Full Brain Syndrome-Revisited

For those who have followed this blog for awhile, you may recall I wrote two posts on F.B.S. or Full Brain Syndrome. Though it sounds like a feminine product, it is a self-coined term for how I was wired, or so I thought.

When growing a relationship with the Living Son of God, some parts of your old self hang on longer than others.

I had worried my whole life from the age of ten on up.

In middle school, I had wrinkles in my forehead which friends in high school referred to as my “furrowed brow”.

Worry is a habit of a soul who knows fear and who longs to gain control over her world. That’s how it worked for me. There will be more about this in my first book.

When I began to fall in love with Jesus, really let go and melt into His arms, the worry subsided. When I learned I had a good Father in heaven who listened to every whisper of my heart, I began to talk to Him more often than I turned inward. As I learned He used every last thing on this earth (the good and the horrible) for the good of those who love Him and who are called according to His purpose, that age-old desire to control things began to fade.

Racing thoughts? Not so much.

Overwhelmed with too many thoughts mixed with high expectations of myself and others. Yup that was me. Maybe you, too.

Jesus is so very patient with His teaching of us. As He refines us in the fire, we do not burn. We may sweat, we may wonder how long in this wait, Lord, but we do not get consumed. Because He who knit us with holy fingers knows what He made is good. Not all of us has to go, but much of us needs to be transformed if we are to please our Father and become more like His Son on this earth.

F.B.S. I thought was a thing of the past, the old Julie, one of those roots He pulled up and tossed into the flames.

Lately, I have found myself with a multitude of competing thoughts when I first peel my eyes away from sleep. The pace in my head at o’dark thirty has quickened like a frightened bunny. It is opposite of what I have come to know in my mornings with Him, the stillness, the solace. Prayer needs multiply daily, even double-Dibble multiply in the midst of this pandemic, in the midst of political unrest, in the midst of our own family’s transitions and challenges.

Is it intercession that is overwhelming?

Or is it the devil stirring up a storm, creating what weatherwatchers call white-outs … a snow squall … to attempt to blind me and re-claim a soul who finds her rest in the palm of His hand?

In the attempts to blind, the devil whispers, “You know what you need to do, get up and get moving. Don’t be lazy. Did God really say ‘be still’?”

It has been my experience that when I feel overwhelmed, the devil tries to hurry me along. It makes me think of something my grandmother would say: HASTE MAKES WASTE.

Don’t buy satan’s cheap use of Scripture, twisted in such a way to direct you far away from the transformative power of the Cross.

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I just shared in our family devotional last night how God expects us to work out our salvation. Yes, it is given by His grace when we believe and receive. But salvation is a gift. Just like any other present that didn’t thrill you after opening, it can be put on a shelf and forgotten about. The Bible gets dusty … pages stick together from lack of contact. The prayer life does not get developed as a relationship with Him but rather a list-ticking. Meeting with others is never an occasion to talk about Jesus. This is double-mindedness. You profess with your lips, but you allow your lost soul to be swayed by the devil time and time again … until nobody would know you were saved, not even God.

How do you work out your salvation? What about that process incites fear and trembling?

What I’m getting at, friends, is that you should simply keep on doing what you’ve done from the beginning. When I was living among you, you lived in responsive obedience. Now that I’m separated from you, keep it up. Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God’s energy, an energy deep within you, God Himself willing and working at what will give Him the most pleasure (Philippians 2:12-13 MSG).

In these early mornings after waking with too many things filling my brain, I have made myself focus on God. Sit my butt down, turn off my phone, open my Bible, look up and let Him lead my next step.

“I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at My request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the thins I have told you. I’m leaving well and whole. That’s My parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left-feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught” (John 14:26-27 MSG).

So even if I wake tomorrow with a myriad of names and situations that won’t respond to my own efforts of settling down, I will go to the Cross.

Sisters and brothers, we cannot will ourselves free, no matter who wants to say pull yourself up by your bootstraps. In order to be released from old things, we must re-visit His death, His resurrection and re-meditate on what being free in Him means for this given day.

One step, one prayer at a time.

Freedom from F.B.S. is my heart’s desire. It no longer serves any purpose in my life to be busy-brained. I trust the Lord, who has brought me this far, will continue His good work in me until He comes back.

While I trust Him to work, I must seek, follow and weave salvation into daily living. It helps me to re-member that He lives before, with and after me. It helps me to trust He is my refuge, my strong tower, the holy mountain. Perhaps above all, it helps me to re-member that I was headed for death without heaven before He saved me.

Simply saying yes to the Living, Loving Hope of Jesus is a daily surrender to the One who is greater than all things, than all people, than all time.

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Thank you to all who read this post. Thanking Jesus for these words to share. If you are in need of prayer, please email. God will help me as I go to Him with others on my heart. My email is juliedibblespeaks@gmail.com.

I am curious. How do you press on, continue growing in Him, even when an old stubborn part of yourself re-surfaces? Are you able to discern the lies of the devil from the Truth of Christ?

Feel free to start a conversation here in the comments.

All photos in this post are from Pixabay.com.

May Our God of All be your all in all today.

Love in Him,

Julie

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