with a book by the pool. This was my reward after a full schedule of work (thankful + tired), and soon after settling into my chair, I could feel the restoration in my body. It was 107 degrees—no joke—and the palms were still, but the wind was moving, evidenced by narrow ripples across the pool’s surface. When the valley winds are alive, I know the Spirit of God is close.
I thought about nature’s outright inability to be unmoved by the Spirit, how it is always vulnerable to the movement of its Creator. This is something I think about often. “Trees don’t decide how or if they’ll respond to God, they simply bend to the wind of His Spirit.” Nature cannot resist God. Humans can.
God extends kindness to all of creation, but He only extends grace to human being—His image bearers. As Jacques Philippe writes in Interior Freedom, grace “cannot be fully fruitful in us unless we fully cooperate.” This is important to note. We receive grace, we receive the Holy Spirit, but to live the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love, we have to take action. We have to participate fully—heart, mind, strength, will, body. Nothing held back; nothing holding us back.
Take it from someone in the fitness and wellness space, bringing heart, mind, strength, and will into anything is a challenge of epic proportions. The obstacles are more complex than we recognize, more internal and invisible than we realize. Plenty holds us back and there are reasons for it, and those reasons are interwoven with our conscious or unconscious needs, beliefs, fears, experiences, and doubts.
Peter experienced this when walking on water. Of all the disciples, Peter was the only one bold enough to leave the boat and move toward Jesus. But his knowledge of water was too powerful for his bold faith. The memory of friends lost to sea was too real. Logic was too loud—Peter, are you crazy?! People can’t walk on water!
Notice Jesus’ profound question after pulling Peter back to steadiness: “What made you doubt?” This was not a rhetorical question. Jesus was asking Peter what part of him prevented him from fully cooperating in the call closer to Jesus. He was inviting Peter to take a somatic look at his faith. I believe He asks us to do the same.
As a somatic coach who is always reading and learning, I spend a lot of time in ‘spiritual’ spaces where the religion is humanism, and the body is ruler. The somatic lens is on self—self-interest, self-actualization, and self-absorption. No holy curiosity. No desire to steward our created being. The goal is connection to something… Nature? Humanity? The present moment? It’s never really clear.
Taking a somatic lens to faith is refreshingly different. We observe our interior landscape with one priority: to reorient ourselves to the Person of our faith. It’s not about self; it’s about Jesus. It’s about trusting Him more. Don’t ever lose sight of this beautiful grace.
Let’s use today’s passage as our trust template: Trust in the Lord with all your heart [mind, care, attention, seriousness], and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord, and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones. Proverbs 3:5-8 ESV
Is it my heart, my mind, my cares, my attention, or my logic that most often interrupts my trust in the Lord? How does it start?
What personal understanding or wisdom do I lean on? (Education, past experience, skill, etc?)
What activities/situations are the most difficult for me to acknowledge God in?
When I didn’t ask for God’s direction in the past, what did that path look like?
In what areas of my life do I need Spirit wisdom rather than human wisdom?
If I truly feared the Lord with reverent love, what evil would I turn from right now?
Dependence on the Lord promises healing and refreshment to the bones. How would I describe that specific to my body’s needs today?
