Brain Again

I wrote about the brain a couple of weeks ago. I reported a comparison between the brain scan of a child who had endured trauma and the brain scan of a child the same age who had not (what we cautiously labeled "normal"). We noted the physical changes that occur from trauma, which lead to incapacities to behave well consistently or even to receive correction normally. Then I spent time noting that even a "normal" brain is fallen, and physically incapable of right behavior or rightly responding to correction all the time. I'd like to ponder a little further on these ideas.

Our baseline is this - a brain that has been significantly damaged in some way is more clearly obvious in its diminished capacity, but a "normal" brain is also fallen and therefore physically incapable of perfectly generating right responses. This is our working assumption. Both are fallen and physically dysfunctional to some degree, but one may be more obvious than the other (or frustratingly less obvious!).

This working assumption also applies to self identity. My self identity is who I see myself to be. Perhaps I see myself as a lowlife. Perhaps I see myself as God's gift to Johnson Country. Perhaps I see myself as unlovable, unforgivable, slow-minded, awfully clever, dashing, hilarious, or socially invisible. Obviously, an accurate self identity is more healthy than an inaccurate one. A significantly inaccurate self identity leads to any number of problems: emotional, social, theological, and so on.

The brain has much to do with one's self-identity. Given our working assumption that all are "brain damaged" but some are more obvious, we are physically incapable of perfectly healthy senses of self identity. We don't have the physical capacity to be exactly correct in how we understand ourselves. And with self identities that are inaccurate to some degree, we are then prone to the problems that come from those inaccurate self identities.

Furthermore, given our fallenness (and our subsequent "brain damage"), part of our self identity can become that we're hopelessly brain damaged, spoiled goods incapable of anything worthwhile. A vicious cycle! We can begin to define ourselves by this incapacitation, accept a label as our identity, and therefore doubt we can ever grow significantly.

Related to this is that our fallen brains are damaged in their role in our beliefs. The brain is involved in what we believe and how we believe it (although not solely responsible for beliefs), and a physically damaged brain, obvious or not, contributes to wrong beliefs.

And yet it is our very beliefs, imperfect as they are, that illumine our path away from these incapacities. The Gospel says that in Christ, I have been made perfect before God. Jesus provides us with His perfection, which means that in Christ, our damaged brains are counted as perfect before God. The resulting errant behaviors, reactions, self identities, and beliefs are counted as perfect before God, too.

Even though we can't believe perfectly, this is a truth that we can believe. It's true whether or not we believe it well, but it is a truth we can believe. We can grab onto it and run with it. Our salvation doesn't depend on how well we can believe this, but we can believe it. And when we believe it, our self identity now becomes something like, I am a child of God who is credited in Christ as if I had a perfect brain which makes perfect decisions. That's a pretty good self identity! Not that we always do make perfect decisions, but that this dysfunction is not my identity. My identity is in Christ, declared perfect and empowered by the Holy Spirit, to one day be gifted with a new, glorified, unfallen brain.

This is one reason why I believe that those with severe brain damage are no less "capable" of salvation. Salvation is not the product of an adequately functioning brain, lest none of us be saved. The perfection of Christ's brain function is adequate for all who, in whatever capacity God has allowed, trust in His Son. I dare say many who suffer damage to the brain can frequently demonstrate a far greater trust than I can. 

The sufficiency of Christ is not limited by our incapacities, whether they are obvious or not. Therefore, our identities need not be anything less than "perfected in Christ no matter what."