Should Men Exercise?

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Alright Tim, the question for today's episode is should men exercise? Yeah, I think most people for most of my life would probably have answered this question with just an obvious kind of, duh, kind of response to it.

So, I mean, you ask a question like that, should men exercise, should people exercise in general, however you're asking it,

I think most people would just kind of think that that would probably go without saying that most people should probably exercise in general.

But then it seems like one of those things right now that I don't know that most people, their intuitions are trained that way anymore, so it seems like in the minds of many people this kind of question is a lot more complicated than it seems to be on the surface of it.

Is that your experience? Yeah, yeah, I've seen a lot of people who, you know, if you were to say like, hey, it's a good idea to exercise, they're kind of like they get very defensive very quickly, basically.

Yeah, I mean, some of that's the body positivity stuff, like in general, but that influences women more than it influences men, but then there's a lot of men out there that just seem to respond primarily, you know, to questions like that through the language of offense, and that's kind of strange, you know.

Yeah. That's definitely kind of strange to think that men are responding to this kind of question with, you know, primarily through the lens of offense, but then on the other hand,

I mean, I think a lot of people have some sort of intuitive sense that they should probably try a little bit more than what they're trying, and it doesn't hurt to get in shape, and there's all, you know, health benefits to getting in shape and everything else to where, you know, it decreases your risk of heart attacks and, you know, strokes and all that, and so,

I mean, I think overwhelmingly obvious, yeah, I mean, it would probably be a good idea for most people to at least get some sort of aerobic exercise.

Yeah, yeah, especially given how much free time most people have.

It seems like a good investment to, like, at least go, you know, walk around the park for 30 minutes or something.

Sure, yeah, so, I mean, instantaneously, I guess with the rise of, like, social media and the internet and everything else,

I think most people, when they hear this sort of thing, they instantaneously, like, hear, you know, for some, you know, bizarre reason that if you were to say, yeah,

I mean, people should probably exercise a little bit, then they hear, like, that you're putting upon them some sort of demand to be some sort of, like,

Instagram model or something like that. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's typically the girly response to that kind of thing to say, you know,

I'm sorry, I'm never going to be an Instagram model or whatever, you know, that kind of thing, which is a real defensive, real sensitive kind of response, but then on the other end, like, men do the same kind of thing.

They may not word it quite like that, but, like, instantaneously, they get kind of high and mighty and get kind of offended.

But, I mean, I don't know. I mean, 1 Peter 4 .8 says that while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way as it holds promise for the present life and also the life to come.

So, you know, many people are reading that kind of verse, and they're reading that as if it's saying bodily training is of no value, right?

Right, yeah, right. And godliness is of value in every way. And so there's this kind of, like, very sharp disjunct between, you know, godliness and bodily training where,

I mean, the point of the passage is to say that bodily training is of some value, and so you might not want to minimize that value.

And, I mean, certainly, like, we're living in a different society right now. So we're living in a sedentary society where most people, you know, most middle class kind of people are working jobs that require them to sit for long hours.

And so you have that, plus you have, like, probably one of the most unhealthy diets in the history of the world. And then all of that is kind of conspiring to people, you know, gaining weight, essentially.

And then, you know, a lot of it is diet related. So, like, meaning, like, if you eat the most unhealthy diet in the history of the world, you know, you're going to gain weight.

And so a lot of people, like, they try to exercise a little bit, and they realize that it's not really doing anything, so they give up on that.

And, you know, most of it is probably diet and what they're drinking. And I'd say, like, most people, like, if they would just switch away from getting the sugar drinks, they would lose a lot of weight, and they wouldn't be, like, near as morbidly obese as what they are.

But, you know, just taking this topic as a whole, trying to answer that question, I mean, you know, David talks about that he makes his arms strong for war.

And, you know, he talks about being able to bend a bow of bronze and that kind of thing. And so, I mean, I don't think there's any value in weakness.

And, you know, I think in our society right now, a lot of the situations where men are in that require them to be protectors and providers are protectors in general, you know, of people, like particularly weak people.

I think most men are not put in those kind of situations on a regular basis. Yeah. And so they're looking to, like, the government to be that for them.

