Getting Feelings In Line
Wildwind Community Church
David Flowers
August 30, 2008
We talked last week about the role our thoughts play in determining how we feel. The relationship between thoughts and feelings is undeniable and we cannot pay enough attention to it. We’ll be talking more about it this year. But tonight I want to respond to an email I received recently about the sermon from last week. Someone wrote to me and said, “I listened carefully to what you said, and I agree that our thoughts influence our feelings. I agree that if we’re feeling something terrible, we need to change the way we think. But here’s my problem. I’ve been through a lot these last few years. I’ve lost people I love. I’ve had health problems and problems in my family. I don’t complain about my illness, but sometimes I get a little down about it. Sometimes I miss the loved ones I have lost. What do I do with these feelings? How do I get my feelings in line?
That’s such a good question that I just responded briefly to the email and then asked that person to wait until tonight’s sermon to hear the rest of my thoughts. It’s worth thinking and reflecting on. Here we are, acknowledging the connectedness of our thoughts and our feelings. Here we are, realizing that if we’re depressed we need to change the way we think. If we’re angry we need to change the way we think. If we’re lustful we need to change the way we think. So what do we do with feelings of loss? Feelings of grief? Feelings of discouragement? Feelings of loneliness? These are very real things, after all. Can we just think our way out of them? Is that what I was advocating in last week’s message?
Last week we focused mainly on thinking. I stated that we live from our feelings and define ourselves accordingly, and we are meant to – the problem is that our feelings are mucked up and misguided because oftentimes our feelings come from thoughts that are not focused on God-realities. Our thoughts are not accurate, therefore our feelings are not accurate. But this doesn’t always happen. Even when we are thinking rightly, immersed in God-reality, we will encounter strong feelings. Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus – he grieved in the face of death. He sweated blood in Gethsemane as he stood in the shadow of the cross. He mourned for Jerusalem and its hard-heartedness and stated his desire to gather the city up into his arms and just cradle her. He expressed anger at the money-changers in the temple, frustration with his clueless disciples, and disappointment with the Pharisees. The book of Isaiah refers to Jesus as a “man of sorrows,” and “familiar with suffering.” We don’t ever see Jesus make any attempts to pray away his emotions. Surely there’s room for healthy emotion in the life of a Christ-follower.
It has been the error of some Christian denominations to oversimplify the head/heart connection. Some would say that we can, and actually should, think ourselves out of grief, or sorrow, or frustration. Some would say that fear is always a sign of a lack of faith. Some would say that these are all carnal, fleshly, worldly things, and that a strong Christian should live in constant victory over these things. But this is not the way the church has understood feelings throughout history.
A long time ago Pastor/Apostle Paul addressed kind of the same question Pastor Dave was asked this week. What do I do with this grief I am feeling? How do I handle these feelings I am having about the losses I have suffered? Here’s what he said. Now in the remaining moments of this message I will be focusing a lot on grief, but what I am saying applies to many different kinds of emotions we might have.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 (NLT)
13 And now, dear brothers and sisters, we want you to know what will happen to the believers who have died so you will not grieve like people who have no hope.
14 For since we believe that Jesus died and was raised to life again, we also believe that when Jesus returns, God will bring back with him the believers who have died.
15 We tell you this directly from the Lord: We who are still living when the Lord returns will not meet him ahead of those who have died.
16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a commanding shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First, the Christians who have died will rise from their graves.
17 Then, together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Then we will be with the Lord forever.
18 So encourage each other with these words.
Notice Paul begins at exactly the place I started with you last week. And now, dear brothers and sisters, we want you to ______________. He’s attempting to address their grief and their suffering, but begins with what he wants them to know. Why does Paul start this way?
Because what you think determines how you feel. If I think you are trying to harm me, I will feel cautious around you, even if you are not actually trying to harm me. If you notice I’m acting strange when I am around you and ask why, I’ll say, “Because you’re trying to harm me.” And what will you say in return? “Dude, I want you to KNOW -- I’m not trying to harm you – I promise. I don’t know why you think that or where you got that impression, but that’s not the case at all.” If I believe what you say, my feelings of caution will dissipate, and I will naturally begin acting normally around you again. Get the head in line and you will almost always get the heart in line. My friends, this is how Jesus meant for us to function. Jesus intends and desires for our thoughts to guide our feelings and our feelings to guide our behavior, but in order for feelings to properly guide behavior, they must be based on right thinking. So over and over again in scripture we are urged, challenged, and encouraged to learn to think rightly, to actually believe and put our faith in what Jesus has told us. So Paul does exactly the right thing in this passage. He’s addressing the grief that people are having over the loss of loved ones, and he begins by saying, “I want you to ___________.” Paul knows it will not work to say, “There, there – now feel better!” Feelings spring from what we know or what we think we know, so if Paul wants to deal with the feelings, he must start off with what he wants them to know.
