Information Related to "A Beautiful, Vertical Mind"
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You
may have seen it. In the critically acclaimed motion picture A Beautiful
Mind, actor Russell Crowe played the part of real-life Nobel Prize-winning
mathematician John Forbes Nash Jr. Paranoid schizophrenia overshadowed Nash's
mental brilliance for a time, but with dogged determination he fought back
that terror of mental illness until he regained his beautiful mind.
As
a pastor I've counseled many with mental illnesses and a few with paranoid
schizophrenia. In their lucid moments they desire a return to full sanity.
They want to have a sound mind, a beautiful mind.
What's your mind like? Do all your synapses fire in logical sequence? Can you quantify reality, then add, subtract, multiply and divide until you come to good and reasonable conclusions? Do you have a beautiful mind?
Most people think they do. But most people are wrong. They have only half a beautiful mind, and it is corrupted by sinful thoughts—a form of spiritual insanity.
You see, as human beings we have a natural mind composed of our brain working in conjunction with a nonphysical component God gave us that the Bible calls the spirit of or in man. Scientists who don't believe in God disagree with this explanation because they don't accept anything outside the physical realm.
Within Christianity many think the nonphysical or spiritual element is an immortal soul. But they're wrong too. The Bible says, "The soul who sins shall die" (Ezekiel 18:4). A soul that can die is mortal, not immortal.
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