John 14:1
Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
Allow me to ask you a question,
Why do people leave a church?
Why do people leave a marriage?
Why do people abandon babies?
Why do people have road rage and anger problems?
Why do people give up and call it quits?
There is only one answer and that is because of emotions.
One more question
Why would you or I ever consider counseling?
The only reason that we would ever consider counseling would be because we feel that things are out of control and what is out of control when things are out of control, our emotions.
So let’s deal with the reality of our emotions for a moment,
Every single one of us has emotions and the emotions that we have are directly tied to our five senses.
The good news is this,
When God created us he created us with emotions and emotions have a purpose in our lives and I am constantly amazed as I speak to people because the best and the worst that people speak about concerning there life is directly tied to there emotions.
Every individual has and is tied to emotional experiences that completely dominate there lives whether they be positive or whether they be negative and these emotional experiences have a direct effect as to the quality of life that each individual is living.
I believe that the key to successful living in the Lord Jesus Christ is winning the battle over those emotions.
Emotions are a fact of life that we can not live without but we as children of God need to learn how to direct and how to win the battle over these emotions,
In the world that we live in today every thing and I mean every thing is tied to and linked to our emotions, we have elevated our emotions to a place of importance above morality, above accountability, above responsibility, above integrity, above truthfulness and honesty.
Forty years ago when a woman became pregnant it did not matter what feelings she felt, she became a mother in spite of her feelings and the man married the woman in spite of his feelings,
All feelings were put aside to do the right thing
Abortion was not an issue and an orphanage was not an issue
Forty years ago when a young man reached the age of 13 he worked at a job to help the family make ends meet, it did not matter how much school work that he had, it did not matter how tired that he was or how far he had to walk home from school, his feelings were shelved to help in whatever manner he could.
Our emotions are involved with saving the whales and killing our children, our emotions are involved with doing what feels good and then they are involved with not paying the consequences for our actions that feel good
And we now are at the place in our society where our emotions dictate to us instead of us dictating to our emotions
Instead of people having there emotions under control for the most part peoples emotions are out of control
Let me give you truth that will make you free,
The temptation that you are dealing with is limited to what you think
You are not what you eat you are what you think
If you do not think about the temptation you will not be tempted by it because you will never be tempted beyond what you are thinking and emotions are controlled by what you think as well.
One of the major problems that I have with physiology and psychiatry is that they do not make you accountable and responsible for your thinking, they do not teach you how to control your emotions instead they give you drugs and anti depressants to get you through but your condition never changes and they just keep you holding on as your emotions go on a roller coaster ride.
I wonder how many of you have understanding that God has made you accountable and responsible for your emotions.
Deut 28:47-48
Because thou servedst not the LORD thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of heart, for the abundance of all things;
Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies which the LORD shall send against thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things: and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck, until he have destroyed thee.
Hear the word of God,
Because you do not have joy when you served me, because you do not have gladness, because you did not rejoice concerning all the blessings and abundance that I have given you, I am going to bring you into bondage to be punished for your negative thinking.
There it is
Negative thinking brings forth bondage
God brought forth judgment on his people because they had negative thinking and negative emotions.
Most churches do not want to hear this in fact most of Gods people do not want to hear this and yet this is the truth of Gods word that brings the captive to revelation and makes them free.
YOU ARE ACCOUNTABLE FOR YOUR EMOTIONS
Turn once again to our opening scripture
John 14:1
Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
Here we find the Lord speaking to His disciples concerning the things that are going to be taking place in a few short days and He is telling them that He is going to be given into the hands of those who desire to destroy him and He will be crucified, scourged, beaten and tortured.
And then He makes this incredible statement
Do not let your hearts be troubled
Why would He tell them not to let their hearts be troubled if it was not possible for them to come to that place of peace and rest?
John 16:33
These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.
Jesus told His disciples, you are going to see and hear things in the next couple of days that are going to rip your heart out, things that are going to overwhelm you and frighten you but
Let not your heart be troubled.
Be in peace.
So let’s have understanding,
He is telling them not to be troubled in the midst of tremendous trouble because they can have perfect peace.
Isa 26:3
Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.
What is perfect peace?
