ReIntegrating Holiness: The Wholly Trinity of the Gut, Mind, & Body

1. Relatable Story: The Battle Within

Hey everyone,

So I’m in the middle of learning a little fun fact. And by “little,” I mean it might be one of the most important things I’ve ever processed.

If you’re a Christian, you’ve probably heard someone say we need to live in “God’s order.” And if you’re anything like me, you’ve probably said that a time or twenty.

Another phrase I repeated a lot?

“Be holy, as He is holy.”

“Be perfect, as He is perfect.”

…We’ll get to those in a minute.

Back then, I was a young Christian and believed God’s order meant doing the “right” things:

• Don’t drink, smoke, cuss, sleep around—blah blah blah.

• And at the same time, go to work (work hard, because that’s honorable)

• pay your bills on time

• go to church on Sunday

• serve selflessly

• evangelize constantly

• Tell people how good God is and how they should think like you to get to heaven.

  
  

You get the picture.

For me—single with no kids—God’s order looked like this:

• Work as a secretary

• Read the Bible aloud in the library I bought for public evangelism.

• Play YouTube sermons on Sundays. Pay the bills. Buy Christian DVDs to give away.

Repeat.

And like everyone else, I had breaking points. Exhaustion does that. So I’d escape on a two-week trip to Disney—and then feel guilty about it… because Disney was “so unholy.” The only way I could justify going was if I got the trip cheap—or free. (And a few times, I did.)

And then there was writing. Once in a while, I’d write a romance scene—something I used to do every night as a kid.

Even then, it felt like a guilty pleasure. I shouldn't want romance. I should be focused on work. Not on Play. Focus on doing the Right thing, Not on something Foolish that will NOT lead to a future.

As a teenager, I’d only allow myself to write those scenes after school, softball, and homework. Once the house was asleep, only then could I escape into fantasy.

As an adult, the writing remained a guilty pleasure that I would do every so often when I needed to escape. But with “maturity,” I could deny it more easily. Because I was a responsible adult. So the writing became less and less.

And once I turned to God in my thirties…. that sense of responsibility grew even stronger (and writing eventually disappeared completely).

Now, I wasn’t just supposed to be a responsible adult.... I was supposed to be a holy Christian.

Somewhere along the way, I realized: The problem wasn’t that I wasn’t trying hard enough. The problem was that I didn’t understand what holy or perfect actually meant.

2. Rooted Assumption: Be Perfect. Be Holy.

For most of my life, I thought God's command to “be holy” meant “be sinless.”

And “be perfect” meant “be without flaw.”

So I tried. I strived. I repented. I was full of right ideas I wanted to share with the world… (Wait a minute… I think I’m still doing that. Awkward. lol.)

But then I learned something that completely flipped my understanding.

The original words don’t mean what I thought they did.

Holy doesn’t mean “morally pure.” It means “set apart.” “Whole.” “Sacred.”

Perfect doesn’t mean “flawless.” It means “complete.” “Mature.” “Brought to fullness.”

That’s a huge difference, right?

God isn’t demanding performance. He’s inviting wholeness He isn’t waiting for me to never mess up—He’s drawing me to become integrated.

But what does that actually mean. What does it mean to be “whole”? It sounds like something a fancy therapist might say. I mean, I’m me—so of course I’m whole… right?

Thankfully, God says that whoever asks, receives. So I started asking. And slowly, I began to see the pattern.

First, I saw it in marriage. A man and woman become “one flesh.” We even talk about marriage like that— “My better half.” “Looking for my other half.” Two becoming one. That’s a picture of integration: two parts joined in a way that creates something new and complete.

Then came the second answer: God Himself. He’s a Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Three persons. One being. Unified in love and purpose. And we’re made in His image.

So maybe being holy—being whole—is about something much deeper than being good.

Maybe it's about becoming integrated within myself. Not perfect in performance—but complete in design.

But that left me with a new question: How is one person a Trinity?

3. Re-examined Evidence: The Design of God is the Design of You

Turns out, God didn’t just make us in His image metaphorically. He actually designed us to function like Him—three in one. And when one part is ignored or dominates the others, things break down. We are physically a Trinity. Each Individual has a Spirit, a soul, and a body. And each one of those entities has their own function.

Part of the Person	Biological Seat	Function	Reflects…
Spirit	Gut / Intuition (ENS)	Discerns truth, detects peace or threat	The Father
Soul	Mind (Conscious thought)	Interprets, reasons, chooses	The Holy Spirit
Body	Flesh / Nervous System	Acts, stores trauma, manifests beliefs	The Son

• The Enteric Nervous System (ENS), or your "second brain," is located in your gut and contains 100 million neurons. It can function independently from the brain and is responsible for intuitive knowing and emotion regulation.

• The vagus nerve carries signals between gut and brain—and 80–90% of those signals flow from the gut to the brain.

• Polyvagal theory shows that your body detects threat or peace before your brain can explain it.

• Trauma therapy and internal family systems (IFS) affirm that healing requires internal harmony, not dominance of one part over the others.

  
  

God wants your gut, mind, and body to operate in unity. Each part reflects a member of the Trinity. Together, they form one whole you.