So if there's any kind of difficult thing that happens, they're instantaneously predisposed to call the police or whatever.

But, I mean, I think if you do keep yourself in reasonable shape, like there's something about that that puts you in a better position, like it gives you confidence to put you in a better position that, like if there is danger that requires some sort of physical response, then you're ready to respond.

Right? Right. Yeah. And so I think the standard kind of guy today, like if he encounters a situation like that, his instantaneous impulse is because he probably hasn't taken care of himself because he doesn't have a whole lot of self -confidence because he totally let himself go in certain ways.

The standard kind of impulse is to pull out your phone and then record it or something like that. Right? Yeah. Yeah.

Just to be a bystander. And, you know, I mean, I was kind of in a situation like this past week where I saw a guy downtown being attacked by a pit bull.

Okay. I'm laughing because it was obviously a pit bull that was attacking this guy.

But, I mean, the guy was to be - We've done an episode on that. There's a guy being attacked by a pit bull downtown.

And, you know, I pulled the van over and I thought, I need to go help. Right? And so as I was about to go get out of the van to go help, the owner of the dog kind of got him away and then drove off.

And then I'm pulling out my phone trying to take a picture. So maybe if I would have taken like the metrosexual approach to not help,

I could have gotten like a picture of the whole thing. Yeah. If you had posted it to WorldStar, they might be tracking the guy down right now.

I mean, but the poor guy on the other hand, man, he got like bit by this stupid dog. But, you know,

I think most people they don't have some sort of impulse to go and help, you know? And a lot of it's because they're just, man, they're just there.

You know, those situations, they don't come up often, but they come up enough and you should be ready to go. And so I think, you know, there's a lot of reasons why exercising would be a good thing.

Just taking care of yourself, taking care of the body. God's given you, he's given you. Like if you know that you're embodied, you know that.

I mean, there's obviously a sense in which like, you know, whenever it's your time to go, it's your time to go. But God uses means to accomplish his ends and just keeping yourself in reasonable shape.

You know, you might not die of a heart attack at 40 or something, you know, but my, my wife's her, her dad, he died of a heart attack when he was in his mid forties and or mid to late forties.

And, you know, he didn't take care of himself very well. And so, I mean, like, if you, if you think about things like that, if you just keep yourself in reasonable proportion and keep yourself reasonably strong, it could be that.

Yeah. I mean, you, you know, God might use that as a means of extending your life a lot longer than otherwise.

So, I mean, there's things you can do that just like take a, you know take this body that's

God's given you and just kind of thrown it, throw it in the trash. And I don't think Christians should do that. I think we should, you know, be somewhat conscious, but at the same time you have to keep these things in perspective.

And you know that, you know, whenever it's our time to go, it's your time to go no matter how well you exercise. And, you know, a lot of people like they make idols out of these things on the other end, you know?

Sure. You know, I have relatives who died in the early forties when they tried their whole life to be healthy too, you know, get cancer and die.

So like, it's just, it's it's not a guarantee that you're not a guarantee.

Yeah. But on balance of probability, I mean, why wouldn't you want to do the things necessary to keep yourself in shape? And particularly if you're a man, you have a job to kind of protect people who are weak.

And if you want to put yourself in the worst position possible where, you know, I mean, basically you're out of breath after you run a couple of steps or, you know, if you try to run a few steps, you may be in danger of spreading your ankle and falling and tripping and run 10 steps and you're out of breath already.

You're done. Yeah. I mean, so you might want to put yourself in the best kind of situation to, you know, not have to be dependent on other men to be the men for you, you know?

So, yeah, I would say keeping yourself in some sort of shape is good. Yeah, there's definitely some wisdom there.

And, you know, yeah, my, my grandparents were a similar way where they, they didn't really take care of themselves.

And then one of the, you know, one of the unfortunate aspects of that is my grandfather didn't get to live long enough to see his great grandchildren because, because, you know, they ate a really, they ate a really poor diet, diet was a big part of it, but then they also were extremely sedentary at the same time.

And so because of that and some other stuff that was probably out of there, out of his control, but, you know, it's, it's the lack of exercise, the lack of really taking care of his body.

