My eyes catch a glimpse of the fingers slowly dancing across my keyboard. Wrinkles web across the surface, highlighting every bump and lump. They weave up towards the rounded knuckles—the ones that gripe at me from time to time. The thinning skin that’s weathered years of toil reveals blue veins beneath. I wonder if, or when, arthritis will come to stay?

I recline in my chair and slowly roll my shoulders back and forth, attempting to free the pinched nerve from the previous night’s sleep. It’s been happening more often. The sound of grinding muscles reverberates through my head, as I try to release the tightened offender. 

I’m thirty-four years old, but I’m already acutely aware of the way my body is changing. It surfaces in spurts—when I wake up, crawl out of bed, and stretch only to suffer the consequences for the rest of the day. I feel these changes when I attempt a spinning ride with my children, leave a dish too spicy, or find myself unable to keep my eyes open in the evening. Things are not as they were. 

Our culture tries to convince us we can all drink from the fountain of youth. Actresses in their seventies zip themselves into the latest fashion and appear on magazines and screens. They perpetuate the con that a little makeup, Botox, and a fitness regimen can keep your youthful zeal forever. Yet it’s nothing but smoke. 

The graceful arms of our favorite movie icon can no longer do all they used to do. The intelligent wit of that actor has slowed, and some of their neural connections are now non-existent as memories slip from their mind. No matter how much pampering, clean eating, or willpower we commit to on this earth, our body will continue to weaken. The curse of sin demands it. Each day we wake up, our bodies walk toward death. 

Pilgrimage to Dust

As much as we don’t like to admit it, we know weakness hangs in our future. We feel it with each funeral that hits our church. We see it in our grandparents and parents who force us to view the fragility of their bodies up close. We see it in ourselves. The writer in Ecclesiastes tells us no one can escape. We all go to one place: “All are from the dust, and to dust all return” (Eccles. 3:20).

We can hide, deny, or try to avoid it, but the reality remains that our entire life is one of increasing debility. We begin our lives helpless, as babies who begin to grow in strength and power. Yet with each day, our bodies begin to cycle back to the beginning, in a rhythm that releases whatever strength we accrued in this life. Our toned muscles will eventually deteriorate. Our neural connections will gradually wane. Our pilgrimage to dust might be delayed, but death will come for all flesh on this earth, just as it did for the Word who became flesh.

When Christ took on human nature, he, too, took on a body headed for weakness. He may not have felt the years of natural decline of the body, but he felt the full force of weakness in his earthly life.

Every day of Christ’s ministry was one day closer to the day he would die. While the disciples dreamed of the power and revolution he would bring, Christ knew that suffering waited ahead. While Peter and John argued about who would sit at his right hand, Jesus anticipated when that hand would be suspended by a nail as his naked body hung against a tree. 

The humiliation of Christ was not one moment, but it was a crescendo that built across his whole life. From the day he was born, Jesus walked towards weakness again and again. He put aside his rightful glory and made himself lower, even to the point of his painful and gruesome death on the cross (Phil. 2:6–8).

Yet the story doesn’t end there. 

While Christ walked toward weakness, we know in reality, he walked towards his greatest exaltation. The mockers and jeerers at the cross saw his humiliation while he hung, but we see the ultimate victory for our cursed world. One man to his side laughed at his fragility and another man hung at his other side and saw his mighty Savior. The crucifixion that many regarded as foolishness, we know to be the joy and hope of the saints’ existence. 

Though Christ progressed towards physical death, he was truly walking to his glory. In his physical body’s greatest moment of weakness, Christ took our punishment, conquered sin’s grip, set us free, and rose again to life. Incredibly, he allows his children to follow in the same way. 

Pilgrimage to Glory

As saints united to Christ by faith, we follow after our Savior. Our bodies will continue to weaken in this life as we walk each day closer to death, but our story doesn’t end there either. Because of Christ’s death and resurrection, we know we too walk towards something greater.

On the outside, we’ll continue to deteriorate each day. Our bodies will wear out, we’ll grow weaker, more dependent, and helpless. As the years pass, we’ll bid goodbye to activities we once loved doing. We’ll watch our lives shift from being the providers and doers, to mere observers and takers of the younger people around us. The world may then tell us we’re useless. They’ll tell us our greatest years have already past—that humiliation awaits us. 

Yet amidst the growing weakness, we know God is doing something amazing. Each day that wears on our aching body, is another day our hearts are being conformed and molded after Christ. Along with each line that surfaces on our face, and every memory that slips past our consciousness, we take one step closer to the day Christ will finally complete the good work he has begun in us (Phil. 1:6). It all seems foolish to those around us, but to us it’s our life and our hope.

Our bodies may be driving us back towards the dust, but at the same time the Holy Spirit is inwardly pushing us along to glory. He will continue sanctifying us, until the final day, seemingly at our weakest, when our body succumbs to its physical death, we will behold the greatest victory! The beautiful chain of God’s work will be fashioned, and the sin that plagues our hearts will be cast off forever (Rom. 8:30). We will finally grasp freedom from the grief, pain, and loss in our sin-cursed world. And on that day we’ll be face to face with the one who also willingly walked towards weakness, so that we would be able to walk towards glory. 

The world around us shouts that our weakening bodies are a liability. They’re something we must find shame in, and hide as much as possible. Our Savior invites us to take his hand and boldly walk towards our weakness. He beckons us to see his power displayed in the midst of our growing helplessness (2 Cor. 12:9). And he gently directs us to fix our eyes on the hope that awaits the frail saints who follow after their humiliated, but exalted Savior.  

Brianna Lambert is a wife and a mom to three, making their home in the cornfields of Indiana. She loves using writing to work out the truths God is teaching her each day. She is a staff writer with GCD and has contributed to various online publications, such as Christianity Today and The Gospel Coalition. You can find more of her writing paired with her husband’s photography at lookingtotheharvest.com.