I can’t believe I’m writing about this – again! Today is a day that causes me to shudder and gag. This is National Love Your Feet Day, a day that focuses on feet, foot care, and all foot related issues.
While I’m certainly glad to have two of my own feet with all 10 toes attached at the right place and pointing the right direction, I am not infatuated with my feet and certainly not with the feet of the 8.1 billion people in the world. Most of those individuals have feet which means there are 16 billion feet and 160 billion toes! Heels that look like they need a cheese grater – and would probably break it; crooked, gnarly toes; toenails; toe fungus; bunions and corns – I’m sorry but it all makes my stomach church just a bit. Baby feet, though, are beautiful.
I’m glad that there are people like Carolyn Jenkins who are interested in everyone’s feet.
Carolyn Jenkins is the founder of this day and I have to give her credit as to why she found this day. “Carolyn D. Jenkins is the founder and CEO of CjQenterprises, which develops and promotes creative ideas and products that lift you up! She is an award winning author, the founder of The Jenkins Donelson Foundation, JDF, the creator annual National I LOVE My Feet Day!, and the Health and Wellness site found here, on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest, entitled I LOVE My Feet Days!
“Carolyn’s interest in feet began in college when she met a young lady who was born without arms. The student used her feet as hands by writing and eating with them. Everyone on campus was very impressed with that student’s ability to overcome adversity and the respect and awe she garnered was well deserved. Carolyn earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Education and never forgot the young lady. Carolyn learned about the importance of good foot care from her mother, who was a diabetic. After Carolyn experienced foot pain she visited a podiatrist and discovered she had fallen arches. Carolyn traced the cause back to wearing flip flops that didn’t provide arch support.”1
Podiatry became a field of medicine in 1862 when Dr. Isaac Newton Porter, an American surgeon, coined the term.2 According to the experts in this field, “Over 75% of Americans have some problem with their feet, but you can prevent many of these simply by taking care of your feet in the first place. We take care of other parts of our body but often forget about our feet. That’s a mistake.”3
I’ve already written more about feet that I’m comfortable with but if you would like to find out more, consider these “foot facts:”
The human foot and ankle has about 100 muscles, 33 joints, and 26 bones.
A typical individual must do 10,000 steps every day.
Over 8,000 distinct types of nerves may be found in the foot. It has the highest density per square centimeter of any body.
Your foot will feel forces comparable to that of a fully laden cement truck during the course of a day of walking.
A half-pint of perspiration may be produced by the 250,000 sympathetic nervous systems found on the human foot per day.
The size of a person’s feet will be at its greatest at night and at its smallest in the morning.
A totally new toenail will grow in around six months.
The condition where the second toe of the foot is longer than the first is known as Morton’s Toe.
Over the course of a lifetime, the typical person walks more than 110,000 miles.4
Obviously, the foot is every bit as much of our created anatomy as our face, eyes, ears, nose, and hands. God made us “fearfully and wonderfully.” But let’s admit it, every body part doesn’t have as much eye appeal as the other. And God made us that way for a purpose. We are a living, breathing, walking illustration of a truth found in 1 Corinthians 12:12-25.
“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. (13) For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit. (14) For the body is not one member, but many. (15) If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? (16) And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? (17) If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling? (18) But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him. (19) And if they were all one member, where were the body? (20) But now are they many members, yet but one body. (21) And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. (22) Nay, much more those members of the body, which seem to be more feeble, are necessary: (23) And those members of the body, which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow more abundant honour; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness. (24) For our comely parts have no need: but God hath tempered the body together, having given more abundant honour to that part which lacked: (25) That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another.”
God admits that within the body of Christ, just like in our physical body, there are going to be those members who really stand out in more prominent roles. There will be others who are in less glamorous roles. ALL members are to be given care. ALL members are to be treated with love. In so doing, we elevate the “less honorable” and “uncomely” to heights of honor and beauty.
What a great lesson for the body of Christ to learn about itself! And, as far as those feet are concerned, God is interested in foot care, especially those feet that take the Gospel. Isaiah 52:7 says, “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!”
1https://www.ilovemyfeetdays.com/?p=1856
2https://www.whatnationaldayisit.com/day/i-love-my-feet/
3https://syracusepodiatry.org/2021/08/how-to-love-your-feet-for-i-love-my-feet-day/
4https://www.nationaldaystoday.com/national-i-love-my-feet-day/
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