Bjcorbin's Blog

When I was a child, I was very sensitive and emotional; which sounds kind of funny since I don’t suppose that I’ve ever stopped being those things.  But as time went on, I figured out that wearing my heart (i.e. emotions) on my sleeve was both messy, and at times, even dangerous. 

The first step was learning to suppress the urge to express every thought and/or feeling that bubbled up within me.  This was only moderately helpful, as internalizing these things just allowed them to fester until they came blasting out in some other unhealthy fashion.

Eventually I began to develop my intellect as a way of heading off those powerful emotions, ultimately learning to talk myself off the ledge.  I started to anticipate situations, and to think my way through them as a hedge against getting overwhelmed by circumstances. 

While this step was a little more fruitful, I began to slide off the other side of the spectrum, often times becoming relentlessly pragmatic, cynical, and/or emotionally shutdown. It was easier to manage that way, but I’m not sure it was any healthier.

In my early thirties, the life that I had carefully built (without God) began to unravel, and the powerful emotions that accompanied that season threated to drive me back into the volatile sensitivity of my youth.  Though I did have some bad moments, they were tempered by a rediscovery of my faith, as the collapse of my first marriage coincided with a sudden and unexpected revelation of Jesus.  It was a slow, and somewhat painful process, but I began to learn how to surrender my overwhelming emotions to Him, so that they wouldn’t spill over into other areas of my life.

On the surface, I may have appeared to be calmer and more mature, but in reality, I emerged from the wreckage of my old life emotionally exhausted, guarded and with a fair amount of skepticism with regard to the future (i.e. little hope).

As I attempted to cultivate my renewed faith, I frequently found myself in Evangelical settings, where ministers often warned of the dangers of “emotionalism”.   Their antidote always seemed to center around more Bible study.  If we could just memorize scripture, we’d be inoculated against the toxic effect of our emotions.  This created a rather cold sanitized religious atmosphere, much like a clean kitchen with no food in the cupboards.  It felt safe, but it generally left you hungry.

Over time, I felt pulled toward more Charismatic circles, and that atmosphere was the antithesis of what I’d experienced previously.  It was lively, loud, and filled with unabashed emotion.  It was warmer, and more inviting, but it also felt chaotic and precarious.  For a long time, I just sat back and watched.  It was like a messy kitchen with plenty to eat, but a lot of it looked like junk food.

I felt caught between two worlds, neither of which seemed to be what I was seeking.  And in the midst of this turmoil, God in His mercy, allowed me to encounter His Holy Spirit, which became the pivot on which everything shifted. 

In that moment, the otherworldly, historical God that I had grown up hearing about stepped into the present tense, and became a reality to me.  The sense of His presence was so tangible and healing that I never wanted to live apart from Him again.

This was the beginning of a new journey for me.  I was no longer interested in religious rituals, and quasi-sacred dogmas.  If God was a real person, and I could have an actual relationship with Him, that is what I wanted.  Life had taught me that people are generally self-serving, unreliable, and not worthy of my trust, so the thought of eliminating the middle man was very appealing to me.

Like Peter, this unveiled revelation of who He was made me want to set up a tent, and live with Him on the mountain top, and God allowed me to revel in that “just You and me” relationship for a season.  But just as He did with His disciples, He let me know that ultimately the mission was down in the valley, where all those people I struggled to trust lived. 

The good news was that He wasn’t asking me to trust them, He was asking me to trust Him.  The bad news was that I couldn’t distance myself from them without also creating distance between Him and me.  Given my newfound sense of His nearness, that was a cost I wasn’t willing to pay. 

But I also understood that routinely dealing with the complexities of other human beings was going to require a level of patience and self-control that I had not yet manifested at that point in my life.  From the base, it looked to be a mountain that might be impossible to climb.

To my dismay, the more serious I became about laying my life down for the Lord, the more I found Him pushing me back toward the emotional sensitivity of my childhood.  I felt as though He said that this was part of how He designed me; that my gifts were wrapped up in that sensitivity, and that only a childlike heart would be able to experience His kingdom. 

While I understood that He didn’t want me to be driven by my emotions, I found that He was equally dissatisfied with idea that I would be guided by my own rationalizations.  God, and His kingdom far exceed the bounds of my natural mind’s ability to understand them, and to rely on my thoughts as a guide greatly diminishes the influence He means to have in my life.  To that end, He has graciously given us His Holy Spirit, that we might have the mind of Christ, and the heart of the Father, but to partake of that requires genuine surrender.

I wish I could say that I’ve consistently walked in that level of submission, but that wouldn’t be true.  I will say that it has been in those moments when I’ve been able to set aside my own thoughts and feelings that God has most clearly manifested Himself in my life.  As with all things, there is a balance that needs to be achieved.

Our emotions are not inherently evil, they are a reflection of the Creator, whose image we were made in.  They are a vital part of who we are, and of the gifts He’s given us, and of the loving relationships we were meant to have.  Indeed, we cannot accurately reflect His character without them.  But they were never meant to be our motivation to speak/act, or to be our source for fulfilment.

The same is true of our mind, which the Lord also gave us.  It is a beautiful gift, that can be a powerful instrument when in subjection to His authority.  But like our emotions, it has tremendous potential to facilitate chaos and destruction.  The scripture warns that we need to take every thought captive and to make it obedient to Christ.  I would suggest that this is also the necessary pattern for our emotions.

When we surrender ourselves to the power of God’s Spirit, He does not seize control of us like some drone being flown remotely.  Instead, He works through the gifts He’s given us, including our mind and emotions.  Moment by moment, it is our choice as to whether we will remain in subjection to Him, which is why “Self-Control” is a fruit of the Holy Spirit.

In my lifetime, I have walked through a spectrum of emotional experiences.  I have been the hyper reactive, easily offended, perpetually triggered melt down machine; and I have also been the callous, cynical, apathetic jerk.  I have seen my emotions (& thoughts) become seeds for destruction, and I have seen them powerfully used by God.  Today, as with all things, I simply try to keep myself (i.e. mind, will and emotions) in step with God’s heart.