The Neurological Point of Faith
An X (Twitter) user declared – If Jesus isn’t the focus of worship in your church, it isn’t a Christian church.
I say that’s unfortunate. Consider this:
The cortex (see image) is directly connected to the senses. You cannot use the cortex without activating elements of the modeling networks associated with the senses. This is how you can visualize (imagine) objects in the absence of the object.
The prefrontal cortex, by contrast, is very different and operationally separate from the cortex. Its networks are formed differently. In the prefrontal cortex, you conceptualize, whereas in the cortex, you perceptualize. Your brain is a collaborative application of these two systems. Earth’s other living organisms do not conceptualize, I hypothesize. As a result, they cannot create civilization or envision God (I hypothesize).
Yet, I suspect enabling and developing conceptualization is the point of the Bible’s First Commandment (worship only God). God is 100% conceptual. God is thus beyond or outside human reality (i.e., never accessible through perception, only conception). Therefore, an understanding of God begins and ends in the prefrontal cortex. Yet, if you choose to use Jesus instead of God (I understand that you do this as a logical/Biblical alternative), you necessarily anchor your understanding of God in perception–the cortex. However, while Jesus, the man, can be understood through perception, God and Jesus (now in spirit) may only be envisioned conceptually since they are now both (as one) beyond reality. Jesus’s death, resurrection, and ascension thus ideally move the faithful from perception to conception. I believe this is how Jesus saves. Specifically, conception is built around absolute or God’s truth and the elimination of sin. Perception, by contrast, is dependent upon and deceived by the SELF–the cause of sin.
Therefore, the perceptual approach limits the development of your prefrontal cortex (and, accordingly, your problem-solving skills for civilization) and, critically, your best and ultimate understanding of God.