Week 4 Day 1: A Gift from God

Emotions are God-given feelings of pleasantness or unpleasantness. They are reactions to internal or external stimuli. Emotions are not good or bad; you make the choice of whether you use emotions to honor Christ or to harm yourself or others.

Emotions are an essential part of your personality. Life without emotions would be dull. If you did not have emotions, you would not experience anger or anxiety, but you also would not experience joy or love. God created you to experience a variety of emotions.

Emotions are spontaneous responses to your values and beliefs. Over the years your emotional responses have been either affirmed or challenged. Because your values and beliefs are not exactly the same as any other person’s, you react to the same circumstances differently than someone else does.

Jesus was fully human and experienced the whole range of human emotions. Read Matthew 21:12-16, about when Jesus overturned the tables in the temple and Luke 10:30-37, when a priest, Levite, and Samaritan all passed an injured man on the road. In each of these circumstances, the people reacted with different emotions.

Your values help determine whether you make the correct emotional response in a given situation. Too many people are glad, sad, or mad about the wrong things for the wrong reasons. If you can discern what makes you glad, sad, or mad, you can know your true values. A worldly Christian places his or her values on a self-centered life.

Think about the most recent time you were angry. What caused this anger? Did someone challenge your position or reputation, your rights, your identity, your physical needs, your plans, your possessions, your ideas, your desires? What about a recent time you felt fear, grief, joy, loneliness, anxiety, or embarrassment? Why did you feel these emotions? Often, a person cannot control emotions because they are narrowly focused on themselves; self-centered and following a worldly nature.

When the Holy Spirit transforms you, He is present in your life to give you the ability to control your emotions. The Holy Spirit can even influence you as you relate to persons whom you do not particularly like or who do not like you.

Daily Thoughts: What did you get from today’s study?