This is a poem that depicts the battle of the brain in a world that is increasingly choosing ‘me’ over God.  The battle in the brain that is waged, but often won over by the phone in our hands or the noise online.  The battle in the brain is real, yet we often choose what’s temporary versus eternal.  Which will you choose?

BATTLE IN THE BRAIN

Stop trying to “get it”.
Stop trying to rationalize God and how he does certain things of this world.
Stop trying to make it all fit and find all the inconsistencies.
Stop trying to find the flaw.
Stop trying to be your own god and know it all.

God is infinite
God is great
God is Holy, Holy, Holy
His ways are beyond words, his plans are perfectly placed
We can’t comprehend, we can’t understand,
For his ways are more than our brains could ever formulate
And far too grand.

Yet, the enemy prowls and goes throughout the earth
Planting seeds of distrust and skepticism any chance he gets.
It’s easier to deny or distrust what God commands
For if it goes against my desires, my plans, my wants of this world-
Then he must not be great, he must not be grand.

Oh what a scheme, what a trickery of the enemy
To make a loving God seem hateful, mean and angry
To make me the ‘captain of my own fate’
and choose the things that only serve me

For if a choice doesn’t choose me
If a choice simply says to deny me
Then I’ll take that choice and throw it to the curb for free
I’ll choose the way of me and my own pride
I’ll choose the way that lets “me be me”
And doesn’t go against my desires

But what if I got it all wrong?

What if God really did say he chose me?
What if God really did knit me together piece by piece?
What if God really does know what’s best, which is what he wants to show me?
What if God is actually for me?

What if denying myself really is the perfect plan?
To instead carry your cross and choose your commands?
What if your laws, which I thought were harsh,
Are actually for my good and to keep me in the ark?

But the fear of the Lord?
How can that be?
Why am I to fear a god when I can simply let me be me?
My body, my choice,
Yet, silencing those who don’t have a voice.

But, what if God really did know me in the womb and what’s best for me?
What if denying myself really was the perfect plan,
To instead deny the flesh and live by his commands?

What if God really did create the heavens and earth?
And knew right from wrong, which is why he put them forth?
He set instructions before us to give life, not death
Yet we still chose from the tree that would create havoc for the rest

We choose us, we choose me, instead of our God who set the captives free
We pick our ways because they feel safe, they feel free, they feel kindest to the rest of humanity,

But then again, there’s an enemy.
Oh the irony,
Oh the twist.
When the good guy becomes the bad guy
And the bad guy somehow wins.
When the good guy died for you and now the bad guy enslaves you.

I thought I was free in choosing me,
I thought I was right in “choosing humanity”
Yet, here I am now, with chains all around me
Writing my own destiny, yet I think I was never meant to be.

What if God really was for me and not against me?
And what if I was simply a pawn used by the enemy?

I guess I’ll never know,
I guess I’ll never see,
For I continue to choose from the tree, which continually enslaves me
The tree I thought was free,
The tree I thought was right,
And now by choosing me, I’m being held tight
I’m enslaved to the enemy, entangled in his trickery.

But what kind of God would make me deny me?
Yet in denying me, you’ve actually set me free.
Free from the chains that so easily entangle me.
How can denying me, lead to a life of being free?

Yet, the Bible still stands.
The Bible still reads
It continues to play out exactly as it was foreseen
Within God’s Word, within His great Truth
Inviting me to “come”, inviting me to live
All I have to do is repent and choose Jesus instead.
For choosing Jesus is never a loss
Choosing Jesus is freedom – in the form of the cross

And yet – free will still stands
Free will in my own hand
And which will I choose?
Me for me?
Or the cross and nails in his hand?

Ring-ring, there goes my phone
An idol, a great god, my best friend
Endless amounts of scrolling and updates flooding in
I must go, I must see the multitude of news awaiting me.
For my phone is my friend and it stays close to me
My phone is my friend and it lets me… – be me.

The battle in the brain, the battle in my mind,
So often won by the noise online.
And which will you choose- which will you claim?
You for you or Jesus’ mighty name?