Why does gravity have to pull us down as we age? Why can’t we age in reverse direction, growing more taut, smooth, and muscular with the passing of each new decade? Certainly, we older people would appreciate looking “young” more than the younger generation who so effortlessly appears so.

Why do we have to slump and sag as we age? Why can’t we grow ever stronger, sleeker, and more powerful through the years?

Perhaps we can. But to do so we need to look a little deeper than our bodily exteriors.

In the New Testament there seems to be a direct correlation between the decaying of our bodies and the renewing of our souls. In 2 Corinthians 4:16 the Apostle Paul said, “…though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”

It seems that our bodies and spirits are capable of moving in two different directions at the same time, down toward the ground and up toward the heavens.

It’s almost as if we’re walking billboards, advertising eternal (zoe) life in the midst of natural (bios) life.

We touch that eternal life in transcendent moments—in worship, with loved ones, through art, in nature—and we are convinced that we were created to live forever with the God who loves us most. But then we duck back into the rat race and feel the inexorable pull of gravity, drawing us ever closer to the grave.

Perhaps a perspective shift would help us. Rather than bemoaning the pull of old age and frantically trying to preserve our youth, what if we set our spirits free to soar? What if we invested in the life that Jesus spoke of, an eternal kind of life that begins in His presence and extends beyond our mortality? That’s the kind of life we were destined for.

So go ahead and do your push-ups, stick to your cardio, and drink lots of water—but remember that real life is upward, where your spirit naturally soars.