Tuesday, November 11th, 2003 - Case of the Jerbies

I hope that you are not getting annoyed by my growing habit to make up my own words. I shall explain what the "jerbies" are....

For the first two years that I was a Christian, I was plagued with the jerbies. Recently, I talked with a friend, and he described to me a struggle that he has been having. As I realized that he too had the jerbies, God also began to show me that I have been slowly slipping back to a jerby-ish style of relationship with Him.

The jerbies comes from the abbreviation "JRB" which stands for "Jesus Red Bull." For those who are not familiar with Red Bull, it is a popular, strong energy drink. The jerbies is the type of relationship with God where we, as Christians, drink our Jesus Red Bull to "spiritually energize" ourselves when we are down. This is done by praying, spending time with God, reading the Bible, or any other way that you may connect with God in your time alone with Him.

He who has the jerbies spends time with God and feels spiritually energized for a time; when he runs out of energy, he begins to feel down again and will remain there until he drinks another Jesus Red Bull. This practice has been called by other names, such as "Roller Coaster Christianity" or "Tarzan Christianity," where the inflicted goes through emotional "highs and lows" (or "mountains and valleys") similar to riding a roller coaster or swinging from vine to vine.

There are three big problems for a guy with the jerbies. One, his relationship with God is based on how long it has been since the last time he spent time alone with God; while this time is important, it should be a supplement rather than a basis. Two, once he slips up and misses a day without setting time to drink the JRB, his emotions crash down on him because he is without that which he bases his relationship with God upon. Three, he evaluates his relationship with God based on his emotions. Read my Feeling Down? post to see why emotions should not affect our relationship with God (scroll down about halfway and start with the paragraph that begins, "I'm not really saying...").

So what is the cure for the jerbies? For a time, I thought that it was persistently spending time with God and trying really hard not to evaluate our relationship based on my emotions. I suppose this could work for some, but it didn't for me. I have found the answer to be in practicing the presence of God which I have two different posts about. The first, Practicing Communion With God, explains 'what' this means; the second, Practicing the Presence of God, focuses more on 'how' to reach that point.

In a nutshell, the difference between this practice and the jerbies relates to the three properties of the jerbies. Here, the relationship involves constant time with God, stretching beyond just those times set away to be alone with Him. This helps to remember that our relationship with God should be based on His love for us and our love for Him, not on when we spend time with Him or on our emotions.

Put in another way, our relationship should be based on why we spend time with God rather than when, how often, or how we feel after doing so. Don't get me wrong, sometimes God gives us incredible feelings after spending time with Him, but I'm warning that we should not be any less joyful if He doesn't give those feelings. Christ is still the same regardless (Hebrews 13:8); His love does not decrease, so neither should our return of love back to Him.

As I remarked in the beginning, God has shown me that recently I have been slipping back toward living off of the Jesus Red Bull instead of Jesus himself. I thank God that He has shown me this to help keep me from falling back into the jerbies, and I look forward to more completely surrendering my heart to practice His presence. My prayer is that anyone with the jerbies who reads this will lay that burden down before God and pray for a complete immersion of Him, reverting the relationship back to the love that God has for us and we for Him.

Back to Main Page