Gray Matter
Even if you aren’t or have never been pregnant, you may be fascinated to learn that there have been a number of studies done on how much women's brains change once they do become pregnant. One study describes the changes this way, “The researchers found that the new mothers experienced gray matter reductions that lasted for at least two years after birth. This loss, however, is not necessarily a bad thing (according to Hoekzema, “the localization was quite remarkable”)...It is not entirely clear why women lose gray matter during pregnancy, but Hoekzema thinks it may be because their brains are becoming more specialized in ways that will help them adapt to motherhood and respond to the needs of their babies.”
Talk about Intelligent Design! How incredible to have a God that wired our bodies so specifically!
When women become pregnant, their brains and bodies rearrange entirely, and they even lose grey matter in their brains, which are rewired to focus on their new babies! The brains of women who have just had a baby work differently than those people who have not.
In our Christian lives, our focus on Christ should rearrange our brains and lives too. They should work differently than those who do not. Some of the grey matter in our life needs to be reduced sometimes to help us respond to the will of God.
God calls us to be different, to function differently than the rest of the world.
Romans 12:2: And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
We’re different because our focus is different. What we value and aim for in this life is intrinsically, drastically different from someone who does not know or believe in God.
Luke 12:34: For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
We know that God is the Creator, the Designer, and the Orchestrator of everything in our lives. Nothing happens without His knowledge.
Romans 11:36: Everything is from him and by him and for him. Glory belongs to him forever! Amen!
Why is that difference so drastic? Why do our lives and actions function differently than those apart from Christ? Because we know what we once were, what our sentence was, where we deserve to be. We know that our Creator God sent his one and only Son to die and take our place so that we can live in perfection forever with Him in heaven. We were lost in darkness and headed for hell when Christ came to reconcile us to the Truth. That knowledge needs to be the catalyst for change in our lives, the rewiring of our brains and lives to the Christ-focus.
2 Corinthians 5:17-20: Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
Unlike mothers whose babies, whose focus, are dependent on them, we are dependent on God. Mothers’ brains are rewired to help those precious, helpless babes. We need to rewire our lives, our brains because we are helpless. We are also precious to Him. That love of God for us far surpasses that of a mother with a new baby. That love is eternal and incomprehensible. What that love has done should be the catalyst for change, for us to live, focused on Him who saved us.