A Mind-boggling Communication System

Tuesday, December 3, 2024

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Philippians 2:5.

The key to clear thinking has to do with the healthy communication of billions of neurons (nerve cells) that conduct impulses from one part of the body to another.

Let me give you a small idea of how mind-boggling the process is: Each neuron in your brain can carry on several million different conversations at the same time. No, you’re not going crazy. This is normal. A single neuron can receive signals from more than 1,000 other neurons. And these electrical impulses take differing routes and speeds. Some take express routes. Light is bright–you squint your eyes. The dish is hot–you remove your hand quickly. Reflex actions like these travel first to the spinal cord, where the nerve impulse to pull your hand away is initiated; then it travels to the brain. Interestingly, messages sent through pain receptors can travel as slowly as 2 mph, whereas the signal from a kiss travels at an amazing 140 mph! We were created for love!

To picture the working brain, we might think of viewing New York City from the sky, with cars going in all directions and yet all is orderly and each part is in tune with the others. However, the perfection with which our minds function can become damaged, blunted, or shattered. In addition to injuries or illnesses, the type of stimuli we feed into our systems can distort the perception or interpretation of the information. The communication within can go awry. Neurons (including the chemicals, neurotransmitters and hormones that regulate them, their circuitry, and the electrical impulses that flow through them) make you, you and me, me. We’re not all wired the same. Each nerve pathway and connection has been constructed experience by experience, choice by choice.

We were created for an incredible amount of communication or stimuli reception. Not only are our brains capable of immense amounts of storage, but their programming and reprogramming occur largely as a result of information, chemicals, and stimuli that enter through the avenue of the five senses. What we do with this information or stimuli plays a part in shaping our lives.

The Lord desires to infuse our senses with information that will cause our hearts to beat with His, our minds to long for His will, and our love to be set upon Him.

Lord, help me to guard my senses so I can have what You created me to experience: Your mind in me–as it was in Your Son, Jesus.

—Risë Rafferty

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