Many present a split between emotions and actions. Thus we may not be able to help feeling a certain way but feelings are okay as long as we do not act on them. Examples would be fear, anger, or desire. These feelings are not thought of as right or wrong, but instead one evaluates one’s actions as right or wrong. So acting right becomes more important. Similarly, if one does not feel enough joy, hope, or love, one may put more emphasis on actions, focusing instead on doing what is right. For example, one may act like love but not love! “If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:3).
By doing what is right and leaving the importance of emotion behind we may hope that our feelings will catch up. “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him” (Philippians 2:13). The risk though is that too much emphasis on acting without feeling may leave one feeling empty inside, or may even lead to more negative emotions like guilt. Or, acting and finding one’s worth in one’s actions can lead to hypocrisy and self-righteousness, and is the basis of legalism. What is God’s view of the self-righteous? “They say to each other, ‘Don’t come too close or you will defile me! I am holier than you!’ These people are a stench in my nostrils, an acrid smell that never goes away” (Isaiah 65:5). Instead, God may be looking for a change of heart. For example Jesus told the religious Pharisees “First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean” (Matthew 23:26).
The author Dan Blair is a Christian therapist at Blair Counseling and Mediation.
I applaud what you said. This issue has been a conundrum for me for a long time. For example, I know that feelings are not sin, yet Jesus said if you lust, it is like commiting adultery in your heart. I think it means that the feeling is not sin until you choose to dwell on it. The will has to be involved in it in order for it to be a sin.
Another angle of it is the importance of being authentic. In other words, those who tell me “to praise God for this trial” when you feel pain, anger, and despair, seem to me to be telling me to be inauthentic. I think God would rather hear how I really feel. Yet there is healing in praise.
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