I was walking out of another lifting session with my trainer. He started telling me about how his girlfriend had come over and spent Sunday afternoon with him…in bed (TMI Alert!). I did not say anything judgemental or otherwise but he must have seen the look on my face as he said, “We all have physical needs!” Again, I did not say anything, it was none of my business. However, I left thinking about what he said.

Several years before this, I had a conversation with a Catholic priest. He was telling me that he did not deny that he had a desire for physical intimacy with a woman but that he gave his needs to the Lord. He told me that I should to. While that does not make the desire go away, he admitted, it does give you strength to have patience. He reminded me that even Jesus had needs and desires as He was fully human.

Now, I have never seen the full movie, The Last Temptation of Christ, I did try to watch it, but I got very confused in the first 10 minutes and just turned it off. I heard a lot about it: how bread and the wine turns into real human flesh and how on the cross, Jesus imagines having a family with Mary Magdelene. The real Jesus may have been tempted by Mary Magdelene and thoughts of making a life with her, I do not know. However, I do know that He was tempted by the comforts and sparkly things of this world. I do know he wanted to eat and drink good food and drink and breathe and he did not wear camel’s hair, that was John the Baptist’s thing.

However, after thinking about what my trainer said, a thought came to me. Yes, my trainer and myself, and everyone else has physical needs, but Jesus did too. And He put off His needs to accomplish something great. His flesh definitely did not have a desire to be rammed through with metal spikes or with a thorny crown. He did not have a desire to be whipped within an inch of his life just to be hoisted up on a large “t”. He did not have a physical desire to be stabbed in the side with a spear. His physical body definitely did not need that.

Yet, he had a larger goal in mind. I am definitely thankful for that. It gives me hope that as I put off my physical needs (whatever they may be at the time) for the right time, a time blessed by the Lord, it will be worth waiting for.

John 3:14-17 As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only born Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 17 For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him. 

———————————————————————————————-W.