Resilience - headspace 

As Christians we believe in a mind informed and inspired by heaven, that responds in faith, love and hope to the reality around. Terry Young concludes his series on resilience by briefly touching on a theology of headspace

Let’s recap: we want resilience because post-pandemic life feels strangely fragile. Daniel and his friends, along with Christians in Colossae, lived difficult lives with precarious episodes. We have, therefore, looked to them for clues about resilience.

We started with habits and moved on to hope. Many Christians – especially pastors and teachers – find this all wrong.  Belief shapes behaviour, they say, so start there. The message from the pulpit is usually about belief, expecting behaviour to fall in line.

This strategy often fails because it ignores the truth that behaviour also shapes belief. Many of Paul’s letters are structured with a first half on doctrine (belief) and a second half on practice (behaviour). The second halves are not bolt-on extras since neither half works in isolation from the other.

Like any mind, the Christian mind cannot function without a body. As an example, over several years, I have been learning to compose. I like to sing and have a reasonably musical ear but have never played an instrument because you need fingers, where I come up short.

Many musicians – including my teacher – do a lot of their musical thinking with their fingers. He will turn in a lesson to a keyboard and then return with some options a minute or two later. I’ve realised that good music is physical as well as mental.

Years of practising scales and playing chords provide musicians with an intuitive feel for what works. When they decide to flatten a note or play a chord with a fourth instead of a third, they don’t use look-up tables. They play different notes ascending and descending in minor keys because their fingers simply know where to go. I can write a piano score and work out what to put in the left and right hands but it takes me more effort and cribs than any decent musician needs.

We know you can’t simply work your way to heaven, but James tells us that belief without action is no belief at all. Neither succeeds in isolation. In the last blog I introduced a framework of faith, hope and love, so let’s use it to establish the balance.

The Christian mind is a big deal in both the Old and New Testaments. It won’t take long with a smart device and perhaps BibleGateway.com or BibleHub.com (other tools are available) to find dozens of relevant passages. Resilience depends upon a robust Christian mind. From a viewpoint of faith, this means purity of thought and quality of belief. The Psalmist writes,
 

If I had cherished sin in my heart,
    the Lord would not have listened; (Psalm 66:18)

Meanwhile, Peter tells husbands who are inconsiderate of their wives that their prayers will be blocked (1 Peter 3:7). No communication: no resilience.

Daniel clearly avoids what would soil his conscience (Daniel 1:8) and does things that maintain his communication with God (Daniel 6:10). Paul follows a similar line: he urges his readers to ‘put to death’ (Colossians 3:5), impurity, greed, etc.; and encourages them to grow in faith through prayer and by soaking up Scripture. Habits work best in a believing community where reinforcing behaviour matches belief.

Love and the Christian mind is a trickier proposition, since it’s less a question of right or wrong and more about what you love most and what comes in second or comes off second best. If the lordship of Jesus is central to his message of faith, then the love of Jesus drives Paul’s relational message. Although he discusses other loves (such as sexual desire and greed) here his focus for the Christian mind is on relationships, principally in the household where he is keen to establish humane behaviour. 

The love-grenade at the end of his letter concerns a slave who has become a believer, presumably under Paul’s ministry (Colossians 4:7-9). Paul returns him to his master (along with a letter to said Philemon) so that he can become a full member of the church at Colossae. Ironically, this emotive directive could only be fulfilled in very concrete acts of humanity. There were few more precarious existences than slavery and none more affirming than joining a worshiping community.

Finally, hope and the Christian mind! With his cosmic thumbnails (Colossians 1:15-20; 2:9-15), Paul tries to lift his readers’ eyes in hope (as Daniel did centuries before) from the desolation of their circumstances to the glory of God in Jesus and their inheritance in him. It is certainly a hope beyond death, but also a hope fulfilled in the growing global community of Christians. It’s a hope in tension between what appears to be important from looking around and what is really important looking up and forward. The helpful habits here focus on mutual encouragement and in living out what one day they will perfectly become.

As Christians, we don’t believe in an isolated mind caught up beyond physical reality or detached from the daily grind. Some of Paul’s readers were clearly under pressure to think that way.  We don’t believe, either, in a world so messy that we can only escape through esoteric visions or consuming experiences. We believe in living here with a faithful, loving, hopeful, eye fixed firmly on somewhere else. We believe in a mind informed and inspired by heaven, that responds in faith, love and hope to the reality around. 

We have only touched briefly on the theology of headspace. I have no idea exactly what you feel contributes most to any sense of anxiety or fragility you may have, or where you may best begin. For you, resilience may start with setting an alarm on Sunday morning so that you can go to church in person once more. It may mean something radical around your internet to avoid temptation. Or it may start by rethinking about what you really believe and want in life.

Turning these blogs into your own roadmap will take effort, but I hope there is enough here to make it possible. And to make it fun!
 

Image | Megan Watson | CreationSwap

 

This is part of a five part blog series called What can we do about resilience?

 

1. What can we do about resilience?

2. Helpful habits and how to develop them

3. Harmful habits and how to dismantle them

4. Hope

5. Headspace 

Terry Young is a missionary kid who read science and engineering. After a PhD in lasers, he worked in R&D before becoming a professor, when he taught project management, information systems and e-business, while leading research in healthcare. He set up Datchet Consulting to have fun with both faith and work and worshipped at Baptist churches in Slough for 19 years before moving to the New Forest. 
 

Acknowledgement
Although other pressures prevented Rob Wright from sharing in writing these blogs, discussing them with him helped me restructure my original thinking, for which I am grateful.
 

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