53 - Christianity: Multitasking or Bipolar?
- rcbarbas
- Apr 22, 2024
- 19 min read
Multitasking or Bipolar?
The bible clearly states that there is a difference between Christians and non-Christians; namely what we believe, and the goal to live a different lifestyle based on the belief in God/Jesus and salvation. In the old testament, before Christianity began, the bible says in Genesis 6:5 “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” Early on, before the flood of Noah, God noted how mankind was completely evil all the time. In just a few generations we went from Adam and Eve being sinless, to everyone on the planet being a bucket of sin, at all times. Then God brought the flood and killed almost all of humanity, saving only Noah and his family, eight people in total.
After the flood, God populated the earth with humans again, but this time with sinful people from the outset. On this second time, He brought about a new method of protecting people from the debt of their sins with the Jewish laws and rituals. This set of rules directed people to complete specific acts to be relieved of their debt to God for breaking His laws for life. This time He detailed a set of laws, in stone (the Ten Commandments), and gave Moses the rules by which people must live. The first four detailed how we should behave regarding God, and the last six detail our behavior regarding other people. In Matthew 22: 38-40, Jesus wrapped up all ten in two succinct sentences “37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”. Just these two simple sentences proved too much for us to live by; we still sin – all the time.
There’s always something a bit deeper. In the Ten Commandments, in Exodus 20:14 the text reads “You shall not commit adultery”, in Matthew 5:27, 28 Jesus said “27 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”. So it’s not just having sex with a married person, or someone besides your spouse if you are married, but it also includes lusting for someone who is married to someone else, or being married and lusting for someone who is not your spouse. When God said, in Leviticus 11:44 “...be holy, because I am holy.” He intends for that to be pure; undefiled in any fashion.
When we look at His commandments, we can each be sure that we haven’t met His standard; have you loved the LORD with all your heart, soul and mind – that means all the time, as much as you can – I haven’t. Have you gone through life never lusting after someone? I haven’t. Have you ever lied? I have.
In Matthew 5:22, Jesus said “22 But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire.”. Have you ever called someone stupid, or made fun of them because you thought they were an idiot? I’ve done it so much that if it were an Olympic sport I would be an odds-on favorite for a gold medal.
When Paul penned, in Romans 3:23 “For all sinned and fall short of the glory of God”, he knew what he was writing about.
He also penned, in Romans 6:23 “for the wages of sin is death and the gift of God is eternal life”, then in Hebrews 9:27, 28 “27 And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, 28 so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.” (it is argued that Hebrews was and wasn’t written by Paul, but that’s not a point here) Then in 2 Corinthians 5:17, Paul penned, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new”.
In the past few paragraphs we see that the bible says we all sinned; we are only focused on evil all the time; we are not holy as commanded by God; there is a penalty for sinning; Christ paid that penalty by bearing our sins, and He will bring us salvation when He appears next time.
The bible often calls our lives of sin – prior to salvation – living in the world, or living according to the flesh. It calls our lives – after understanding and believing into salvation – according to the spirit.
So, first things first – as humans, before salvation, we are, or were, completely sinful; after salvation, we have become new creations – completely new beings. When we live in the world, according to the world, we were different than what we became after we were saved.
Multitasking: According to Merriam-Webster.com, “the concurrent performance of several jobs by a computer: the performance of multiple tasks at one time” https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/multitasking. I believe we can all agree that this term is not restricted to computers, and it has been applied to humans innumerable times over the past few decades; so I will keep this definition as applicable.
Bipolar: According to Merriam-Webster.com, “having or marked by two mutually repellent forces or diametrically opposed natures or views” https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bipolar
I think that either, or both, of these terms accurately reflect the mindset, and lifestyle, of how Christians should think and behave. The bible tells us that humans are flawed (see Romans 3:23 above) and refers to our flawed state as “the flesh” and “the world”.
· Mark 14:38 “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
· Romans 7:5 “For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death.”
· Romans 8:8 “Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.”
· 1 John 2:15, 16 “15Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world.”
The bible tells us that we have a spiritual being as well as a flesh (skin, guts and bones) being. This spiritual part of our identity is based on our belief in God/Jesus and salvation, and the relationship we have with God. Do we believe in Him and how much do we allow that to impact us? It should impact EVERY iota of our existence. Romans chapter 8 is all about us and “the Spirit” of God. Christians are “in the Spirit”, no longer in the flesh, or the world.
