The Conversation That Sparked This

I shared an article about how anxiety causes real physical symptoms - the headaches, tight shoulders, churning stomach - even when doctors find "nothing wrong." A friend responded with this:

"I don't agree that perfection is impossible. Perfection is possible, but only through Christ, who is able to make us whole through the process of sanctification."

"The Spiritual presides over the physical and the mental (emotions)."

She included a beautiful devotional about God being "the Alpha and the Omega" - how He orchestrates necessary endings to move us into new seasons.

This response reflects a common and sincere Christian perspective. But I believe it misses something important - and in missing it, we may inadvertently harm the very people we're trying to help.

The Misunderstanding

Here's what happened in that exchange: I made an observational statement about how the body works, and she heard a theological claim about God's limitations.

But these aren't in opposition.

Saying "anxiety causes physical symptoms" is not saying "God cannot heal" any more than saying "fire burns" denies God's power to deliver Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the furnace.

Understanding mechanism is not unbelief. It's stewardship.

The Incarnational Reality We Often Forget

Consider this: Jesus Christ - fully God, fully man - experienced physical distress.

In Gethsemane, He sweat drops like blood (Luke 22:44). This wasn't a failure of faith. This wasn't sin. This was the Son of God experiencing what happens when a human body encounters overwhelming stress. Medical literature calls this "hematidrosis" - a rare but documented phenomenon where extreme anxiety causes capillaries to rupture into sweat glands.

Jesus didn't bypass His body. He inhabited it fully.

The Word became flesh (John 1:14) - not spirit wearing a flesh costume, but actual embodied humanity with all its vulnerabilities. He got tired (John 4:6). He got hungry (Matthew 4:2). He wept (John 11:35).

If the spiritual simply "presided over" the physical in the way we sometimes imagine, why would any of this be necessary?

Paul's Thorn and God's Sufficient Grace

Paul pleaded three times for God to remove his "thorn in the flesh" (2 Corinthians 12:7-9). God's answer wasn't "you lack faith" or "try harder to let the spiritual preside."

God said: "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."

Notice what God didn't say:

• He didn't say the thorn wasn't real
• He didn't say Paul was being unspiritual for experiencing it
• He didn't remove it

Instead, He offered presence within the struggle, not escape from it.

This is a profoundly different theology than "the spiritual presides over the physical" - it's a theology of accompaniment, where God meets us in our embodied reality rather than lifting us out of it.

The Danger of Spiritual Bypassing

When we tell someone whose body is manifesting anxiety that they simply need more faith, or that the spiritual should override the physical, we risk several harms:

We add shame to suffering. Now they're not just anxious - they're anxious AND spiritually deficient. The very thing meant to comfort becomes another source of condemnation.

We discourage practical help. If the answer is purely spiritual, why learn breathing techniques? Why examine thought patterns? Why steward the body God gave us? This isn't faith - it's a form of neglect dressed in spiritual language.

We misrepresent Scripture. The Bible is full of practical, embodied wisdom. Elijah, after his greatest spiritual victory, collapsed in exhaustion and God's prescription was... sleep and food (1 Kings 19:5-8). Not a sermon. Not a rebuke. Rest and nutrition.

We isolate the struggling. People learn to hide their ongoing battles because the expected testimony is victory, not process. The church becomes a place where only the healed are welcomed.

What "Renewing Your Mind" Actually Requires

Romans 12:2 tells us to be "transformed by the renewing of your mind."

But you cannot renew what you do not understand.

This is why cognitive behavioral therapy, properly understood, is not in opposition to faith - it's an application of the biblical principle that our thoughts shape our experience. "As a man thinks in his heart, so is he" (Proverbs 23:7).

Understanding that anxious thoughts trigger stress hormones, which cause muscle tension, which creates pain, which generates more anxious thoughts... this isn't denying God. This is mapping the territory so we can cooperate with the transformation God desires.

The farmer who understands soil composition isn't showing less faith than the one who just scatters seed randomly. He's being a better steward.

A More Integrated View

What if we held both truths together?

• Yes, God is sovereign and capable of miraculous healing
• And He has given us bodies that operate according to discoverable principles
• Yes, the spiritual realm is real and significant
• And the physical realm is not less real or less important - God created it and called it "good"
• Yes, sanctification is a work of the Spirit
• And that work often happens through natural processes, not despite them

The spiritual doesn't "preside over" the physical like a manager who never visits the factory floor. The spiritual permeates the physical. They are interwoven by design.

This is why the resurrection is bodily. This is why we await "the redemption of our bodies" (Romans 8:23), not escape from them.

A Gentle Challenge

To my brothers and sisters who respond to physical struggles with purely spiritual solutions:

I know your heart is good. You want to point people to ultimate hope, not temporary fixes. You believe - rightly - that God is the source of all healing.

But consider: when someone is drowning, the most spiritual act might be throwing them a rope, not explaining the theology of water.

Jesus healed bodies. He touched lepers. He made mud for blind eyes. He cooked breakfast for tired fishermen. He was relentlessly, embarrassingly practical.

Perhaps we honour Him best not by transcending our humanity, but by attending to it with the same care He showed.

The Invitation

If your body is hurting and nothing seems physically wrong, you're not crazy. You're not unspiritual. You're human.

And there are ways to understand what's happening - ways that don't require you to choose between faith and physiology, between trusting God and getting practical help.

The same God who designed your nervous system can teach you how to steward it.

That's not a contradiction. That's integration.

That's faith with skin on.