So he says,
1 Thessalonians 4:13 (NLT)
13 … we want you to know what will happen to the believers who have died…
Just as you might say, “Dave, I want you to know I have no plans to harm you so that you will not feel cautious around me and avoid me,” Paul says, “I want you to know what will happen to the believers who have died, so that…what?
1 Thessalonians 4:13 (NLT)
13 … so you will not grieve like people who have no hope.
Now notice what Paul does not say. He does not say, “I want you to know what will happen to those who have died so that you will not grieve.” Paul isn’t about to introduce any information that will short-circuit the feelings. We will still have deep feelings about things sometimes. We will still grieve, still feel hurt, still find ourselves thinking of them and longing for them and feeling their loss deeply.
What Paul says is that knowing what happens after death will make sure that when Christians grieve, their grieving will be of a different kind. They will not grieve like people who don’t have any hope. They will not grieve like those who do not believe they will see their loved ones again. They will not grieve like this is all there is, like the last chapter has been written and this is the end. They will not grieve in a hopeless way, but their sorrow, their grief, their pain and loss will be punctuated with a sense of hope. They will smile through their suffering, knowing they are called, for now, to bear this heavy burden – but that one day they will put that burden down at the feet of God in order to free up their arms to wrap around those they have lost. We grieve differently when we know that our wound is not permanent. We feel differently when we know how it all works out in the end. That allows us to put our feelings, however strong, into proper perspective – so that we do not live as if our feelings are the end of the story.
This December 5 will mark 18 years since I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. They have been mostly healthy years, fortunately, but there have been some pretty rough times. Times when I could not drive or walk or see or even eat without choking. I will not stand here and try to take anything away from those times. I won’t tell you that I always had some supernatural ability to overlook it, or accept it, or glory in it. But I will tell you this. At those times I always carried inside of me a hope that I would get better. During those times I would try to focus not on the disease but beyond it. I would try to look not a few hours or days ahead, where the disease might actually continue to get worse, and scarier, but I would look farther ahead to a time when I might find the symptoms waning.
I would try to imagine myself being able to swallow properly again, or see myself walking without a cane, or imagine the constant dizziness going away, or my hands working right again, or being able to stay awake more than a few hours at a time. Most of all, I would think about being able to tell my girls, “See girls – I told you, daddy is okay,” and seeing their fear begin to dissipate.
During those times I could not pretend to be okay. The symptoms were too obvious at a certain point and my girls knew I was sick. So there was no use saying, “Daddy’s okay.” I clearly was not. But I would constantly say, “Girls, daddy is going to be fine. Let’s just be patient and give it some time, and let’s count on God to have better days ahead for us. I know you’re afraid, but daddy will be okay. I’ll bet in just a few weeks daddy is going to make a huge comeback. You’ll see.” I have gone through those times and grieved for what has happened to me, not knowing for sure how much I would improve, or how soon. I have felt the sting of fear and concern, wondering where this might go. But I have never grieved as one who had no hope. There is always hope that I will be restored and will experience more healthy days ahead, if not in this life then in the next. We grieve differently when we know that our wound is not permanent.
I read this passage and I see a pastor and a friend writing to his parishioners in the same way I have talked to my girls. “I want you to know that it’s going to be okay. You have a reason for hope. Maybe it won’t be okay right now. You’ll find yourselves swallowed up for a time in your feelings of grief, but one day every person you’ve lost is going to make a huge comeback. You’ll see.”
Grief, loss, suffering, sickness, discouragement, frustration – we can just expect those things. We will never be exempt from them as long as we are living on this earth. And there is no reason to believe that we are to try to talk ourselves out of our feelings. But we do not grieve as those who have no hope, in other words, because of what we know about God’s grace and God’s goodness, we do not get lost in our emotions – we feel them, we do not deny them, but neither do we act like the emotion is all there is. We know there’s a great deal more to us than how we feel and we know that regardless of what happens, God will set it right one day! Paul reminds the people of this by explaining what is going to happen to those who have died and telling the people about their reasons for hope. Then he concludes this section by saying,
1 Thessalonians 4:18 (NLT)
18 So encourage each other with these words.
Encourage one another with these words. We are to repeat God’s promises over and over again – encourage ourselves and each other with them. Take them up into ourselves and bring them into our friendships and communities and circles of concern. We are to live by them, build our lives on the hopes they make possible, and expect – absolutely expect – that in doing this it will not spare us from grief, from loss, from suffering, from discouragement – but will ground our feelings in reality – the reality that our suffering – no matter how severe, is temporary! This will not eliminate our suffering or make it fun, but it gives us a place to stand. Our feelings do not have to consume us. When they are grounded in hope that is real, they do not rule over us. We do not get lost in them, because they are kept in check by hope.