I had heard the teaching about spirit, soul, and body years ago. But I didn’t know the physical reality of the fact we technically have two brains inside our body, each with a different function—the brain we know and the gut. (Bonus fun fact—science now confirms what Scripture has always shown: your gut is wise—and it was designed to help you discern truth, not just digest lunch.)

And even the brain itself reflects this same pattern. Your left hemisphere is logical, structured, and detail-focused. Your right hemisphere is emotional, creative, and intuitive. They don’t speak the same “language,” but they’re both essential. You need both to reason clearly and feel deeply. To plan and dream. To build and connect. When one side is silenced, the whole system suffers.

But still, what does that look like?

Remember how I told you about the romance writing that I suppressed and gave up because it was foolish? What if my secretary side represented one of those brains (the logical side), and the writing side of me represented the other side (the creative side)?

What’s outside reflects what’s inside. And considering my life consisted of logic, practicality, and doing the "right thing", it would suggest I was suppressing one entity - specifically the creative entity - of my Trinity.

God made us in His image—not just spiritually, but biologically. A Creator designed us to create. But nothing is created from one part alone. Babies require two halves. So does wisdom. So does beauty.

Wholeness isn’t a feeling. It’s your original wiring. It’s what unlocks your creativity, your clarity, and your calling.

4. Reframed Belief: Salvation is Wholeness

Let’s be honest. Most of us grew up thinking salvation was about a one-time decision: believe in Jesus, get into heaven, try not to sin too much until then.

But what if salvation isn’t just about being rescued from hell? What if it’s about being restored to wholeness?

The Greek word for salvation—sozo—doesn’t just mean "save." It also means:

• to heal

• to restore

• to make whole.

  
  

So when Jesus says, "Your faith has saved you"—He’s saying, Your faith has made you whole.

Salvation isn’t just about where you go when you die. It’s about becoming who you were created to be—right now.

This matches the Hebraic worldview: the life you live now flows directly into the life to come. The afterlife is not a cosmic reset. It’s a continuation—a magnification—of who you’re becoming.

“...he will receive a hundredfold now in this time... and in the age to come, eternal life.” (Mark 10:30)

So why does wholeness matter? Because it’s the very definition of salvation. It’s not extra credit. It’s the core of the Christian life.

When you become whole—spirit, soul, and body aligned—you reflect the nature of the Trinity. You don't just know about God. You become one with Him.

Jesus prayed: “That they may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.” (John 17:21)

That’s not theology. That’s union. That’s wholeness.

Which is why God’s order matters.

Becoming one with God isn’t about simply agreeing with facts about Him. It’s about living like Him—functioning in harmony with how He designed life to work. Like a bride doesn’t just believe in her husband’s existence—she shares his home, his rhythms, his purpose. To live in union is to live in alignment.

That rhythm? That home? It’s order. It’s wholeness.

Because it’s not about control—it’s about becoming one with God. And God, being a Trinity, works through order:

• Initiator (Spirit or the Gut)

• Interpreter (Soul or the Mind)

• Responder (Body)

  
  

This is the divine pattern. This is what it looks like to be saved. This is what it looks like to be holy.

And now, you get to ask: Where am I living fractured? And what might it mean to return to wholeness?

5. Reflective Invitation: Returning to Wholeness

So now what?

If salvation really means becoming whole—spirit, soul, and body aligned with God’s divine image—then it’s worth asking…

Am I whole?

And here’s the tricky part: most of us assume we are.

We think wholeness means functioning. Paying the bills. Reading the Bible. Showing up for work and church and family. But just because you're operating doesn’t mean you're whole.

Wholeness isn’t just about doing—it’s about being aligned. It’s about each part of you doing its job:

• Spirit leading with peace and discernment

• Soul interpreting with wisdom and surrender

• Body responding with presence and action

  
  

But what happens when the parts are out of sync? That’s when we see the symptoms:

• Stress that never leaves.

• Chaos in the home.

• Controlling behavior.

• Constant fatigue.

The ache of creativity unexpressed. Joy that feels... foreign. These aren’t just “modern life.” They’re signals. God uses your physical reality to point to spiritual misalignment.

Even science agrees:

• Suppressed creativity is linked to depression, anxiety, and psychosomatic symptoms.

• Unprocessed emotion raises cortisol, weakens immunity, and increases inflammation.

• Over-functioning in one role—especially the logical or managerial side—can result in hormonal imbalance, adrenal fatigue, or emotional numbness.

  
  

Suppressing the creative, intuitive, beautiful parts of yourself doesn’t keep you safe. It shuts down life.

You were made to reflect the Trinity. You were made to create with God.

So here’s your invitation—not to strive harder, but to come back into rhythm:

• Where am I over-functioning and under-feeling?

• What part of me have I dismissed as foolish?

• What joy or beauty have I labeled as unholy?

• What’s working… but not whole?

  
  

You don’t need to become someone new.

You need to become all of who God made you to be.

That’s salvation.

That’s wholeness.

That’s holy.

I hope you all have a great day!

Jacqueline Marie