Holding It All Together (S13E60)

Introduction

0:00Hey, it's your friend, Dr. Lee Warren. I'm so glad to be back with you for some more self-brain surgery. Welcome back to the podcast, friend. And if nobody else told you this today, I'm so proud of you for showing up. I'm grateful that you're here to do this hard and holy work with me. You could be doing anything else you want to do, but I'm giving you a pat on the back, a little fist bump, a little bro hug and saying, hey, thanks for showing up today. We gave a talk in Durham, North Carolina a couple of weeks ago. And then the week after that, Lisa and I went to Alpharetta, Georgia. We met lots of people at those two beautiful churches,

0:32Greystone and Durham with Pastor Clay Waters and Alpharetta Methodist in Alpharetta, Georgia with Pastor David Waters. And we're just so grateful to have met all of y'all. And a woman named Regina came up to me in Alpharetta and she said, hey, I lost my husband unexpectedly last year. And I just want to say that finding your work has been so helpful. And I love how you always start by congratulating me for showing up and patting me on the back because it's been a while since somebody told me good job. So Regina, this is for you. Little fist bump. Good job. Glad you're here

1:05doing this work. And friend, that's you too. Okay. I always want you to know that when I record a podcast or write something, I'm not writing to a million people. I'm writing for one person and it's you. It's me too. We're doing this work together. So let's get after it. Today, we're going to

Abundant Life

1:19talk about something that I find really fascinating. We've done a couple of episodes lately about this idea that when God says something, it's true all the way down. It's true from metaphor to medicine. It's true from feelings to physics. It's just true. And the more you study the Bible, the more you dig into science, the more you see there's always layers to everything. And one of the things Jesus said in John 10, 10 is that he came here that even though the thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, Jesus said, I came that you might have life and have it abundantly.

1:51So I want to dig into this idea that how can we live this abundant life even when everything feels like it's falling apart? And in the context of that idea that when God says something, it's true all the way down, I've been sort of riffing on this idea, this concept that I found in a scripture that I'll share with you a minute from now. And I wrote a newsletter about it that's going to be coming out in a few weeks too. So we're going to spend some time on this concept in the coming weeks. We've done two episodes about the true all the way down issue and idea because it's

2:23so it just resonates with me so much. And I want to try to dig in with that with you today so that it'll resonate with you too, because this has been lighting up my brain. I've been really on fire with this concept lately. And it changes how I see the world. It changes how I see the things I struggle with. And it changes the way I see the God who made me. And I know it'll do the same thing for you. And it'll give you some juice when it seems really hard, when you feel like you can't hold it all together. This concept, the more you dig into it and study about it and journal it and think about it, run cell brain surgery plays on it, you're going to start seeing that when God says

2:56something, it's not just poetically true or metaphorically true. It's true all the way down. And that becomes something you can really hold on to, friend, from the deepest ache in your soul on a hard night when you can't sleep, all the way down to the subatomic particles that are literally holding your body together right this second. It's one seamless reality. It's not some sacred spiritual layer floating around somewhere above a cold, godless, physical layer down here on Earth. It's one truth all the way down. That's where we're going today. Stick around to the very end for a preview of season

3:3214, which is going to start next week. It's going to be a short four-episode mini-season that's going to give us a place to start, especially if you're new around here. It's going to give you some things to share with other people and a little touchstone. So no matter how deep we go or into the weeds of the physics we go or how far off into mental health we go or how far off into healing hope and higher performance we go, you can always have these four episodes to come back to and say, this is where I start. These are the principles that self-brain surgery is built around. These are the big ideas, the big concepts I can share if I'm trying to build a team of people to do this work with me. Those episodes are going to help.

4:05That's what we're going to do next week. But for now, I want to start with this idea that's really been setting me on fire lately. We're going to get into the concept of when God says something that's true, it's true all the way down, and why that's so important for helping you hold it together when you feel like you can't even hold on to yourself. Let's get after it.

