Emotions: Biblical and Unbiblical Ways to Handle Our Feelings 

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

Stuffing Our Feelings: Over-Controlled Emotional Suppression 

For most people, especially us as Christians, “spearing of emotions” seems like the worst possible scenario. Additionally, many Christians seem to assume that the opposite extreme is actually a healthy emotional response: “stuffing our feelings”—over-controlled suppression of our feelings. That’s not the biblical approach to healthy, Christlike feelings. 

The psalmists model how to handle our feelings maturely. The psalmists faced their feelings face-to-face with God, candidly and boldly shared their feelings with God, and they soothed their soul in their Savior God.

Instead of being like the psalmists, many times as Christians we think we are supposed to be like Mr. Spock of Star Trek fame. He tried to repress his emotions, deny them, if he could, eradicate them. And we try to live without pathos, without passion and feeling, thinking somehow that this is the Christlike way to manage our moods.

So, let’s explore several biblical contrasts between suppressing our moods and psalm-like facing of our feelings face-to-face with our God.

1. Option One: Acknowledging Our Emotions or Trying to Eradicate Our Emotions

We should not try to eradicate our feelings. Paul tells us to be angry but sin not; he does not tell us never to be angry (Ephesians 4:26). The psalmists acknowledge their moods to themselves (candor) and to God (lament).

Psalm 73 is a classic expression of a believer’s struggle to comprehend and control his envy, jealousy, and hatred. Asaph is dismayed that a good God could allow bad things to happen to good people and good things happen to bad people. He faces his envy coram Deo (face-to-face with God) telling God all about it. He takes himself, all that he is, including his envy, to God. Once in God’s presence, he is able to see and confess the folly of his envy.

Those who try to suppress their feelings, on the other hand, try to eradicate their hatred. “If I don’t think about it, it’s not there. If I repress it, it will go away.” They choose denial and self-deception over biblical candor and lament. 

2. Option Two: Seeing Our Emotions with Spiritual Eyes (Wisdom) or with Eyeballs Only (Folly)

To handle our emotions like the psalmists, God wants us to explore our moods with spiritual eyes. Asaph enters the presence of God to gain perspective on his perspective.

“When I tried to understand all this, it was oppressive to me till I entered the sanctuary of God; then I understood their final destiny” (Psalm 73:16-17).

God calls us to view our external situation and our internal moods from His eternal perspective.

Those who suppress their moods try the opposite approach. When a mood doesn’t vanish, they mull it over and over and over again with eyeballs only—from a worldly perspective. Asaph was once trapped there, seeing only the prosperity of the wicked. We’re doomed to defeat whenever we look at our situations and our feelings only from a temporal perspective.

3. Option Three: Confessing Our Sinful Emotions or Playing the Pharisee with Our Sinful Emotions 

Third, when we handle our emotions in a psalm-like manner, we confess our sinful emotions to our Father. Asaph says:

“When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before you” (Psalm 73:21-22).

On the other hand, if we suppress our awareness of our emotions, then obviously we can’t confess our sinful moods to God. Often one of the inner heart motivations behind emotional suppression is our sinful belief that we can’t come to God unless we perfectly, serenely suppress all our feelings. We play the emotional Pharisee—trying to deal with our emotions through the flesh, through works, and through self-sufficiency. 

4. Option Four: Facing Our Emotions with Grace or with Works

Fourth, when we practice psalm-like emotional maturity, we receive grace, as Asaph did. Having faced the sinful folly of his envy, he still perceived the amazing grace of God:

“Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand” (Psalm 73:23).

Not so the emotional suppressor. In self-righteousness, they do not receive grace because they do not face their feelings face-to-face with God. They arrogantly believe they can manage their moods without God.

5. Option Five: Choosing God-Sufficiency or Self-Sufficiency

Fifth, psalm-like emotional maturity involves recognizing that only God is enough.

“Whom have I in heaven but you, and earth has nothing I desire besides you” (Psalm 73:25).

When we face our emotions, we are forced to face the truth that we are not self-sufficient. We yield to the reality that we must live every second in God-sufficiency.

Emotional suppressors choose self-sufficiency by denying and attempting to repress their feelings. Why? Facing moods forces us to face our insufficiency. Nothing makes us feel punier than being overwhelmed by feelings. No one wants to hear the derogatory comment, “He’s so moody.” “She’s so emotional!”

When feelings overpower us we feel powerless, impotent. In our flesh, we would rather stuff our moods, would rather survive self-sufficiently, than admit that we need help managing our moods.

That’s why stuffing our feelings is sinful—it is a work’s orientation. It displays a self-sufficient denial of our need for God. Though more subtle than out-of-control expression (spearing) of our feelings, suppression is equally sinful.

The Rest of the Story 

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

For Reflection and Application 

How surprised are you that suppressing/stuffing our feelings is just as harmful and sinful as using our feelings as spears? Do you agree or disagree? How would following the 5 psalm-like ways of facing our feelings face-to-face with God help you in your emotional life?

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