· John 4:23, 24 “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
· Ephesians 6:18 “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.”
· Romans 8:5 “Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.”
Because all people have a human/flesh body and live on a physical planet, surrounded by physical, tangible things, we are continuously subjected to input from this material environment. But, because Christians have a spiritual being, that believes in, and accepts, God and salvation provided by Jesus’ atoning death and resurrection, we are inculcated with a holy, righteous, spiritual mindset as well. That means that every Christian is full-time, 100%, engulfed in the things of this planet as well as the things of God. (Non-Christians are also enveloped in a spiritual mindset, but it is a mindset run by Satan, the devil. In John 8:44, Jesus said “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”)
Because “in the flesh” and “in the spirit” are completely adverse to each other, Christians are 100% living in two opposing realities.
And the third “because” ... Because we are simultaneously focused on two opposing mindsets and lifestyles, Christians should be multitasking at all times. Being focused on two opposing ideas at the same time, all the time, would seemingly put us in the category for bipolar disorder.
$$ ? – One topic briefly
· Proverbs 13:22 says “A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children, but the sinner's wealth is laid up for the righteous.”
· Malachi 3:10 “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”.
· Proverbs 3:9, 10 says “9 Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; 10 then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.”
So, we have a clear indication that we ought to put some of our focus on wealth and how to use it. But 1 John 2:15, 16, above, says to not love the things of the world, “the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes, the boasting of what he has and does...”
Christians should focus on the wealth we leave future generations, but don’t love what the world loves, and that includes money. These are not contradictory, one says to plan for your life on earth and what you leave behind as a legacy, the other says to not get caught up in wanting more and more. Don’t forget, a wealthy legacy includes spirituality and knowledge as well as the wealth of finances. God completely understands how the world works, there is nothing of which He’s unaware; this is discussed by King David in Psalm 139. We need money to buy peanut butter and jelly, eggs, homes, cars, etc. We are never counseled, in God’s word, to ignore, or not prepare for these. On the contrary we are told to take care of our earthly business and debts (Mark 12:17 “Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” And they were amazed at him.”), but we are directed to prioritize our interests, and God gets top priority. In Mark 12:30, Jesus said “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” We get no such exhortation about money or earthly things.
It’s no secret that everyone included in mankind is born on, or of in Adam’s case, earth; and when we die, we basically decompose into “dirt”. In Genesis 3:19, the curse that God placed on Adam included “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return”. There is a pretty good description of human decomposition found at https://www.theguardian.com/science/neurophilosophy/2015/may/05/life-after-death if the reader is interested. If contains “rigor-mortis”, “putrefaction”, “thanatomicrobiome”, bloating”, “liquefied tissues”, “partly mummified and with several large, brown mushrooms growing from where an abdomen once was” and other terms descriptive of the process.
As we are born here, live here, die here and decompose into what “here” is made of, it is certainly understandable that we are impacted by “here” at all moments of our existence on earth. We are influenced by just about everything that happens near us and to us. Imagine the millions of things occur to us over an average lifespan of 72-75 years. Our personalities and characters are developed in light of these incidents. We might become a racist, a musician, a philanthropist, a philanderer, a philosopher, a philatelist, a president, or anything else that piques our interest or is a result of combined life experiences. Sometimes we don’t become what we want, we just end up at a job because that’s the way life played out for us; but we’re still on earth and impacted by earth – and that includes other people and their behaviors.
Everything that surrounds us helps develop us into what/who we become. The old arguments about nature vs. nurture (environment vs. heredity) are absolutely key and I would propose that both are absolutely central, if two different things can be the center of something – otherwise I would propose that they are key to our being instead of both being central. That’s just a bit of humor, insert smiley face here.
The bible says that we all come from Adam and Eve; surely there are some people who believe differently, but I haven’t the time, or interest, in breaking apart an argument about whether Adam had two wives, one named Eve and a second named Lilith, or Adam and Eve mated with some people outside the garden of Eden after they were expelled from the garden. In Genesis 1:28, the bible says “God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”. Adam and Eve filled the planet with people.
When they had children, those kids were in the fallen image of Adam. Genesis 5:3 says “When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth.” If Seth was in Adam’s image, so were the other offspring. How could it no be so? As a matter of fact, the first chapter of Genesis sets precedent for every form of life populating after itself. Everything populated after its own kind in verses 11, 12, 21, 24, 25, 26; then God made man in His own image in verse 27. Adam and Eve reproduced after their own kind – and make note, this population began AFTER they had sinned, so mankind was populated in the image of sinners.