It led to, you know, consequences that you're not thinking about when you're 30 and when you're 20, when you're 40 even in your teens.

And, and there certainly are people that take exercise far beyond what it's meant to be, like you said, but then it does seem like there's a lot of benefits to it.

You know, like what, what happens if as Christians, we eventually have to like go live a life on the run.

Right. And you, and you have a family and it's like, you're the, you're the guy who gets winded going up a flight of stairs, then, you know, you're not going to, you're probably not going to fare too well.

So what's funny about, yeah. So, you know, what's funny about these kinds of things is that like typically people, they apply the wrong part of this kind of verse to their situation.

Okay. So meaning like, you know, for while bodily training is of some value, Godliness is a value in every way, as it holds promise to the present life and also to the life to come.

Like what typically happens is, and this happens like with both genders in different ways. But you know, like, like there are situations where like, if I were to use a female analogy or something like this, like, you know, there's all these mommy blogs out there where ladies are basically not really taking care of their home very well.

And then like, they all like, you know, they post pictures of like their house just being an utter ruin, utter mess or whatever.

And then all the girls come along, like, you know, all their friends come along and basically, you know, encourage them and say, you know, like God, you know, like, you know,

God's not expecting us to be perfect and that kind of thing. Right. And you don't have to be a perfectionist and we don't want to be self -righteous and we don't want to be legalist and, you know, all that stuff.

And, and it's just in like, and then, you know, the girl will write the blog and then what she's writing is about like her struggles with perfectionism and all that.

And I hope sometimes she just has to like, let it go, you know, to show that she's not being a perfectionist.

It's like, but this is, this is like sloth, right? Could you imagine saying that at your job?

Sorry, I didn't get that report in. I wanted to make sure I wasn't giving into my, my tendency to be a perfectionist.

So, but like there's some ladies though, who like, you know, I've known some ladies who like, they have, they have a list of like housework that is like, you know, four pages of housework, you know things they have to do every day, you know, including like hand scrubbing the floors with their toothbrush or something like that.

Right. And so there are those kinds of women who they need to hear the, don't be perfectionist kind of thing.

Right. Yeah. And then on the other side, like the ladies who like their house is a mess and they're posting pictures of it on Instagram, Instagram and all that.

And like, they're not the perfectionist. They don't need to hear that message. They need to hear the, like go to the ant, your sluggard kind of message.

Right. Yeah. And so, but the same thing is happening with like the, the like with guys with this bodily training is of some value kind of thing.

It's like, you know, like the, there is a kind of guy who like is so obsessed with working out that, you know, he's working out three, you know, three hours a day or whatever.

Like there's that kind of guy who is just, you know, beating himself, raking himself over the coals.

If he gained a few pounds or whatever else. One bicep is larger than the other bicep.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so there are guys like that, but I mean, those are very rare and like the vast majority of American men are not that.

Right. And so like, just talking about gaining like the discipline necessary to maybe, you know, walk for 20 minutes a day or something like that.

Most, most men are not even like anywhere near that having that kind of like, so their problem is a lack of discipline.

Their problem is not that they're perfectionist. Right. Right. And so then you don't basically like comfort yourself with like, don't be a perfectionist kind of stuff.

Like when your problem is a lack of discipline. Right. So bodily just bodily training, bodily discipline is of some value.

Godliness is a value in every way. So what you're not doing, like, so you have a lot of guys who are basically saying, you know, it's of no value.

And then they're comforting themselves because they have no discipline and they're not have like no man despises his own flesh except for basically all

Americans. Right. But nourishes it and cherishes it.

Right. So you basically like you want to apply the right message to the right situation. And like, you know, most guys are probably not like, you know, fitness guru freaks who are, you know, obsessed with all of these things like that.

Most of them just need to gain some discipline. They have like the lack of discipline problems. And then on the other end, no, yeah, sure.

I mean like, you know, you're not going to die if you eat a cheeseburger once or something like that. Right. Right. Right.

So, so basically, yeah. Yes. There's some value. Sure. Okay. Fair enough. This has been another episode of Bible bashed.

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