Ep.38: Prayer Guide for the Female Body

Welcome to the woven well podcast. I'm your host, Caitlin Estes. I'm a certified fertility care practitioner with a master of divinity degree. Each episode will cover a topic that helps educate and empower you and your fertility while honoring the deep connection your fertility has with your faith. Let's get started.

Welcome back to the woven well podcast. If you are a frequent listener of our podcast, then you know that we often take an educational or theological topic about fertility and really dive in. But today we're going to do something a little bit different. We're going to really connect with our physical bodies and ponder the relationship that we have with it, and also God's perspective on our physical body. So we have provided on our website a prayer guide for the female body, because most of our listeners are females, and we are mainly talking about female fertility. And so we have this prayer guide available. It is free. You can get it anytime you would like at woven fertility.com/resources, but we're going to use that as a general guide as we walk through this process today. So you may be tempted to say, ‘oh, well, this episode I don't need,’ but just pause for just a moment to think about that.

What I have found very often is we can sometimes have a hard time with our physical bodies. We get too disconnected from our bodies. Either that's because we are displeased with it, or we feel that society is displeased with it. Maybe we don't live up to some sort of standard, or we don't compare to someone else out there, whether they're celebrities or the friend down the street or someone we grew up with, or our body's been harmed in some way. And in each of these situations, or because of one of these situations, we disconnect a little bit and we tend to talk negatively about our body too. But you know, God is a big fan of the physical body of the human being. Both body and soul, that’s what's so unique about being a human being. In fact, God thinks it's so critical that Jesus was sent to put on flesh fully God, fully man, to become a human, to say, I'm going to put on bones and flesh and blood.

That is amazing. It's unbelievable when you stop to think about it, that God would put on flesh, came into the world, be birthed of Mary. That's what we celebrate every Christmas when we celebrate the birth of Jesus that God put on flesh and fully became a human being. So there's something to it, right? There's something critical to being a human being. And within that, both male and female, we learn in Genesis 1 26 through 27, where it says, “Then God said, let us make humankind in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created humans in his own image, in the image of God. He created them, male and female.He created them.”

So there's something unique to being a human and there's something unique to being a female human within that. So I think it's worth it to celebrate those things. If it was significant enough for Jesus to put on flesh, to become human, it's important enough for us to take notice of it and really celebrate that aspect. Even though I know it can be difficult. So I find that the best way to start this practice is by asking to feel God's love for your physical body. Be prayerful, be open God, “You made me just as I am. There are things about my body that I struggle with, but you love. I am broken. You are the healer. I know that you have a beautiful purpose for my life. You created me as a human being to bring you glory and for my good help me to see that help me to experience that. Allow me to feel the love that you have for your creation. Point me back to you as I think about how I am created in your image. Thank you for making me in your image. What an honor, what a blessing.”

Now, with that mindset, I'd like for us to take a new look at our body through God's perspective. Let’s start at the top and work our way down, and what we're going to do is think about each aspect of our body and how we feel about it. Start at the very top of your head, move down to your face and your ears, your shoulders, your chest, your abdomen, your reproductive organs, your legs, your feet, your toes. And as you think about each aspect of your body, what first comes to mind? Is it something you don't love? Is it something that maybe kids used to make fun of when you were younger? Is it something that you wish it was different or you want to improve in some way versus how does God see those aspects of you? When we look at ourselves through the lens of God's creation, God's craftsmanship, and God's love for us, doesn’t it radically change how we experience each part from there? I find that asking certain questions can be helpful. 

As you ponder, as you're prayerful in this openness, they may be, “Why did you design me as you did? What good do you have for me through the unique design of my body? I know it's intentional. So what good do you have in store for me through how I am uniquely made? Show me the significance of having a womb that sheds blood each cycle. Why did you create me like that, Lord? What good do you have for me there? Show me the significance of ovaries that produce hormones and release eggs. I know there is an intention. You are pointing me back to you through this process. How can I see you in a new way, through how you uniquely built me as a female? Help me to understand you better as I ponder the unity of female and male for the creation of new life. Why is it that you created male and female differently? How does all of this point me to you? How are you pointing me to you through the potential of life within my womb?” 

All of these are good questions. You may want to take one or two of these questions and really sit with it for a while. Really be open to what God could lead you to in this moment. It could be that scripture is helpful for you too. We already mentioned Genesis, and I think that's really important. But another favorite one that you've probably heard before, but I think is so important and meaningful is Psalm 139 specifically versus 13 through 16 “for you created my inmost being. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made your works are wonderful. I know that full well, my frame was not hidden from you. When I was made in the secret place.When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”

Those verses speak to this intimate relationship between us and our God, not just spiritually, but physically. God knit together our bodies in our mother's wombs. Ah, what does that speak to you? That speaks to intention, that speaks to beauty, that speaks to craftsmanship. You were not an accident; you were made on purpose. Your body was designed as it is on purpose, which means that there is good there. There is a way to glorify God there and God is present in it. Man, there's something so important about that. And that leads us to a time of thanksgiving, a time of praise for all that God has done in creating us as God did.

So maybe we end with a time of that thanksgiving. Maybe in this process, as you started at the top of your body and worked down all the way to your toes, maybe there was something that God inspired in that thought. Maybe God revealed a love for a certain aspect of your body that you struggled with. Thank God for revealing that love, redeeming that painful memory or scar that you have. And if you are still in that space of pain when you think about that area of your body, leave that open to God's work. God will work within it. Maybe as you asked those questions, as you pondered what God was teaching you in how you were designed, how you were made as a female, what your body does as a female, that you could celebrate each one of those things, each one of those lessons that you learned, or maybe it was just one critical insight. That's all we really need for thanking God for that insight in how we were made. 

Even if this has felt totally funny for you, this is not your kind of thing, I say, congratulations on doing it anyway! And thank God for the opportunity to have this moment of open prayer with God. Sometimes practicing something new like this can be just simply awkward the first couple times, but after that, it really becomes fruitful. So maybe you practice it again on your own without my guide if this is not your kind of thing. Like I said, you can go to our website and get this free resource at any time. But one thing we can all thank God for is the love that God has for us, that God demonstrated through making us in the image of God, through making you in the image of God. We can also thank God for the fact that Jesus came to earth to put on flesh. What a gift, what an absolute gift God was intentional in crafting your body. God was intentional in making you a female. God was intentional in the design for humankind. Let us celebrate that together. Thanks for listening today. As we continue to explore what it means to be woven well.