See, we get our feelings in line? We ground them in kingdom reality. Buddhism says you get feelings in line by learning to ignore them. Buddhism teaches that your feelings are irrelevant and that you have to so detach yourself from the world that you will no longer be affected by suffering. Christianity says God made you to have feelings and your feelings can be good – when they are not on the throne of your life. We do not have to act like we are immune from sadness and suffering, like they are signs of weakness. No one ever suffered as much as Jesus, and no one was ever as strong. No, hope in God does not eliminate our feelings. Rather, it puts them in perspective. What did Jesus keep telling us in the Sermon on the Mount? It’s your heart that matters. Emotion itself is not wrong in any way – the issue is where emotion comes from. Many of our feelings come from selfishness and pride and the need to have our own way. Let’s think about that for a minute. When you lose your temper because someone cut you off in traffic, do you think that’s healthy emotion? When you get angry at someone at work because they were promoted and you were not, do you think that is healthy emotion? When you are so caught up in the drama of another person’s life that it steals your joy and peace, do you think that’s healthy emotion? When you cannot separate yourself enough from your spouse to allow them the space to be in a bad mood or to not think well of you every second of the day, do you think that’s healthy emotion? When someone in your life who loves you tries to speak truth to you and you get angry with them, do you think that’s healthy emotion? When you feel an urgency to make sure people know you were right, do you think that’s healthy emotion? When you feel you cannot function without the approval of so and so, do you think that’s healthy emotion?
I’m trying to do two things in this sermon and I hope you’re catching them. First is that I’m trying to affirm that emotion has a legitimate and valuable place in Christian life. Second is I’m trying to point out that some emotion comes from proper grounding in God’s kingdom, and some comes from over-attachment and over-involvement with the affairs of this world. Many of our emotions are negative and destructive because they are not grounded in God-reality.
So how do you do it? How do you actually get your feelings in line? The next time you are really emotional about something, ask yourself this question: “Is this how God would have me feel?” Someone cuts you off in traffic and you cuss and flip them the bird, and the answer to that question will be pretty obvious, won’t it? When you’re angry at that person who was promoted over you, I think you’ll know the answer to that question. When you’re beating yourself half to death because of your flaws and failures, I think you’ll know the answer to that question. On the other hand, when you are grieving because you have lost someone God placed in your life, when you are suffering persecution for doing something you know was the right thing to do, when you are sorrowful because you have identified sin in your life, when you are discouraged or hurting for a time because someone you love is ruining their life – you will know the answer to that question, and it will be a different answer, won’t it? There are emotions that come from a godly place, and emotions that come from selfishness. When we are suffering and believe it comes from a godly place, then we keep Paul’s words in mind. We do not grieve as those who have no hope. The pain and loss and heartache and sorrow and frustration we encounter in this life is real – it stings. It’s temporary, but it hurts. So we take our hurt to God and ask him to show himself through it and pray to be made more like Jesus in it. When we are having emotions that come from selfishness and other ungodly places, we do not try to deal with the emotion itself. Instead we deal with our thoughts because ungodly emotions always have their roots in ungodly thoughts and that goes back to all we talked about last week.
Jesus came to bring wholeness to us. We should hope so, because we are broken people. Our emotions often prompt us to do things that run counter to our interests and the interests of those around us. What we need is a life lived in the central reality of God’s presence and activity in us and through us and around us. As we immerse our thoughts more and more in that reality and learn to see into that world with greater depth and clarity, we will see that it is more real than the things that consume so much of our time and energy – most of which are on their way out! As you realize this more and more, the natural result will be that the concerns of this world will have less and less ability to control your emotions. See, your emotions will naturally be in the service of what you most deeply believe. I don’t mean what you say you believe or what you have learned in church, but with what you actually believe and live by. Let me close with a few things you can do with your feelings.
1. Ask the question. “Is this how God would have me feel?”
2. If yes, pray that you will experience God’s grace and presence through it.
3. If not, work on your thinking – change your mind and your heart will take care of itself!
4. Give yourself permission to feel godly emotion. You do not have to pretend.
5. Deny yourself permission to wallow in ungodly emotion. You do not have to serve your feelings, because your master is Jesus.
6. Keep soaking yourself in God-reality. Learn to live in it and as you do your mind will change and your emotions will more often be godly and less often be selfish.
7. Place worship and thanksgiving at the center of your plan to renew your mind and renovate your heart.
We’ll have a lot more to say this year about stuff like this because as you’ll begin finding out next week, Wildwind is coming out this year leaner, sharper, clearer, and more focused than ever before on seeing us all become people who are learning to take Jesus Christ seriously as a redeemer who can save our lives, a teacher who can change our lives, and an example who can show us how to live our lives. Will you pray with me.
Jesus, thank you that you have made it possible for us to live free from slavery to our desires and whims and feelings. May we look to you for our salvation, listen to you as our source of information, and follow you faithfully to the destination you have for us. Amen.