Colossians Scripture

4:25Now let's start with this scripture. It's been anchoring me lately. I've been spending a lot of time with it. You know, every time I go on my friend Susie Larson's radio show, the first question she asks is, what's God been working on you about lately? What scripture does he keep bringing up to you lately? What have you been sticking on? Have you been spending time with the Lord lately? And for me, the next time I talk to her, it's going to be Colossians chapter one

4:56verses 15 through 17. And I'm going to give you a little preview of that right now. If you're watching Susie, this is a preview of what we're going to talk about the next time I talk to you because Colossians one has been in my head and on my heart and in my journal and in the emails that I sent to Lisa a lot lately. It's in a newsletter that I just wrote yesterday. It'll go out in a few weeks. And it's been this concept that's been really sticking with me. And I know God is sharing it with me because somebody that hears this today is going to send me an email or send me a message

5:28or leave a comment on YouTube. And they're going to say, you know what, doc, that's exactly what I needed. I've been feeling like I can't hold it all together and I needed it. And that's where that's that really landed for me today. Somebody's going to do that. If it's you, leave a comment and let me know Colossians one verses 15 through 17. This is the apostle Paul writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. And here's what he says about Jesus. It says this, he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation for by him, all things were created in heaven and on earth,

6:04visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things and in him, all things hold together. Did you get that? Everything that was made, John says this too, everything that was made was made by him and for him. And everything in the universe, it says in him, all things hold together. Notice the

6:38tense. This isn't past tense. It's an active voice. He's saying right now, not once upon a time, Jesus set the laws in motion and, but he didn't just walk away. It's not deism where God made this thing and wound it up like a clock and just set it off to see what would happen. It says he is before all things and in him, all things hold together. It's not just pious poetry layered on top of a mechanical universe. If it's true all the way down, then this is physics. It's biology. It's

7:09neuroscience. It's the very air you're breathing and the neurons that are firing as you hear these words that I'm speaking to you right now. Think about the gospel of John chapter one. In the beginning was the word, that's capital W word, that's Jesus. And the word was with God and the word was God. All things were made through him. And without him, not anything was made that was made. John is reaching all the way back to Genesis one when God said, let there be light. And there was

7:40light. Guess who made the light? It says Jesus did. He made the photons. He blew up the big bang, but John pulls back the curtain and shows us something astonishing. It was Jesus doing the work. The same Jesus who walked the dusty roads of Galilee, who wept at Lazarus tomb, who hung on the cross and rose again. He was the agent of that creation. He spoke and photons burst into existence. He spoke and the universe began its dance of order out of chaos. That same Jesus, Colossians tells us, is still speaking,

8:15still creating, and still holding everything together. So when you say, I don't feel like I can hold it together. Guess why? Because you were never meant to. He does the holding. Now let's take this into this true all the way down idea. Look at it through that lens and press it all the way into the physics that keeps reality from dissolving into quantum foam every single second. Modern science describes four fundamental forces of the universe. There's only four forces that really hold everything together in the universe. These are the how of the universe not flying apart. They're the mechanisms. They're

8:50repeatable, measurable, elegant, but science is silent on the who, the why, and the what now. I wrote about that in my new book, The Life-Changing Art of Self-Brain Surgery. I said science is really good at giving us the how, figuring out the mechanics, but it can't answer the why and what now kind of stuff that life brings us. That's where theology steps in. It doesn't override the data. It interprets the meaning of the data. The four fundamental forces aren't four blind laws that are running on autopilot.

9:21They're four windows into different aspects of what the sustaining person of Jesus Christ is doing in his ongoing active involvement in the universe and in our solar system and in our atmosphere and in your life. So let's walk through them one by one, slowly, because this matters for your life

Four Fundamental Forces

9:41today. Now, if you're not a science person, I'm just going to break this down really simply. Just so you know, there are four forces and Jesus is the one operating all of them, even though he's the one that made them. First, it's called the strong nuclear force. The strong nuclear force is the brute, short-range, super powerful force that clamps quarks, subatomic particles, and makes protons and neutrons out of them. And then it locks those nucleons into nucleuses, atomic nuclei. And without

