Breathe.

There. You just did it. And there--again. Without a thought. Maybe there was a blink or two inbetween. You took a breath. Inhale. Exhale. Oxygen. Carbon Dioxide. Again. Your lungs expand approximately 23,000 times a day, intaking around 10,000 quarts of air that lend oxygen to your blood.¹ That's a LOT of breathing. And yet we do it without thinking. We don't have to think about it; we just do it. In. . .and out. Your chest pushes out. . .then shrinks in again. No one commands you to do this. It just happens.

Or does it?²

We were created to breathe. If you don't do it, you're dead.

If a person is not breathing, we say they're dead. Those medical people define death as: "the irreversible cessation of all vital functions especially as indicated by permanent stoppage of the heart, respiration, and brain activity : the end of life"³

And what does it mean to be dead? "No longer living; not endowed with life; bereft of sensation; lacking sensitivity of feeling; no longer funtioning; not moving or circulating; put out, extinguished; incapable of being emotionally moved; lacking the customary activity."4

It even says in the book of Psalms that God takes away our breath, and we die as a result.5

Duh, right?

But I don't want to talk about physical breath.

I want to talk about spiritual respiration.

Just last weekend I drove down to my beloved hometown of Toledo, in order to fulfill an appointment I had made at the aforestated city's hospital. My doctor had written a free pass6 for me to take a pulmonary function test, and although it sounds like a very serious, lengthy type of test (it WAS rather long--1 1/2 hours), let me assure you that it wasn't serious enough for me to quell my random observations about the tubed equipment to the wonderful nurse.

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¹ http://www.mamashealth.com/organs/lungs.asp

² Hm. Funny how this is looking (commentating in annotation-style. . .? What?) and sounding creepily like a mix between a guy who authored Sunsets and Sushi (and happens to play in the sweetest band EVER, consequently named after him) and a guy who wrote Velvet Elvis and in his spare time creates 15 minute-in-yo-face-redefinting-Christianity videos(new ma?) that sell for sixteen and a half dollars at Lifeway Christian Stores. . .

³ "death." Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary. Merriam-Webster, Inc. 13 Sep. 2007. .

4 "dead." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 13 Sep. 2007. .

5 "when you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust." (Ps. 104:29b, ESV).

6 It was really a prescription for this test to be administered--and yeah! It WAS on that cool, two-toned 'This-is-an-authentic-prescription-Do-not-forge-or-the-medical-fuzz-will-come-after-you-in-a-paddywagon' paper. This author was majorly impressed with the authoritative status of this small piece of paper.