God confirmed this in Genesis 6:5 when He had Moses write “The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time”. Our basic disposition in life is wickedness. Romans 8:7, 8 states it quite succinctly with “7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Romans 8:1-11 lays out the argument that fleshly man cannot be a spiritual man, following God.
· 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”
· John 3:3, 5, 6, 7 “3Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’”
· 1 Peter 1:3 “3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”
· John 1:12 “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”
The discussion of this section, like most in the bible, could go on and on; but for brevity I will stop here.
Christians are clearly called reborn, born again, new creation, children of God, etc. We were born of water as termed in the phrase “her water broke” when a woman delivers a baby. We were born of the Spirit as termed “a new creation”, in 2 Corinthians 5:17 (above), “children of God” in John 1:12 (above). Our first birth was from water, “born again” is a reference to who we become after we believe into Jesus and salvation, and become children of God instead of Larry and Lisa, or whoever our earthly parents are. Romans 10:9, 10 states that we become saved upon belief and statement “if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.”. It requires nothing on our part to become born again.
· Titus 3:5 “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy.”
· Ephesians 2:8,9 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith -- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God -- not by works, so that no one can boast.”
· John 6:44 “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.”
We aren’t saved because of anything we have done; we are saved by a gift of God that is faith and grace, and we cannot decide to become Christians on our own we are drawn to Jesus and salvation by God.
To be born again, we are drawn to God, by God; we cannot do anything to earn it, we are continually evil at all time. That doesn’t mean that we continually rape, steal and murder at all times, it means that we fail to live up to God’s perfect plan for our lives. We are not holy. Our goal should be to be holy. In Leviticus 11:44, 45 God said “Be Holy because I am holy”.
For anyone not knowing the definition of “sin” it is this: “sin” comes from the Greek word hamartanō, ἁμαρτάνω, and is defined in Strong’s Exhaustive concordance https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g264/kjv/tr/0-1/ as
1. “to be without a share in
2. to miss the mark
3. to err, be mistaken
4. to miss or wander from the path of uprightness and honor, to do or go wrong
5. to wander from the law of God, violate God's law, sin.”
When we are told we are sinners, we tend to think someone is pointing out how rotten we are, and very few people think of themselves as rotten, nasty or poisonous, so we are offended. I continually sin; I continually fall short of God’s perfect plan for who I should be and how I should act. I get mad at drivers who pull out in front of me and force me to change my speed or direction of travel; they’re obviously stupid, right? Nope, I’m the knucklehead in each of those situations. If I call someone “stupid”, even in my mind, that’s a sin according to Matthew 5:22 (But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire.); I’ve fallen short of what I should be.
But even at that, I am still a child of God. I am born again of the spirit of God. I’m just still living in a skin, bones and guts suit, here on earth, and always impacted by these surroundings. I have no acceptable excuse for falling short of what I should be, but I still do. We are afforded God’s grace and mercy, via Jesus’ sacrificial death, to pay for sin to protect us from the penalty of these actions and that’s the gift the separates us from the rest of the world. We believe in His work to save us from the debt we’ve accrued by sinning; non-believers (people who have not been saved/reborn) have no one else to cover that debt, so they’ll have to pay it themselves.
The big point of this bible study is to present a bizarre truth about Christianity. We are set in this world, a place where we are surrounded by sin, and some of it is our own (so we’re not blameless). We are enveloped by sexual impurity, greed, lust, theft, lies, deception – pardon me for a moment while I insert some bible descriptions here...
Romans 1:29-32 “filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, 30 backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31 undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; 32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.”
Ephesians 4:31 “bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice.”
As we meditate on these human traits and consider how much we are exposed to them, as well as the fact that we, ourselves, commit many of them, is it any wonder that our mindset is full of evil? Not that we murder, rape and steal all the time, but that we fall short of the behaviors that God has intended for us – that evil.
Then, when we consider what God has intended for us, is it any wonder that we find ourselves caught up between two divergent realities?
The two cannot go hand-in-hand. 1 John 2:15 tells Christians not to love the world or anything in the world. In Matthew 6:24, Jesus said “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other”, in this, He specifically mentioned money, but if God is your master you cannot serve worldly goods and goals, and vice versa.
