To the saints who are at Ephesus and who are faithful in Christ Jesus…Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him…to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption…In Him also we have obtained an inheritance…you were sealed in Him.
~Ephesians 1:1, 3-4, 6-7, 10-11, 13
I stopped growing when I was like 13. I thought for years I was a late bloomer; it took me until mid-adulthood to realize, nope, not a late bloomer, this is just all the blooming I’m ever gonna do.
I’ve never had the experience of outgrowing anyone in my family. A youngest sister can’t reasonably hope to overtake her big brothers but seems like a 50/50 chance I’d end up taller than my sister—and most everybody gets to be taller than at least one parent.
Not me. Not even close. My sister still has a good four inches on me, and it’s no contest with my mom either. My brothers are probably even taller, I don’t know. When one spends one’s whole life looking up everybody looks the same height.
So I’ve always been small. Short and slim. If the boyish figures of the 1920s were still in vogue I’d be dead on.
Except now I’m 41 and three-quarters years old. I’m still short (probably getting incrementally shorter nowadays, as my kids remind me), but my boyish figure is filling out a little. And not in an emerging-womanhood, blooming kind of way.
More like an over-40 kind of way.
Or, if I’m brave enough to accept more responsibility than that, in an I’m-tired-of-being-responsible-and-I-like-eating-ice-cream-with-or-without-my-kids kind of way.
Gaining a full forty pounds during my first pregnancy was a shock, physically and psychologically. But, being young and genetically blessed and apparently well disciplined in those days, the weight was all shed in three months.
Having learned that “eating for two” is a really bad idea, I summoned even more self-discipline the second time around and gained a trim 25–again losing it all in about six months.
When Lizzy was born I had just turned 30. I had lost most but not all of the pregnancy weight when Caleb made his little existence known.
Lizzy is turning 12 soon and I still haven’t reestablished my pre-pregnancy weight.
My entire young adult life was spent at a certain number on the scale and a certain number on my clothing tags.
This is what I am; who I am; this is the body I inhabit. I may not be particularly clever, or talented, or funny, or pretty, but I am exceptionally petite.
I’ve tried to varying degrees over these years to drop the rest of the weight. At first it was only a creeping couple of pounds (my “over-30” weight…I can lose it anytime I want to), then 5-10 (“I’m-tired-of-trying” weight—I just don’t want to at the moment), and lately…more (pandemic weight gain—we’re all going to die; and then post-pandemic weight gain—does it even matter anymore).
My doctor consistently tells me I’m at “an appropriate weight,” and they’ve even taken to telling me my cholesterol panel indicates good nutrition, good exercise, and bad genetics.
I give my jeans dirty looks these days as I pass them over in favor of stretch leggings. Jerks. They’re so uncomfortable.
My cholesterol will be ok. My health won’t disintegrate. I could buy another size jeans.
But if I’m not the tiny little thing anymore…what even am I?
My brother—the oldest of us—has always been crazy physically fit. Like when he visited a cardiologist they told him he had a “textbook” heart; ie, functioning at the utmost human ideal. At 35 he was running laps around 20-year-olds in pickup basketball games. He’s played soccer and biked to work and gone running for decades. He ran a marathon a few years ago. He won a pumpkin pie on his birthday for coming in first place in the city turkey trot.
(Don’t hold it against him. He’s actually a really nice guy.)
But he’s had some knee trouble recently. He had surgery a few years back and slowly worked his way back up to running. That lasted a while, but knee troubles cropped up again, so he had a consultation this month.
Doctor Breakitgently told him, “Your running days are over.”
Just like that, the guy who runs to work and runs after work and gets up to run and goes out to run and runs on Thanksgiving and finishes a marathon and wins the pies and shames 20-year-olds…isn’t the guy who does that anymore.
So who even is he?
I know who he is. And I know what I am.
We are in Christ.
Preaching from the first chapter of Ephesians last week, our pastor said, almost in passing, that Paul’s favorite appellation for Christians is “in Christ.”
He calls us faithful in Christ.
We are blessed in Christ.
We are chosen in Christ.
We have redemption in Christ.
We are sealed in Christ.
We are seated in the heavenly places in Christ.
We are brought near to God in Christ.
In Christ, in Christ, in Christ. It is what we are. It is who we are. It is the most important thing about me. It will not change; I will nevermore not be in Christ. It’s the source of my identity, my blessing, my standing in this cosmos. It’s my anchor; my foundation. It’s my position before God.
There is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, [runner or couch potato, skinny or pudgy, exceptionally petite or average American body type,] but Christ is all, and in all.
~Colossians 3:11
Christ in me and I in Christ.
This is one reason people get discouraged about turning 30 or 40 or 50. I’m that young running beautiful person who’s energetic and invincible and fun. And then you’re older than you’ve ever been before and your body hurts in new places and you’re tired and so many things aren’t worth doing if it will make you cold. And then you have an identity crisis, because how you defined yourself is fading away.
But I was in Christ when I was 20, and I am in Christ at 40(+), and if the Lord wills me to see that day, I’ll be in Christ when I’m 90.
My identity never actually changes. Life changes, my body changes, but Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. And He is all, and in all.
By His doing you are in Christ Jesus.
~1 Corinthians 1:30
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