BECOMING EMOTIONALLY HEALTHY
Fresh Start #6
Pastor Dennis Clanton
Woodland Church
Sunday, May 5, 2024
(Romans 12:2, NLT) “Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.”
1. Healthy Emotions Reveal the Image of God in My Life.
a. Joy
(Philippians 2:18, NLT) “Yes, you should rejoice, and I will share your joy.”
b. Sorrow
(2 Corinthians 6:10, NIV) “Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing…”
c. Compassion
(Romans 12:15, NIV) “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.”
d. Fear
(Philippians 2:12, NLT) “Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear.”
e. Zeal
(Romans 12:11, AMP) “Never lag in zeal and in earnest endeavor; be aglow and burning with the Spirit, serving the Lord.”
2. Jesus perfectly modeled an emotionally healthy life.
(Luke 10:21, NLT) “Jesus was filled with the joy.”
(Luke 7:13, NLT) “When the Lord saw her, his heart overflowed with compassion. “Don’t cry!” he said.”
3. Emotional Self Control is not a matter of the will, it is a matter of the heart.
a. Emotionalism – All that matters is how I feel.
- Emotionalism has little to do with truth.
- Emotionalism exhausts you in the end.
- Emotionalism does not produce lasting life change.
2. Stoicism – My feelings are not important.
- Stoicism denies your pain.
- Stoicism destroys your heart’s ability to care.
- Stoicism will get you through a problem, while it robs you of compassion.
“For example, the Stoics in the days of the apostle Paul thought that it was the part of wisdom to live in harmony with the way things are in the world, and that this entailed living apart from the “passions,” in perfect accord with reason. Motivated by high moral principles, they prided themselves in living above the emotions, above deep personal commitments that could bring suffering. At one level, such “stoicism” is admirable. But it is a long way from the personal commitments that the Gospel mandates, complete with the vulnerability and suffering that are a part of this fallen order. In fact, that is the problem with the Stoic worldview: its view of the world and what is wrong with it is so far removed from what the Bible says that it defines what is good in ways that owe more to a certain kind of pantheism than to anything else. So from a Christian perspective, even if there is something admirable to Stoic self-discipline, it can never be judged genuinely good. Some self-discipline merely puffs people up with the pride of resolution.” –D. A. Carson, For the Love of God, Volume I
4. Trust what my emotions reveal, but do not trust my emotions.
(Ecclesiastes 3:1–4, NLT) “For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant and a time to harvest. A time to kill and a time to heal. A time to tear down and a time to build up. A time to cry and a time to laugh. A time to grieve and a time to dance.”
(Proverbs 25:28, NAB) “Like an open city with no defenses is the man with no check on his feelings.”
Growthwork
(Isaiah 32:17, HCSB) “The result of righteousness will be peace; the effect of righteousness will be quiet confidence forever.”
(Psalm 42:5–6, NLT) “Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! I will praise him again— my Savior and my God! Now I am deeply discouraged, but I will remember you— even from distant Mount Hermon, the source of the Jordan, from the land of Mount Mizar.”
- What am I feeling?
(Job 7:11, NLT) “I cannot keep from speaking. I must express my anguish…”
- Why am I feeling this?
- Ask God to fill you with the Holy Spirit.
- Ask God to help you control your thoughts and speech.
(Psalm 19:14, NLT) “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”