EMO for Jesus

So I’ve recently discovered I’m a bit of an emotional handful. How’d I come to that conclusion you ask? Hmmmm. Well let’s see. There was a lot of crying, some whimpering and I vaguely remember being curled up in a fetal position and my kids asking Dad if Mommy was going to be okay. 

I’m not talking about the kind of emotional that everyone experiences, you know, the tearing up at a Folgers’s commercial from time to time. I’m talking about a gut wrenching, incapacitating, messy kind of emotion where there is some borderline irrational craziness happening. 

I know there is a whole group of you reading this now that know me and would like to talk me out of this assessment of myself. And then there are the few, the proud and the brave who have seen me at the brink and they are saying “Geesh! You are JUST NOW realizing this? What took you so long?”  

My relationship with my feelings has been a touchy one and here is why. 

They have lied to me. On more than one occasion. 

And once you’ve been deceived, trust is just hard to come by. And also, the weight of emotions—the sadness, the grief and sorrow—seems wrong because they can be so heavy. So controlling. So bossy. That something must be wrong with me because I feel so fragile, easily broken by the sorrowful things in my world. 

So I’ve tried toughening up. I’ve man handled my feelings to attempt to create the feelings I want instead of the feelings I’m having-- all in the name of holy living. A practice I now acknowledge as holy stuffing. Somewhere along the line I’ve believed that airing your feelings isn’t right or good or holy. So I just swallow it. There are pros and cons to this habit of mine, but topping the cons list is the eventual end of my holy stuffing results in something resembling a volcanic eruption spewing hot, deathly lava on anyone who happens to be in my path when I finally encounter that last straw. And can I just say right here that blowing your top is not very holy? Not holy at all. 

My wrestling with all of this, of course, desperately drives me to the One who promises me wisdom if I just ask. So I take Him up on it.  In my estimation, I come to Him with a pretty funny question.

Why am I so emotional? Is it part of the curse of sin? I know emotions are good, but why do they feel so bad sometimes? Most of the time? I mean was Eve crazy emotional? 

I laugh a little as I write that last part, but honestly, this is where my nutty EMO self has landed me and I needed some answers and some “how to”--and fast.  I open up my Bible and I read this descriptor of Jesus,

  “He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” Isaiah 53:3 

And right at that moment, I sense the whisper of God saying 

I’m emotional too. Your emotions are of me. Their control of you is not of me. And there’s your trouble.

I go on to read Isaiah 53 foretelling how Jesus would feel grief and sadness and sorrow. How He would suffer and die for the sins of the world, so we could be reconciled to God all the while feeling every emotion possible and yet not sinning. Not only did He not sin, He carried the sin of the world. My sin. Talk about weight.  

I think of how many times I’ve allowed my emotions to rule my thoughts, justify my wrong behavior, excuse myself from doing the right thing, side track and side line me from life because I just couldn’t possibly handle it. 

And herein lies my example for being rightly related to my emotions: Jesus felt it all, but it did not govern Him. God the Father alone governed his heart and life. His emotions did not rule Him, but rather they fueled Him to seek the face and strength of His Father to accomplish His purpose on the earth.

And so the question I’m left with is “Who governs this heart? Who is in charge here?” 

Hands down, I know the answer to this question in the big picture of my life.  What I’m realizing though is it’s my answer in the dark of the night, when chaos abounds and temptation is knocking and my emotions are all running amuck that matters. 

My questions then turn to prayers, to pleadings for God to be the gatekeeper of my heart.  I ask Him to teach me to bring my emotions to Him, to help me to sift, sort, think and evaluate based on what is true and right. To counsel this stubborn and fickle heart about building my house on the rock rather than the shifting sand of my ever changing emotions. To learn to stay in the posture of waiting on God until my emotions are saturated with grace and truth. I’m learning to abide in His presence until my emotions no longer rule, but rather fuel my steps to go to deeper places with Jesus. My emotions are becoming indicators, warning lights to check into what’s really going on under the hood, not impulses to be obeyed. A “Service heart soon” light that blinks continuously reminding me I need God’s presence to sort this out before I go any further down the road. 

After my Holy Spirit counseling session and we’ve debrief all my willy nilly emotions, issues and faulty thinking and God has purified, sanctified and righted all my off base conclusions, then I can receive my marching orders.  Actions that are steeped in God’s wisdom not my emotions. A life that is effective, purposeful and powerful where my emotions are utilized for God’s grand purposes not my futile excuses. 

All of this has led to a fresh new season both in my relationship with God and my emotions as I’m exchanging emotional rule for fuel. I’m trading in my label of “Emotional handful” for “EMO for Jesus".  

And let me tell you something: It feels good.