Women

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Them Bones, Them Bones

Bone health, the latest buzz word, currently dominates conversation, media coverage, and certainly can be listed as one more burden to the already overburdened modern woman.

A generation fixated on healthy-living woke up to discover themselves victims. Caught off guard, many ask the question, “How?” Fingers point in a milieu of directions and a diversity of recommendations add only to the confusion. I know. I am one of the confused.

Hours of personal research followed my own diagnosis of oesteoporosis, but it accomplished little more than create bleak cynicism that cloaked an initial despair and apathy. Concern for my twenty-two year old daughter quickly added to the concern for myself that already existed.

I am a person that needs answers, whatever those answers may be. Lack of any definitive truth on this subject flies in the face of who I am and what I need. Where peace longed to reside, restlessness trod, heavily.

And then the tiniest piece of discovery fell, bone-health linked to depression, and a picture began to form out of the swirling chaos.

Since the serpent in Eden first gave voice to our own thoughts of godhood, time and again we choose to turn deafened ears to Truth. We remain un-teachable. Even after eons of opportunity, we maintain ourselves to be teacher, rather than recognize that we will ever be students in our knowledge and understanding.

God, however, in His unfailing love of His creation, remains ever faithful. If only we would believe, really believe, that.

Job gives us the earliest picture of a truth about ourselves. In its simplicity we overlook its significance.

Your hands shaped me and made me. . .You clothe me with skin and flesh and knit me together with bones and sinews. You gave me life and showed me kindness, and in your providence watched over my spirit. Job 10:8a,11-12 NIV)


God painstakingly fashioned the fleshly habitation that makes up our dwelling place. Having created the world that would be our home this side of eternity, He knew how our bodies needed to be designed in order to flourish in Eden. Even being cast from Paradise, they remained the perfect form for man to inhabit as he drew sustenance from the earth and divine nourishment from his Creator.

The Psalmist reminds us that we are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psa 139). In that making there was a design that perpetually links man, body and spirit, to His creator.

And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.
(Isaiah 58:11 KJV)


It takes little more than a cursory reading of Isaiah 58 in its entirety to realize that man’s leaving of paradise was not limited to the physical. Man’s spirit left paradise as well. In man’s attempt to usurp God’s authority, he robbed himself of the benefits of walking in utter dependence on God. Numerous prices are paid for that independent spirit that we prize so highly, especially today. Not the least of these price tags is evidenced by the toil taken on the very habitation God designed in perfection for our use.

Solomon, proclaimed by many to have been the wisest man ever to have lived, made a study of the visible world. He was gifted with discerning human nature as well as incredible understanding into the physical realm man inhabited. Just a quick peek serves up an amazing array of insight.

A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones..
(Proverbs 14:30 NIV)

A cheerful look brings joy to the heart, and good news gives health to the bones..
(Proverbs 15:30 NIV)

Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.
(Proverbs 16:24 NIV)

A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones..
(Proverbs 17:22 NIV)


Thought provoking ideas to ponder. Seemingly, a connection is painted here between bone health and our emotions. But that is not the whole story. David, of whom God says a man after My own heart, knew what it was to walk with God. He also knew what it was to walk in his own strength and power. Do his insights speak to you as they do to me:

My life is consumed by anguish and my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak.
(Psalm 31:10 NIV)

Blessed is he
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man
whose sin the Lord does not count against him
and in whose spirit is no deceit.
When I kept silent,
my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
(Psalm 32:1-3 NIV)


David knew what it was to carry his own burdens. He came to realize the cost. And he learned where the truth lay:

You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.
(Psalm 32:7 NIV)


I have never experienced clinical depression. But like much of the population in America, I know what it is to be depressed. To battle weighty clouds, ceaseless cycles of sensing little well-being. I know what it is to carry the weight of the world on my shoulders and the in-fatigable tension that comes with that weight. I know what it is as single parent to try to balance the needs of my children, the financial burden of keeping them housed, and clothed, and fed. I know what it is to attempt time and time again to eliminate or control the stress of life. I know what it is to find myself in a long dark tunnel, straining to see even a hint of light at the end. . .and to fail. And I know what it is to cry out to God. . .then watch myself pick up the reigns again and step right back onto that road. Sound at all familiar?

Then we, as women, wonder why our bones no longer have the resilience to carry us through life. The truth, quite simply, is that they are carrying a load they were never intended to carry.

Throughout my journey with God, He has used many passages to speak comfort to my heart. Some of them have been a continuous anchor I go back to again and again. The following passage from Proverbs 3 contains words familiar to us all. I wonder, however, if like me, you missed a message at the end God never intended to be a secret.

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not on thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct they paths. Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the Lord and depart from evil. It shall be health to thy naval, and marrow to thy bones.


I discovered some interesting statistics on depression in America. In the general population, during the course of a year 17.5 million Americans suffer from clinical depression.1 They go on to say that the majority go undiagnosed. When you consider the number of people who experience depression not severe enough to be labeled clinical, the numbers are staggering.

According to The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, “during their lifetime, about 5-12 percent of men and 10-25 percent of women will have at least one episode of major depressive disorder.” You will note that women suffer from this at a ration of 2:1.

It is small wonder that today evidence surrounds us of the price we pay for neglecting whose we are. Even as believers we are deluged in the media with the ugliness of life. Materialism, self-centeredness, strife, general disobedience, the horrors of what man will do to man, war. Knowledge of these creep into our homes daily. Churches are filled with gossip, discontent, and strife as genuine humility, servitude, and dependence on God moment-by-moment ring hollow in our ears.

There is much to sigh about as we cling tenaciously to our independence. The load becomes heavier and heavier as joy and gladness drains from our lives by lack of good report. . .of kind words. Self-suffiency leaves us exhausted and grief spent. Our bones are consumed.

I am left with much to ponder. But King David’s words throw out a life-line to which I will not only cling, but that I will use to be drawn back to the One who longs for me to cast my every burden on Him. Now I understand one more reason He calls me to do so.

Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me widsom in the inmost place. Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Hide your fae from my sings and blot out all my iniquity. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
(Psalm 51:6-12 NIV)








1 (http://www.prairiepublic.org/features/healthworks/depression/stats.htm)

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