It is the place where your emotions are at perfect rest because your mind is stayed on Him instead of on your troubles.
It is not a place where you are emotionless or hardened to the place where no emotion comes through
It is a place where your emotions are at perfect rest and in that perfect rest your emotions are producing fruit that are positive and productive.
Look at this scripture and understand the implications
Deut 30:19
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
You chose
The Lord has set before us this day life and death, blessing and cursing,
Heaven and earth have recorded it and then the word of God tells you to chose life that you and your seed may live.
What are emotions?
Emotions are the spice of life and the Lord has given us emotions for the purpose of those emotions having a positive effect on us and not a negative effect.
What is the purpose of negative emotions?
The purpose is to rob you of your peace.
The word of God is very clear in outlining to us that the reason that our emotions get out of control is because our emotions are not in control,
Paul and Silas in Macedonia is a very clear indication of what I am speaking about
Paul receives a vision from the Lord and in that vision Paul sees some one telling him to come to Macedonia because they need his help
Paul obeys
When they reach Macedonia, they are beaten with rods, placed in stocks and bonds and cast into the deepest part of the prison.
This is a place where emotions are going to bring forth life or they are going to bring forth death and Duet 30:19 proclaims that you chose the one that will be manifested,
Heaven and earth have recorded it
You choose
What will it be life or death?
The word of the Lord proclaims it
Let not your heart be troubled
Let not your emotions get out of control
So what did Paul and Silas do
They chose life, they sang praises, and they sang hymns and they exalted the Lord and the prison became a place of life in the midst of death.
What is it that is going to keep Paul and Silas from singing and praising the Lord in the worst of conditions?
Emotions
You see I believe that emotions are one of the major things in the body of Christ that keep us from going through and going over and I also believe that emotions are at the top of the list in the four area’s that Satan has access to you and I
What are those four areas?
# 1thoughts
# 2responses
# 3actions and
# 4 emotions
Thoughts plant a seed but they do not immediately motivate us like emotions do,
Emotions spur our actions, emotions spur our responses and emotions even accelerate our thoughts and I do not believe that the church has effectively dealt with this issue in depth so that the child of God is able to walk in victory,
One of the reasons that the child of God is not able to walk in victory over their emotions is because they have not been brought to the place of accountability concerning their emotions and victory only comes by becoming responsible for your emotions.
The word of God is very clear
We are responsible
James 1:13-14
Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
Let no man say when he is tempted that he is tempted of God
For God can not be tempted with evil and God tempts no man
But every man, every woman, every single person who has ever been tempted was tempted because of there own lust and in that lust they are enticed.
The word lust means any overwhelming desire
Most people want to take that word lust and use in an immoral issue, they want to use in a sexual connotation but the true meaning of lust is an overwhelming desire.
I wonder how many of you have revelation that the spirit lusts as well
Gal 5:16-17
This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.
What this is speaking about is a strong emotional desire, the flesh has a strong emotional desire to fight against the spirit and the spirit has a strong emotional desire that fights against the flesh.
And some one might ask that if emotions are such trouble why do we have them,
The reason that you have emotions is because God has emotions
The scripture tells us that God is a jealous God
Exod 34:14
For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God:
Jealousy is an emotion.
The word of God tells us that God is love and certainly love is more than emotions but it certainly involves emotions
God has emotions and God created us in his image and likeness and that is why that we have emotions
James 1:13-14 again
Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
What this scripture is saying is that temptations come through your emotions and the reason that most people do not feel responsible for there actions is because they do not feel responsible for there emotions.
Most people feel that their emotions are the cause of a chemical reaction or imbalance and because it is a chemical reaction they need a chemical to control the chemical reaction, so they take medication, they go to therapy, they go to a psychiatrist or a Christian counselor, they go every where but where they need to go and that is to themselves to bring there emotions under control through the word of God
Hear the scripture,
You are drawn away because of your own lust or desires
Now look at,
James 1:15
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
Have understanding because this is what the scripture is revealing to you,
Sin is conceived in your emotions.
What a radical truth and here is truth concerning that which is radical?
If you can stop the conception of sin, then you can stop the action of sin and if you can stop the action of sin then you can limit the devil being able to use you and you will begin winning the battle over your emotions and walking in victory.