I Cannot Get Enough of...

Quick, fill in the blank, “I cannot get enough of _______________.”

How did you fill the blank? What’s the first thing that came to mind?

In the first century, fishermen, tax collectors, prostitutes, people with various ailments, and thousands of men, women, and children filled that blank with the same name – Jesus; Their hunger for Jesus radically changed their lives.

When we can’t get enough of something or someone, we rearrange our schedules. Our activities are realigned. Priorities are redefined. We rethink how and what we do to better accommodate our longing. We look for every opportunity to connect with whatever or whoever it is. The greater the longing, the less we even wrestle with these changes.

Have you ever encountered someone that totally stole your attention and consumed your focus? When I first met my wife and learned her college class schedule, I quickly remapped my route to class to intersect with her as she changed classes even though it was on the opposite side of the campus from my own classes. I’d run across campus, then casually walk her to class, and then once she walked into her classroom, I’d run as fast as I could back to my starting point to be the last one entering my own classroom. It’s not stalking if she marries you! I was smitten; and that longing, that love, radically changed my life.

It's impossible to embrace the Bible as Truth and reject the Biblical claim that we have an enemy. Our enemy’s goal is to “steal, kill, and destroy” and that starts with stealing our attention. He does that by convincing each of us to fill that blank (I cannot get enough of ______________) with anything or anyone other than Jesus; and he’s never offered more effective distractions than he’s offering right now.

There’s a lot of recent research on what is being classified as super stimuli. A super stimulus is a man-made or synthesized modality which creates an experience that stimulates one’s brain to release a flood of dopamine. Unlike what was taught years ago, dopamine is not a pleasure hormone, but rather a chemical in the brain that produces an insatiable desire for whatever is stimulating its production. Prior to 2004, the primary super stimuli were drugs, alcohol, tobacco, junk food, following the stock market, and to a lesser degree pornography. What happened that turned the world of super stimuli upside down between 2004 & 2013? The introduction of smart phones. Now the dopamine producing powers of porn, video games, and social media have far eclipsed that of drugs, alcohol, or the stock market.

Consider this. Every boy wants to be a hero. Now, a boy can login to an increasingly “real” (appearing) video game, become a Navy Seal without doing a single push-up, using cutting edge weaponry without training, defeat enemies through various levels with rewards at each level until he saves the damsel in distress, and, yes, now, he can virtually make-out with the beautiful young woman he has rescued. Then as clueless adults, we simply shake our heads at his yearning to spend hours in this artificial world while his desire and capacity to navigate the complexities of everyday life and engagement with real people deteriorate. The artificial stimulation of dopamine surges is replacing the less dramatic appeal of everyday life.

The more we research combinations of textures, tastes, temperatures, flavor, saltiness, and sweetness, the more super stimuli have followed the original McDonalds french fries in creating yearnings that the more we chase, the less the appeal of green beans and ham.

Do I really have to convince you that social media is a super stimulus? How often has a minute on Facebook turned into an hour? How often have you watched people preferring to view artificial likes from people they hardly know, but call friends, over making real connections with real people right beside them? How long can you go without checking your social media feeds or your last post for these affirmations?

These super stimuli are serving, just as our enemy hoped, as continual deterrents to our longing for the best of what God offers, the experience of loving God and loving others.

But before we sit in our pews and shake our heads in disdain at younger people and their smart phones, we need to honestly examine how we filled that blank (I can’t get enough of _____________). For if we read the reports of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, it’s clear that any answer, regardless of whether we classify it as healthy, wholesome, religious, traditional, contemporary…, other than “Jesus,” falls short of our calling. When our longing for our way of doing things takes precedent over our longing for an authentic experience with Jesus, we have played right into our enemy’s plans. Just read the Gospels.

Jesus’ harshest words were spoken to religious people who were convinced that God could only be experienced the way they were taught and accustomed to experiencing God.

They sought comfort in their practices, their traditions, rather than in God himself. Jesus made it clear that their commitment to their religious comfort offered no appeal to those pursuing more worldly distractions. The people of God were tarnishing the appeal of God to a world full of people lost as a ball in tall weeds.

Perhaps that’s because we are meant to pursue Jesus rather than comfort. Jesus never raised the value of comfort as a virtue. In fact, he continually nudged people outside of their comfort zones with the plea to follow him into situations that read to be anything but comfortable. To be comfortable, might be the very opposite of being hungry. Anyone can find momentary comfort and ways to repeat such comfort, through taking another drink, checking one’s phone, or engaging in one’s favorite religious practice. But a true yearning for Jesus changes the lens through which we see those practices. It’s only when someone can’t get enough of Jesus that they and those around them are changed from the inside out. There’s nothing else, worldly or religious, in the blank that can do that.

Imagine your life if you honestly said, “I can’t get enough of Jesus.” Imagine the excitement within your church, if most believers looked past their distractions, whether on their phones or their worship preferences, and were just hungry for Jesus.