You’re Not Alone

We often hear that we, as Christians, cannot go by our feelings. Our feelings, or our emotions, come from our hearts. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” The deeper our understanding of this fact, the more equipped we are to recognize and triumph over one of the most effective weapons in our enemy’s arsenal.

The reality, however, is that as long as our heart continues its thud-thump cadence within us, we will be vulnerable to Satan’s tactics. Our battle plan, therefore, is not to defeat our emotions, but to recognize how Satan uses them against us, and to learn how to defend ourselves, utilizing the armor God has specified for us.

As we journey with Christ, our emotions can often overwhelm us. We may experience criticism from others, fall prey to condemnation when we sense that we do not measure up to God’s standards (or even our own), and may even be ostracized by the church or Christian community. The results can be tragic – we conclude that there is something wrong with us and we must strengthen our determination, or else we deem ourselves powerless and incapable, and deteriorate until there is nothing left of the spiritual life we once led, all the while wondering what caused this downhill slide in the first place.

So what hope do we have? Is there help? What weaponry is at our disposal? As well, how should we react when these feelings seem to overtake us? Is there anyone we can look to as our example?