This post is inspired by a conversation I had about a week ago. While speaking with a friend, we were talking about basic human needs and desires - sleep, food, water, etc. My friend said to me: "I may lose you here, but I think a basic human desire is to alter one's consciousness, and to change one's mindset completely. I say this because, well, look at the drug/alcohol/cigarette use and sale around the world. I think it's in us to varying degrees - but the desire to gain a new mindset/altered perspective is in each of us."
At first, I brushed off the idea as silly, late-night rambling. But as I drove home, my mind began to toss this idea around and process it more fully.
Are we wired to crave this altered mindset? If so, why? What purpose would it serve? If so many people have this desire, why have I never really felt the need to alter my mental state with drugs, alcohol, adrenaline or anything else? Then it hit me. We all do have a desire to acquire a new mindset - to change, to crave something more, something different. We are constantly running from and searching for a way out of "normal," boring, repetitive and predictable. The problem is not the desire, the problem is the "solutions" we try to implement. Alcohol, drugs, adrenaline rushes, etc, CAN bring about a temporary altered mindset/reality, but when that buzz wears off, the person is in the same place as before, and often emptier, making the craving stronger and more painful. That which we seek to fill us, only empties us further.
In this situation, I wanted to ask, "Have you tried Jesus? He's a trip." Friends, I don't mean this in a disrespectful or sacreligious way. What I mean is this: if you want a drastically, dramatically, and radically altered mindset, let Jesus and the Word of God take over your life. Let Him renew your mind, and you will never be bored, ordinary, or "normal" in your life again. What's more, the satisfaction that close relationship with Jesus gives not only fills, but fills to overflowing. If you ever crave more - seek Jesus and there is still more to be had. The depths of His ways can never be exhausted. If you have come to Jesus, and still feel this craving - genuinely seek Him, genuinely let Him take control. If you feel like to do so is impossible, or overwhelming - ask Him to help you seek Him, and He will. "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled."
In conclusion, we have been created to crave. But what do you seek to fill this craving - alcohol, drugs, adrenaline rushes, etc? For if you seek after these, you will be thirsty again Allow Jesus to fill you, and you will never thirst again. Crave Jesus - fill your soul and radically alter your mindset.
"Jesus answered, 'But whoever drinks the [living] water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.'" (John 4:13-14)
Isaiah 55:1-2
"Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not food and your labor on what does not satisfy?" (emphasis added)
Drink from the living water; come to Jesus, you who crave, and be filled, and you will never desire cheap imitations and substitutes again. Come to Jesus, and let your soul be not only filled, but satisfied.
