“You don’t have to bow to your feelings.”  Sounds pretty simple, right?  My emotions have a place, and rightly so, God made us to be feeling creatures, but emotions shouldn’t have the final say about what is true in a situation.  God, in his severe mercy, has given me a number of opportunities to practice this lately. As the waves keep crashing, I keep grabbing the opportunities, though sometimes not very well, to sink into the truth.  

I have been thinking about this analogy of being a racquetball court instead of a sponge.  I think somewhere along the way I got this idea from the book, Loving the Little Years, by Rachel Jankovich.  For me, being a racquetball court and not a sponge means I don’t have to absorb other’s emotions around me and take them all in.  When I absorb the emotions of my kids, for instance, I become enslaved to them.  Or if I absorb the frustrations of others, I think I must “fix it”.  Rather, the wall of the racquetball court feels the hit, the sting even, of the ball, yet it lets it go.  

If I am a sponge with my kids, it means that when they are happy, I am happy.  When they are mad, I am mad.  When they are scared, I am scared.  We can logically see how this is not helpful when we take a step back.  Thankfully, God is not like this with us – taking on our emotions, being changed by them, and responding in kind.  Yes, He weeps with those who weep and clearly and vividly displays emotion!  Yet, He is not controlled by other’s emotions or His own.  

You may not identify with this at all – I am a “2” on the enneagram whose core words are love, approval, helper, and feeler.  In some way though, we all absorb the emotions of others or follow our own hearts and feelings.  Most people can identify with being trapped in the endless cycle of feel – act – feel – act.  1 Peter 5:7 reminds us to cast all our anxieties on Jesus because he cares for us.  I imagine throwing emotion onto Jesus, knowing He can handle it, and asking Him to lead me in the truth, then bowing in submission to that truth, not bowing to my ever-changing emotion.  

In his phenomenal book, A Loving Life, Paul Miller says this about Naomi as we see her at the beginning of the book of Ruth,

“Naomi neither suppresses her feelings nor is trapped by them.  She didn’t have to act on her feelings.  She felt anguish, yet she was free from the tyranny of her feelings…if we follow (our feelings) we become trapped by them.”  

Naomi is dealing with great pain and anguish – and most of her anguish comes because she trusts that God is Sovereign and good, but she can’t see it in her circumstance.  

There is something liberating about not being trapped in our feelings; being able to feel and lament and love deeply – yes! – but not having to act on every emotion that rears its head up.  Satan may prowl around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour – whether through internal suppressed emotion, or explosive words, or anything else, but the truth is: Jesus IS the Lion of the tribe of Judah.  Jesus is the Lion.  While Satan prowls like a lion, his power is limited by the power of the true Lion – the eternal King.  

As I was driving to pick up my kids from school this week, I was in the midst of “knife fighting with the devil” as my husband lovingly says, internally fighting between my flesh-driven instincts and thoughts (the barbarians roaming the streets of my mind), OR  looking up to Jesus, attempting to sing and proclaim THE truth louder than the thoughts in my mind, and this worship song by Phil Wickham came on leading me to worship and to the truth of freedom in Christ:

“Out of the silence, the roaring Lion declared 

The grave has NO claim on me!

Hallelujah!  Praise the one who set me free. 

Hallelujah!  Death has lost it’s grip on me.

You have broken every chain!

There’s salvation in your name – Jesus Christ – my Living Hope.”

This King has delivered us from the tyranny of ourselves if we belong to Him.  We are not held hostage by emotions, or our past, or our sin.  We are filled with and empowered by the Spirit to kick out the lies, for me, it’s the fake conversations I’m having with others in my mind, particularly if I’ve been hurt or am angry.  We can replace these with the truth: 

My Father is in charge.  

There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. 

All power belongs to God.  

The Lord has delivered me from myself; the Lord IS delivering me from myself.  All I have to do fall into dependence on and look up instead of down, planning my response in my own strength by staring intently at the circumstance.  

Submitting to the Lord and leaning into him instead of our natural flesh driven responses, having to wait and trust, can lead us into sweet moments of worship.  Even the sins of others, or choices of others, are allowed by God to impact me because it drives me to Him in dependence which becomes a sweet opportunity for growth and sanctification.  

This is soul work.  This is good work.  And it’s also a knife fight with the devil.  

But Jesus has won and will win finally and fully.