10:11the strong nuclear force, no atoms heavier than hydrogen would have survived longer than a blink after the Big Bang. If it weren't for the strong nuclear force, all the hydrogen atoms would have just blown apart and no other elements would have formed, which means no other stars would have formed, which means no stars would have formed, no galaxies would have formed, and ultimately, no chemicals would have formed, no proteins, and no you and no me. This was the creative force that God gave to hold those original hydrogen atoms into place so that they could combine and form

10:43other elements. And from that, he was able to build everything else that was made. When it said everything that was made was made by him, guess what he used to do that? Hydrogen atoms and the strong nuclear force was the beginning of it. Mark Batterson, my friend, always says, I want to know what's really happening when what's happening is happening. This is the mechanics, the physics, and ultimately the chemistry and then the biology of what he did after he said, let there be light. It's the strong nuclear force is the grip that overcomes the electromagnetic repulsion that would

11:16try to explode every nucleus on the periodic table. It's true all the way down. It's not just blind quantum dynamics. It's the grip of the one who said, let there be and never stopped speaking that into the universe and into you and into me. Every proton and every carbon atom in your body, the same carbon that's right now fueling the neurons that let you feel joy or grief or hope is being actively steadied by the son of God, operating the strong nuclear force, not set it

11:47and forget it, held. Colossians says, everything is held together by him moment by moment. That's the mechanism by which he does it. About that. The next time you feel like your life is coming unglued, the same power that is holding your atoms together is the power that can hold your heart together. The second one is called the electromagnetic force, and this one runs the show at the atomic and molecular scales. Think about photons, electrons, the nuclei orbiting around in your molecules, the chemistry that makes

12:19water wet and DNA helical, and your morning coffee tastes like mercy. It's what lets your cells talk to each other. Every covalent bond in the proteins that keep your heart beating is Christ holding together the very possibility of life through the electromagnetic force. The electromagnetic repulsion that should make your coffee cup dissolve into plasma right now is overruled by the electromagnetic force, continuously and personally by the operator who made it all in the first place. The same force

12:51that lets you feel the warmth of sunlight on your skin is the reality that lets you feel the warmth of another person's presence. From feelings to physics, it's a continuum. When you reach out and hold someone's hand in a hospital room, that touch is possible because of the same upholding word that keeps the universe from flying apart, the electromagnetic force. The third one is called the weak nuclear force. This is the weirdo, the oddball force. It governs what's called beta decay, neutrino interactions, nuclear reactions, and the fusion furnace in the sun's core that keeps our planet from freezing solid.

13:26The weak nuclear force is responsible for the slow drip of radioactive decay that powers Earth's geology, and ironically, the very light by which we can read the book of Colossians in our Bibles. When he says holds all things together here, he's not just preventing collapse. He's regulating the controlled unraveling that makes stars shine and elements recycle into new planets and new bodies and new stories. This is the driver of things like carbon decay that allows us to use carbon dating and

13:57figure out how old things are. The weak force is the quiet permission for change within stability. It's true all the way down. That's providence. The universe is not static. It's dynamically sustained so that redemption can unfold across deep time. Without the weak force, things would not decay in a way that allowed them to ultimately be renewed. Even when your life feels like it's in a slow season of unraveling, a diagnosis, a loss, a long period of waiting, a quiet, dark night of the soul, he's still there

14:29regulating it all so that something beautiful can be born from it. The fourth force is one that you're more familiar with, gravity. This is the weakest one by far, yet the sculptor of galaxies, orbits, and the large-scale structure of the cosmos is gravity. It warps space-time itself so that everything doesn't just drift apart after the Big Bang happened. On this reading, gravity isn't impersonal curvature. It's the long-range echo of the same upholding word that keeps your soul from cosmic

15:02loneliness. The force that lets a galaxy hold its spiral arms like ours, the Milky Way, is the same reality that lets a human heart hold on to hope when everything feels like it's flying apart. Friend, the beautiful scandal is the continuing part. Physics textbooks often slip into this sort of deistic language. They say things like, the laws were said at the time of the Big Bang. They don't believe in God, of course, but they say the Big Bang somehow created these laws. But guess what? Colossians won't let us do that because it says Jesus is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

