Winning the Mind War

In the beginning years of genetic research, French scientists took tissue from parts of the Japanese quail brain thought to control the bird’s call and implanted it in the brains of five chicken embryos. The experiment worked. Researchers say the hatched chicks sounded like quail rather than chickens.

 Those poor chickens were of two minds: were they a covey or a flock? Sometimes, we can feel the same way; two stories are competing for our minds and hearts. The first story broadcasts loudly across culture and social media. It claims that you and I are the center of the universe. We are unique individuals, and we can be awesome. We need to create our identities. By making the right choices with our wardrobe and weekends, and by hanging out with the right people and doing the right things, we can be limitlessly happy.

 The second story is quiet. It’s more of a whisper from the darker corners of our minds, but it will not go away. It’s there in the middle of the night, a longing when the promises of the first story are underdelivered. The whisper tells us we were made for more. In hushed voices, it insists that we have an immovable and essential identity, a sort of real home somewhere out there. We long for it, and we know it’s not just in our imaginations. There’s got to be more to this life.

In that second story, we find the ultimate truth: we are created for more; we are created to have the mind of our master, Jesus Christ. That transformation is often subtle and tedious to navigate, but ultimately, it is God’s desire for each of His children that we might see life increasingly from God’s perspective.