April 16, 2020
“God is your refuge.” I read this comforting sentence in a book entitled, Untangling Emotions, by J. Alasdair Groves and Winston T. Smith. The authors examine the complex topic of emotions from a biblical perspective. As humans we all feel. But why? How? What do we do with our feelings? The authors instruct that we should avoid two extremes. The first is to deify feelings as most important. It is when emotional experience becomes the essence of existence. When we value feelings above anything else, including our relationship with the Lord and others. This extreme has its opposite. It is to altogether denounce emotions. It is a stoic stiff upper lip. Emotions are bad. Don’t trust them. It’s better to just ignore your feelings.
So avoiding the extremes of deifying or denouncing emotions, what should we do? We should engage our emotions. This means that we identify, examine, evaluate and properly act on our emotions in our life with the Lord. Listen to Psalm 62:8, “Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.” Also 1 Peter 5:6-7, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” A fundamental purpose of our emotions is to drive us to pour our hearts out to the Lord. Why? Because we trust Him rather than something else. The authors write:
“Taking your emotions to God, walking through the open door, is as simple as talking to him throughout the day, turning to him with every blip on the emotional radar, every stronger eddy in the current of your feelings. Christian author and thinker Paul Miller once quipped that anxiety is wasted prayer. Was Miller saying that any experience of concern that bad things might happen is sinful? No. He simply meant that doing anything with our fears, especially chasing your thoughts on the hamster wheel of anxiety, short circuits the very purpose for which God gave us the capacity to feel anxious. Our anxieties are meant to lead us straight to him. Every time… Do not be deceived. There are a thousand false answers to our anxiety. A myriad of other places we take our feelings for comfort. Everything from drug or sexual addictions, workaholism, abusive behaviors, and anorexia to Facebook, snacking, SportsCenter, and even thick theological volumes can divert us from the path our emotions are trying to pave to bring us to our Father. And, by the same token, every tear, sigh, explosive exhalation, grimace, grumble, or guffaw taken directly to the Friend who makes his home in our hearts is a taste of the fellowship we were made for… So don’t keep your feelings to yourself. Don’t even identify, examine, evaluate, and act on them by yourself. Instead, take him your heart as often as it wells up within you—no matter what shade the upsurge may be—and pour it out before him. A broken and contrite heart he will not despise, nor will he fail to rejoice with those who rejoice.”
Engaging our emotions in our life with the Lord isn’t confined to our qt’s. It’s not merely during our online virtual service once a week. It’s coextensive with life. We walk with the Lord in whatever we do. The wonderful gospel promise is that He is with us. He abides within us! So in these anxious, surreal days of social distancing and closures, let us pour out our heart to the Lord as we walk with Him each day. He is our refuge!