15:38That's present tense. It's active voice. It's not something that happened in the past one time, and he's now just watching it like a spectator in Jordan-Hare Stadium in Auburn. War Eagle. The forces aren't autonomous. They're the current detectable expression of his will. You take away that upholding for one moment, one plank time, one little blip in the history of the cosmos, and nuclei would dissolve. Chemistry would turn to fireworks, and the cosmos would unravel into

16:08death. And yet here we are, breathing, feeling, hoping, watching a podcast on YouTube because he hasn't let go. He's holding everything together. Now, friend, before we go any further, I want you to just take a second, maybe say a prayer, and thank God for the four fundamental forces of the universe. You might not have ever even heard about them before except for gravity. But take a minute and be grateful for these invisible forces that are responsible for everything working and for the force behind them all that's still doing that work. And let's take a little break, and let's have a

16:42word from our sponsors while you give gratitude and thanks a minute to be aware of now something that you may not have previously been aware of but has such a profound impact on your life and even makes your life possible. And we'll be back in just a moment after we spend a second learning about the sponsors that make all this work possible. Did you know three out of four U.S. homes have toxic chemicals in their tap water? Even though contaminated water looks clear, it could put you at risk for devastating health concerns, including fatigue, hormone disruption, cognitive decline, even cancer. Surprisingly,

17:15standard fridge and pitcher filters do very little to remove most contaminants, and bottled water contains microplastics. So what's the solution? Introducing AquaTrue, the countertop water purifier tested and certified to remove 84 contaminants, including chlorine, lead, forever chemicals, and microplastics. It's got a patented four-stage reverse osmosis system that goes way beyond ordinary filters for pure, healthy water you can trust. There's no plumbing, no installation. AquaTrue has been featured in Business Insider, Popular Science, and it's named the best

17:47countertop water filter by Good Housekeeping. You can join 98% of customers who say their drinking water is cleaner, safer, and healthier. And three of those customers are me and Lisa and Tata. We drink AquaTrue water every day. It's been on our counter for over a year. We've blind taste tested it with each other, and you can tell the difference in how your water tastes, and you know it's good for you. Go to AquaTrue.com now for 20% off your AquaTrue water purifier using promo code Dr. Lee Warren. And AquaTrue even comes with a 30-day best tasting water guarantee. That's AquaTrue, A-Q-U-A-T-R-U,

18:23dot com, and use the promo code Dr. Lee Warren, D-R-L-E-E-W-A-R-R-E-N for your AquaTrue water purifier. Welcome back. Hey, we live at the mysterious intersection of mind and matter every single

Mind and Matter Intersection

18:38day. We talk about it all the time. Mind and brain are not the same thing. Brain is made of matter, of material things. It's the stuff in your head, the squishy bits, okay? Immaterial things, mind, eternal things, things that aren't physical. And there's an intersection between matter and mind, between immaterial and material. We live at that intersection every single day. That's where things like we've talked about before, these particles called exciton polaritons come in. They're called quasi-particles, that these hybrid states where light, like photons, and matter,

19:13like excitons, couple together in some materials, especially in semiconductor structures or even biological systems. This is some research that's producing things like quantum computing and perhaps the ability to understand how our thoughts turn into brain activity and maybe how prayer works at the universal level with God. Recent research is exploring how these exciton polariton particles might be the place where immaterial information like thoughts interfaces with material neurons and

19:44neuronal activity is born in your brain. In other words, the physics of how a thought from your mind, something non-physical, could become the electrical and chemical storm that moves your body may be explained with these exciton polariton particles. And if that's true, it opens the door to something even more beautiful, like how prayer becomes real in our bodies. When you pray, you're not just shouting into an empty void. You're engaging the same sustaining word who holds the universe together through the four fundamental forces. And that prayer isn't just spiritual. If it's true all the way down, it can

