For those who work out at gyms…have you ever just stopped to realize the sheer amount of vanity and self-absorption that emanates from the majority of individuals exercising there? People walking around with gallon jugs of water staring in every mirror they can find. People wearing sunglasses while they lift…to look cool! Wearing as little clothes as possible like one is in a strip joint. Guys walking with their arms all flared out yet they only weight 125 lbs! Now different gyms yield a greater percentage of this than others of course but what continues to come to my mind is the scriptures in 2 Timothy 3:1-5:

There will be terrible times in the last days, people will be LOVERS OF THEMSELVES, lovers of money, BOASTFUL, PROUD, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of good, treacherous, rash, CONCEITED, LOVERS OF PLEASURE RATHER THAN LOVERS OF GOD, having a form of godliness but denying its power. (2 Tim 3:1-5)

Now I know not everyone who goes to a gym fits such a bill but as one who has been in gyms for the past 20 years regularly, I can attest to the truth of this matter. In fact, I myself have at times been caught up in such an attitude, all the while wondering my relationship with God was not what it should be. Just too much focus on self. There is one guy at the gym who just sits in the locker room admiring himself for an hour while he gets ready. He constantly goes to the mirror and basically caresses himself in the mirror while looking at himself, grooming himself slowly over and over-then going back to the mirror to admire himself. The guy is in love with himself! The very thing the scriptures speak of! This whole society is in love with themselves, from head to foot! Marriages disintegrate because people care too much about themselves, their comfort, themselves getting theirs, self-idolization! Much of the people in gyms just happen to fall into this category. The first two commandments (of the 10 Commandments were this: I am the Lord your God and you shall have no other gods before me; You shall not make for yourselves any idols.  Our society is rampant in breaking these every day, every minute!

Jesus calls us to lay down our life that we may find another-namely life in Him and Him alone. Recently the Lord had been put on my heart that many of these modern day gym activities were just not pleasing to him because it involves man glorifying himself-worshiping himself. God alone is to be worshiped and adored. This is one of Satan’s greatest tools and the ultimate result of man’s original sin-pride that he/she is god.

“Lord, forgive us.” May our eyes alone be lifted up to Jesus Christ and our realization that He is all we will ever need. This body is temporal and will age and fade away, but His Word and His life which He desires to dwell within us will never fade away.