Emotions can sometimes wreck your day, can’t they? In this brief article, you’ll learn
- You are not alone,
- Emotions — including the hard ones — assist in your sanctification.
- 4 steps to emotional wellness
You Are Not Alone
Meet a former counselee I’ll call Linda, who feels like a twisted piece of metal. Among her emotional wreckedness: rebellious teen, overworked husband, tight finances, loneliness.
And weariness. Deep weariness. Sound familiar? Click & Tweet!
Her teenage son is a Christian but runs with the beer-drinking crowd and stopped attending church. Linda fears he may get in a car crash. Just as bad, her husband is travels for work most of the week. So loneliness darkens her days and nights. In addition, household finances are tight, and the roof is beginning to leak.
And her emotions have affected her psysically. She sleeps poorly, gets migraines, and feels anxious all day.
I and other biblical counselors — some are listed on my Heart2Heart Counselor Directory, by state and specialies — come alongside the hurting every day, listening, giving hope, isolating the problem, determining direction, and helping them implement God-honoring solutions that result in peace and contentment, and most important, God’s glory.
Emotions Help You Grow Spiritually
Emotions tell us something about our hearts. Click & Tweet! They are neither morally good nor morally bad. Consider Jesus. He expressed emotions and never sinned.
- ANGER: Jesus felt righteous anger while he turned over money-changers’ tables who were making his Father’s house a “den of robbers” (Matthew 21:13).
- SADNESS: He sorrowed over the death of his friend Lazarus. (John 11:35)
- FEAR: He feared the pain of dying on the cross. (Luke 22:42-44)
While Jesus felt a myriad of emotions and did not sin, you and I know that we often have ungodly thoughts (“Jerk, why don’t you learn how to drive?” or “No one loves me”) and act in ungodly ways (yell, pout, slam doors, and so on).
To help you achieve emotional wellness, may I share a four-step plan (adapted from Elyse Fitzpatrick, a leading biblical counselor)? It skims the surface. So if you you desire biblical counseling via Skype or in person, check out my counseling info page. We can work together on your emotional wellness.
4 Steps to Emotional Self-Care
God wants to free you from the emotions that lead to sin. So here are four steps to emotional wellness.
1. Agree with God that your current way of handling negative emotions is sinful and cease from it. The one who changes your emotions is the Holy Spirit as you cooperate with him.
2. Be convinced that God’s way of becoming emotionally healthy are right and begin practicing them. Again, this is accomplishes through relying on the power, strenth, and grace of the Holy Spirit, who cares for you and you enables you to achieve God’s purposes in you.
3. Seek to change the way you think and become conformed to God’s will, especially in the emotions you struggle with. Yes, God is able to change you and heal your emotions. Yes, he wants to.
4. Continue to engage in your new godly thoughts and behaviors even when you fail and need to repent.
Achieving emotional self-care is never easy, and in giving four steps, I do not imply that is is. Becoming emotionally well is contrary to “the natural man.” Indeed, it means saying, “Lord, your will be done” when our easy-to-deceive hearts insist, “My will be done.”
The Good News
The good news is, you CAN know peace and contentment. You CAN put away selfishness, fear, and your need to control. And you CAN fight anger and win. Yes, you CAN fall into the arms on God, not the pit of despair. All because of Jesus and his redeeming love shown on the cross.
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence. 2 Peter 1:3
May I pray for you?
Heavenly Father, this one needs your touch. She needs to know you are real and you care and you love her. You know her struggles. You desire to heal her. May your will be done. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Sharing Hope with Your Heart,
Thank you. I really needed this right now.
I’m happy to help. 🙂
I have been angry for a long time. I feel like I am someone I don’t even know sometimes. I did not realize how I became this way, but I know that I don’t like it, or myself for that matter. I scare ME sometimes. How quickly I forgot it is His will not mine, and that I need to pray for God to lift my anger. I have been so focused on praying for strength to handle a difficult situation, that I did not pay attention to what this negative situation was doing to me emotionally. I am so glad that I read this. Thank you Lucy for posting this, I really needed to hear this. 🙂
Jennifer, I pray that God heals you. God wants us to speak the truth in love (Eph.. 4;15). When we cannot speak the truth in love to the person who has offended us (ex: the person is deceased), then we can forgive the person. This isn’t easy, but in God’s strength all things are possible. Praise God. Blessings, Lucy
Thankyou Lucy for your prayer. Dying to self is a daily thing each day as I die to self I pray more of you God and less of me! I can totally relate to the back injury I fell may 31st and it feels like an eternity since I fell. I’m
still having back issues as well. I will pray for your back as I pray for mine!
Thanks, Amanda. I pray God heals you completely and soon.:-)
Lucy,
This is a good reminder to me that emotions are not always correct. We get tired, p.m.s., etc. I struggled with my emotions for years until I realized I did not have to let them rule or control me. I grew up in an environment where anger was explosive, and there was a lot of emotional control and constant stress. With God, I have learned through many mistakes and trials, to not trust my feelings. To give them to the Lord, and have the Holy Spirit direct my emotions. Sometimes I have to pray that prayer 50 times in one day, but it works!
I hear you, Sheryl. God wants us to rule our emotions in his strength, and to not let our emotions rule us. It’s a tough lesson to learn, in part because our culture gives us messages like “If it feels good, do it.” Let us value this Scripture: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Romans 12:2