20:19cross the immaterial material boundary through mechanisms like exciton polaritons becoming real things in your brain, structural changes in your brain chemistry, your immune system, your very cells. The same Jesus Christ who binds quarks with the strong force is binding your mind so it doesn't dissolve into chaos when panic or grief hits. And that naturally leads us to this weird phenomenon that I wrote about in my new book called quantum entanglement. The phenomenon that Einstein called

20:49spooky action at a distance. These particles that have interacted, they become linked in some way so that the state of one instantly influences the other, no matter how far apart they are in the universe. This true all the way down idea says that entanglement isn't just random weirdness in the math equations on the chalkboard of a quantum mechanics class. It's a glimpse of how the one who holds all things together does it personally, intimately, everywhere at once. The same non-local reality that lets two

21:20entangled photons mirror each other across light years, is the same reality that lets your prayer reach the heart of God and echo back into your neurons, your body, your circumstances, or on behalf of someone you're advocating for. This isn't science versus faith. Physics shows us how. Theology shows us who, why, and what now. So the question for us today then is what now? When your neurons are firing in panic or in despair, the same Christ who binds those particles together is binding your mind so it

21:56doesn't devolve and dissolve into chaos. When a marriage or a church or a friendship feels like it's flying apart, the bonds holding it together are not ultimately dependent on human willpower. They're held by the one who holds the atoms together. When culture or politics or your own body seems to be unraveling, you don't have to become a frantic self-holder. You were never meant to hold everything together. You get to rest in the one who does the holding, who makes the forces that hold

22:27things together. Jesus has been the one creating and sustaining everything, including your life, from back in the beginning when he said, let there be light, which as Tata always says in Latin is fiat loose all the way to the, it is finished on the cross. And friend, he'll be there holding and helping you all the way into the future until finally all his promises have been fulfilled because he's the answer to all your whys and all your what nows. And he's the reason I always say

22:59you can't change your life until you change your mind because he's the one that's in your mind. You have the mind of Christ and the same power that he used, the Bible says, to raise Jesus from the dead is in you. And that's why the good news is, as I always say, is we can start today because he's right there holding it all together. Friend, the same Jesus who said, let there be light is still saying it to you in your dark places. In the darkest nights of your life, he's saying fiat loose,

23:30sustaining the photons that let you see this moment, sustaining the neurons that let you feel, sustaining the forces that keep your body from flying apart or flying off into space and sustaining the very fabric of reality so that your story, your grief, your questions, your prayers can matter because he's holding all things together, including you right now. It's true all the way down, my friend. And before we go, let me give you just a quick little preview into season 14 because

24:02we got a lot of new listeners. In fact, our platform has expanded by a power of 10. That's amazing for me to think about. But we went literally a power of 10 over the last year as people found out about self-brain surgery and new people found their way to the podcast and people started following us on Instagram and YouTube and all that. There's a lot of new people. And every day we get an email from somebody that says, hey, doc, you got four books and a thousand podcast episodes and 13 years of newsletters. Where do I start? I don't know where to start. And the first thing I always say

24:37is, well, start with the new book. Start with the life-changing art of self-brain surgery because it's the culmination of all of this work in one handy place with the 10 commandments, the four approaches, the 15 operations. It's the perfect place to start. But if you want a podcast, a place to start on the podcast, I thought maybe I should give you one. So we're going to take season 14 and we're going to do four episodes. There's going to be like a start here episode, the very first one. It'll be a great episode for you to share with a friend, the principles, the high level things

25:09about self-brain surgery. What is this all about? How is it different than cognitive behavioral therapy? How is it different than other therapeutic techniques? What is self-brain surgery all about? The second episode is going to be big, high level concepts like what is your mind and how is it different from your brain and what kind of worldview do self-brain surgeons have and those big concepts like that. And then we're going to do the 10 commandments of self-brain surgery in a new way. We're going to look at that five areas of our lives, physical, spiritual, relational, emotional, and financial, those five areas. And we're going to understand how the 10 commandments speak into