For several decades I have said that the stuff we see (tangible things like big houses, lots of money, high end expensive vehicles, etc.) are usually not important, and that the things we cannot see (intangible things like God, angels, demons, Jesus dying on the cross and resurrecting from the dead, etc.) are the most important things in existence. In the past decade I have heard multiple preachers saying the same thing; maybe I just didn’t hear it before, but it is a truth about life. There is nothing more important than God, and He tells us that, in Mark 12:30, when He said “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” I cannot validate this, as fact, because we cannot discuss the topic with said individuals, but I would bet my legs that any rich person who went to Hell would agree that no Ferrari or Lamborghini was ever worth ignoring God.
So we live here on a planet that is full of one type of riches and behaviors, and we are told not to go along with this lifestyle because it generally supports evil and misses the entire reason we exist in the first place. We are left to figure this out via ethereal manners. We don’t see, or touch angels, demons or God. We speak to God in prayer and He usually doesn’t respond audibly or tangibly. We are told that our prayers are effective if we have faith, if we ask that God’s will be done above all else, and if we are righteous.
· John 15:7 “If you remain in me and my word remains in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be given you”. (If we remain in Him – that’s the requirement to be righteous; asking whatever we wish should be God’s will above all)
· In Luke 22:42, during Jesus’ prayer in the garden, He said “yet not my will, but yours be done”.
· In His description of how we should pray, in Matthew 6:10, Jesus said “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
· In James 5:16 we read “...The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” (the effective and repetitive prayer of a righteous person... to begin expecting answers to prayers we probably should address this first. Are we fervent/repetitive; are we righteous or do we just ask that grandpa in the sky for favors when we need something?)
How many times have you prayed and not seen anything happen that you requested. Me? Myriad times.
Then I am left wondering...
· “is it me?” because I am not Joe righteous? (James 5:16 “... The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.”)
· Was my prayer about my will instead of God’s will? (Even though I say "your will be done" am I focusing on my will more?) Maybe God has the answer set for another day/time. Maybe the answer was “no” and I didn’t understand that.
· Maybe my faith wasn’t enough. Surely that’s a possibility; no matter how much I think I believe I may fall short of enough faith, as detailed in Acts 19:13-16 “13 Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, “In the name of the Jesus whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out.” 14 Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. 15 One day the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know about, but who are you?” 16 Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding.” In Acts 3:6, 7 “Then Peter said, “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.” 7 Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up, and instantly the man’s feet and ankles became strong.” Why haven’t I been able to do that? I have a Christian friend who’s been in a coma for six months (at the time of writing this) and several times I’ve prayed those exact same words while holding his hand; he hasn't awaken and walked yet; am I failing, or is God having His will? (my default belief is that it's God's universe and His rules, His will)
· I've asked for God to save specific people and that hasn’t happened. My dad prayed for his dad for over 20 years before he finally believed. Is it just an issue of fervency and supplication (continuous prayer for a while) wherein God wants us to stay at it and He already has it decided? So I keep asking.
· Is it my lack of faith, is it not God’s will, is it not God’s will for that moment, am I not righteous enough? There’s a whole lot to explore in just this topic, and unless your prayers are answered often you will certainly feel as somewhat of a failure in prayer.
Everybody on the planet is “of the earth”. Christians are truly “of the earth” and “children of God”, and that makes us multitasking and bipolar at every moment of our lives. We simultaneously work on multiple tasks – all the time – if we consider God as we should. Our life on earth and our life for Christ are “mutually repellent forces or diametrically opposed natures” if we live on earth and for Christ as we should.
In 1 Corinthians 15:19, Paul wrote “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied” and that’s probably because we’re living like we’ve got something planned that will never occur – completely misguided; we’re just wandering about with a bipolar, mental disorder.
However, if Christians are correct, and salvation is true, we are, of all people, most to be engaged and followed.
Keeping in mind that multitasking is defined as “the concurrent performance of several jobs by a computer: the performance of multiple tasks at one time” and bipolar is defined as “having or marked by two mutually repellent forces or diametrically opposed natures or views”, we can note that the multiple activities in multitasking can be similar or dissimilar; they do not have to be opposed to each other. Bipolar, on the other hand, is defined as two mutually repellent or diametrically opposed natures of views. Multitasking can be as simple as playing the piano while talking to someone; that wouldn’t be bipolar, just two different things. Bipolar is when the two events are completely opposite, and nothing can be more opposite than flesh and God’s spirit.
Yep, if I had to choose which mental disorder I would want to be afflicted with, bipolar Christianity is the one for me.
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