feelings

this post probably won't be what you think it is based on the title, but i couldn't come up with a better one. i had an interesting conversation with a friend a few days ago about feelings & emotions and how they play into our understanding of Biblical truths and how we can confuse them with the workings of the Holy Spirit....it got me thinking (over the past year or so i've realized i think too much.) how do we know which of the two we're relying upon and basing our decisions? do we make decisions because they "feel right" and relieve us from guilt, make us happier, or because biblical truths show them to be in line with what Jesus taught? which way am i living my life? i hope not the former...

i think often times we go to church and get goosebumps, tingles up our spines, or get really emotional (crying and experiencing that sense of inexplicable joy) and attribute these feelings as being the Holy Spirit working in us. i'm not going to say that those reactions are not results of the Holy Spirit, because they could be a result of him clarifying something to us, working in our hearts, moving us to take action, etc. but i do think we need to be able to separate the workings of the HS from our emotions and feelings because they are NOT one in the same. once we are more aware of what we are basing our decisions on, we are able to make better decisions and live more biblical lives.

the HS is always dwelling within us. he is a gift from God that we received when we opened our hearts to receiving the gospel of grace and truth and accepting Jesus as our savior, and Jesus promises us that the HS will never leave us. when we accepted Christ as our savior, the HS began to dwell within us, causing us to be born again in freedom from sin and baptizing us into the body of Christ, the church.

"You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you." (Romans 8:9-11)

"And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession-to the praise of his glory." (Eph 1:13-14)

"For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body-whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free-and we were all given the one Spirit to drink." (1 Cor 12:13)

feelings on the other hand, are a wonderful gift from God, but they are not always trustworthy. the bible teaches that our hearts naturally, apart from God's grace, are deceitful.

"The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?" (Jer 17:9)

think about your emotions and how they play out in your life- where do they naturally stem from? for me, anger often comes from my heart being hurt or in some aspect of pain, jealousy comes from my heart feeling betrayed or unwanted, happiness from my heart being content, and sadness from heart feeling loss. if you're really scientific, you may say, no brooke- emotions don't come from your heart, they come from your limbic lobe. on that i'll just say that scientists don't even fully understand them...what triggers your emotions? if you're a woman, a whole heck of a lot of hormones! but either way, they aren't coming from the HS. we cannot depend on them, because they are triggered by life's circumstances. since we are sinful, with motives and hearts that can't be trusted, these tender feelings of our hearts can't be equated with "truth."

ex: have you ever been tempted to keep/kept money you found on the ground? did you feel good about keeping that money? if you asked around and found no one missing dollars, you probably felt okay about it. but how do you know if it was selfishness or not that gave you that feeling of satisfaction from having a few extra bucks?

"But they did not listen or pay attention; instead, they followed the stubbornness of their evil hearts." (Jer 11:8)

since we cannot count on ourselves or our deceitful hearts, we need to depend on the promise of God's work and NOT our feelings. we need to depend on the facts and our faith first, and our feelings last. if you go through your spiritual life counting on your feelings of love for God to get you through, you're going to have one heck of a tough time when God tests your dedication and perseverance by taking away those peaceful, happy or tear-jerking feelings during any kind of spiritual "valley." i read an analogy when i was reading about the HS that labeled the facts as the engine of a train, with your faith as the 2nd car and your feelings as the caboose. you can't drive a train by pulling it from the caboose. you have to pull it with the engine in front.

like a train engine trying to push a train down the tracks, we aren't going to get anywhere by pushing our spiritual train backwards. our feelings are not related to God's authority. the Word of God and God's promises ARE. they are never changing and we can and do build our lives upon them. our lives need to be controlled by Christ, and not by us, so we anchor our lives not in our feelings, but in God's word to make everyday life decisions.

it is interesting that the Bible doesn't tell us to listen to our feelings, but we do anyhow. being emotionally driven is not a biblical way to live. we need to live our lives based on solid truths. God's word is pretty clear on this. it states that Satan is actually able to appear in this world as an angel of light. he can produce emotions in us, if we let ourselves be led by them. pretty scary stuff.

"...no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness." (2 Cor 11:14-15)

how do we know then, if we are following God's truth or not? we must continue in the word of God, and his truth will manifest itself in us. we must pray to God and the Holy Spirit to open our hearts to God's truth, open our ears to hear and our eyes to see. we must live the Spirit-filled life.

"You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness..." (Eph 4: 22-32)