25:46each of those areas so that we can become healthier and feel better and be happier and achieve healing and hope and higher performance. The kinds of things we're going to be doing some individual personal coaching on soon. And keep your eyes open for that. Be coming some announcements about that soon. Some opportunities to work with me that really make some transformations in your life. And we're going to use those four episodes to start here. So you can share them with friends. You can have a club. If you want to have a book club to talk about the book, you can use those four episodes as kind of guides for the big concepts, things like that. We also have two bonus episodes

26:20in May that are going to be coming up. One of my good friends is a scientist named J.P. Moreland, and he's written some of the most important books about consciousness and secularism and scientism, these big concepts like consciousness and mind and brain and all these things. And J.P.'s going to help us really understand the kind of worldview that we need to have if we're going to operate as good scientists who are also faithful believers and why those two things are not contradictory. J.P. Moreland is going to be a fantastic conversation, a really deep dive. We're going to get super nerdy, but also super practical. We also have one of our really fun science spotlight

26:55episodes. Our friends at AquaTrue, one of our favorite sponsors here on the podcast, one of their lead scientists is going to be on the show to talk about the most important thing you put in your body every day, water and why it matters. We're going to have a good talk about water, what's going on with our tap water in the United States and what we can do about it. We're going to have a really good conversation about that. And then we're going to introduce the idea of the Self-Brain Surgery Book Club. One of the things I've always done is we've had authors highlighting their books on the podcast, some of my favorite conversations with people like Ann Voskamp and Mark Batterson and Daniel

27:28Lehman and Max Lucado and people like that bringing their books to us. And we give away a lot of books on the show because you're smart and you read a lot. And we have lots of people that listen to this show that love to read and they've always used my show to find out about new books. But we're going to flip that around a little bit and we're going to start the Self-Brain Surgery Book Club. So instead of introducing you to a book and then hoping you'll go read it, I'm going to tell you about a book and then give you some time and then we're going to come back hopefully with the author and talk about

27:59it after you've read it because that'll give you a chance to submit some questions that we can ask the author and have a little question and answer. So we're going to start flipping that and we're going to start with me as hopefully one of your favorite authors and my book. And we're going to do a Self-Brain Surgery Book Club, probably not in May, but probably in early June about my book. And I'm going to give you a chance to submit some questions and we're going to have some interaction. I just wanted to tell you where we're going and give you a chance to get excited about Season 14 because it's going to be shareable, something you can use as a touchstone, a place to remind yourself or come back to and

28:33re-remember some of the big concepts because there may be a time when six months from now we're talking about something and you go, gosh, it's been a while since I heard that. What does that mean? You'll always be able to come back to these four episodes and kind of get your head back in the game and reintroduce yourself to the key concepts as we get more and more professional in our practice as Self-Brain Surgeons. Because friend, I want you to master this. I don't want it to be a technique that you whip out when you need something. I want it to be a lifestyle for you because God says you have the mind of Christ. He says you're supposed to take every thought captive. He says you're supposed to renew your

29:07mind. If you want to stop being anxious all the time, you got to renew your mind. And this is the process. This is the physics of how it gets done. So I'm so glad that you were with me today and we covered this beautiful ground about how things are true all the way down and how you've never been designed to hold everything together yourself because he's the one that's doing the holding down to the subatomic level. And I hope that resonated with you like it does for me. If today's episode meant something to you, would you please do me a favor? Hit that like button. Smash the bell icon if you're watching on YouTube so you get notified about new episodes. If you're listening on the audio players, hit that follow

29:41button. And please leave a review if you have a chance or leave a comment and let us know how this is landing with you. Consider sharing it with a friend. And if you want to go deeper into all these ideas, grab a copy of my book, The Life-Changing Art of Self-Brain Surgery. It's available everywhere books are sold, especially on my website, drleewarren.com. And we have all kinds of other resources, courses you can buy, free things you can download, the thought biopsy, the Ten Commandments, all kinds of good stuff at school.wleewarrenmd.com. School.wleewarrenmd.com. Friend, I'll see you back

30:15here next time for some more self-brain surgery. And don't forget, you can't change your life until you change your mind. And the very good news is, you can start today. See you next time for some more self-brain surgery. And I'll see you next time for some more self-brain surgery.