4 Principles for Handling Our Emotions Maturely 

Note from Bob: You’re reading Part 5 of a blog mini-series on emotions. For Part 1, read Fearfully and Wonderfully Made. For Part 2, read Why Do We Feel What We Feel? For Part 3, read Emotions: Gone Bad and Mad. For Part 4, read Biblical and Unbiblical Ways to Handle Our Feelings.  

Emotions: With Christ in the School of Emotional Maturity 

We’ve looked at God’s original design for us as emotional beings—Creation. We’ve explored how sin mars our emotions—the Fall. Now we’ll examine how our salvation in Christ restores us to emotional maturity—Redemption. 

We’ll start by exploring how our emotions are of value to us. Emotions serve as God-given “warning lights.” That flashing red light on our dash that says, “Hey, you’d better pop the hood ‘cause something is haywire underneath.” 

Emotions are our warning lights that say, “There’s something important going on inside, pop the hood of your heart and check it out.” Our emotions point to our goals, which in turn point to our beliefs. Emotions are a God-given means for discerning inner motivation and thinking. 

Often we’re afraid of our emotions because we do not understand what is natural. Mark 3:5 helps us because it describes the emotional life of Christ. 

“He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored” (Mark 3:5). 

In this passage, we learn that Jesus experienced strong emotions. He experienced anger. This particular word for anger has the sense of “strong indignation and wrath.” He also experienced compassion which is “deep distress and grief.” Shouldn’t image bearers expect to experience strong emotions since Christ did? Don’t deny them. Don’t stuff them. Experience them. 

We also learn that Jesus experienced a full range of both “pleasant” and “painful” emotions. He felt anger and compassion simultaneously. 

“While being grieved he felt intense anger” (Mark 3:5, author’s paraphrase). 

We, too, should expect to go through a full range of both pleasant and painful emotions. The lack of intense emotions has nothing to do with emotional maturity. 

In light of Jesus’ model, we can ask the question: 

• When an Emotion Comes, What Do I Do with It?

1. Admit and Identify What You Feel 

First, admit it and identify it. Acknowledge to yourself what you are feeling. Label it accurately. “I’m hurt, angry, content, nervous, etc.” I do a lot of counseling with pastors with struggling marriages. Sometimes they are so out of practice with tuning into their feelings that I have to express what I think they may be feeling before they can ever put words to their emotions. Jesus, on the other hand, was not tone deaf to his feelings in Mark 3. He knew what he felt and used those feelings for God’s glory. 

2. Courageously Face and Feel Whatever You Feel 

Second, courageously face and feel that emotion. This is not an academic exercise. It is deeply feeling what is going on inside. Jesus experienced his strong feelings of anger and deep distress. 

Not only do I counsel a lot of pastors, I train a lot of pastors to counsel. There are times that a counselee/parishioner has just shared a deep hurt—maybe never before shared. It might be about having been raped, or having witnessed the murder of a relative. The counselee is in tears, sobbing. And the pastor is preaching away, oblivious to how his parishioner feels and oblivious to how he feels. So, after the counseling training session is over, we’ll interact about it. Many times I’ve had pastors admit that they are so out of practice in tuning into their feelings that they can’t even tune into other people’s feelings. 

3. Candidly Share Your Feelings with God 

Third, always share with God what you are feeling. The Bible tells us why we should and can do this in Hebrews 4:15-16. 

“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:15-16). 

When you’re feeling an “illegitimate emotion” (hatred, etc.) confess it deeply, including confessing the goals and beliefs behind the feeling (1 John 1:8-2:2). When you’re feeling a “legitimate emotion” (joy, sorrow, etc.) share it fully (Hebrews 2:18). 

I’m preaching through selective Psalms in our church this January through March. I pointed out to our congregation that there are numerically more Psalms of lament and complaint than there are Psalms of thanksgiving and praise. I challenged our people to be a Berean and check me out on that. Several did. To their amazement, they came back say, “I’m shocked. You were right. There are more Psalms of lament than psalms of praise.” God’s people know how to share their hearts with their heavenly Father and with their sympathetic High Priest. 

4. Use Your Emotions to Probe and Examine Your Heart 

Fourth, we can use our emotions to probe and to examine our goals and beliefs. An acknowledged sinful emotion functions as a clue to a spiritual malfunction just as an acknowledged physical symptom (i.e., a cancer warning sign) serves as a clue to a deeper physical problem.  

When do we probe? Even a good thing can be misused or overused. Should we constantly probe and become compulsively introspective? No. No one (no one in their right mind at least) checks under the hood of their car before every trip down to the local grocery store. No, you check periodically, before long trips, and when the light comes on. 

The same is true with emotions. When the light of intense emotion flashes, then check your goals and beliefs. For most Christians, the problem is checking far too infrequently. We tend to be afraid of our emotions. Check periodically, and always check during times of extremely strong emotions. 

The Rest of the Story 

In Part 5, we’ll explore 5 principles for when to share our emotions with others. 

For Reflection and Application 

Which of the four principles of what we can do with our emotions seem most important to you in your emotional life?

RPM Ministries: Equipping You to Change Lives with Christ’s Changeless Truth