Think of a still pool of water- we all know what happens when you drop a pebble in it. Rings of ripples radiate outward. Emotions are like that- reactions to a stimulus. Truth is the inertia that slowly stops the ripples and returns you to peace. What happens if you put a hula hoop of truth around the impact zone? The ripples stop. We can build roadblocks of truth that keep our emotions contained – contained in the walls of peace God designed us for. Yes, you can have control over your emotions. God expects us to live not controlled by emotion but by truth. There are steps you can take to control your emotions.
Shortly after my youngest son was born the doctor gently told us he had Down Syndrome. Exhausted from 18 hours in labor, stunned by the completely unexpected news my husband and I cried. We grieved the child we thought we were having, the one who was normal. But both of us had built truth into our understanding of the world.
Ian was our fifth child, because we believed that children were God’s best gift (Psalm 127:3). He was formed for God’s purpose and plan (Ephesians 2:1-10). We knew that God had plans for us “for our welfare and not for evil, to give us a future and a hope” Jeremiah 29:11. Gently, as we focused on the truth our emotions stablized. It didn’t happen overnight. It was a process.
We can’t just do the right thing and be done
Christians like to concentrate on doing the right thing. We call it obedience, and we can get legalistic with ourselves when we struggle with right actions. Sometimes that struggle is so deep we wonder if we are even really a Christian. Many feel like they are phony because their outward life looks like they are doing everything right, but their heart is not right at all. Just going through the motions is taking all of their energy. They don’t have time to deal with their thought life and their emotional struggles.
Often, when we want our emotion controlled we just want the struggle to stop.
But the reality is- negative and unhelpful emotions may still come- our chosen responses to emotion, that lead to peace and joy will walk us through that emotional struggle to stability. The alternative is to continue reacting to every emotion and feeling as if it is the backbone of reality- when it isn’t.
I have fifteen, thirteen, and eleven year old daughters. All of them have started their monthly cycle and the accompanying hormonal and physical struggles. It has become a repeated phrase in our house, “My emotions are not always truth”. They are so obvious in their struggles. My daughter stood at the sink telling me how overwhelmed she was by the dishes. I kept telling her she had a ten minute job and just need to get started. She started sobbing about how impossibly hard it was. I asked her, “When are you going to start your period.” She said, “I started today.” Ahhh, mystery explained, my normally even keeled and happy to serve daughter is overwhelmed by three pans and a few knives to handwash? No, her emotions are coloring the lens of her reality. We may be more sophisticated in how we react- but whether it is hormones or just emotional upheavel without a cause we have to guard against making our emotions our truth.
Deception is very actively trying to keep us from remembering this truth-
The Bible isn’t only concerned that what we do with our hands be obedient to God. The Bible deals with what we think and say and do.”
How to control your emotions
Thinking, and speaking, and doing- all of those areas of obedience are results of our character- and they all come from our thought life. Luke 6:45 tells us our words are “the overflow of our thoughts”. Our emotions are the same way; they are the overflow of our thoughts. Our actions absolutely overflow from our thoughts and emotions.
So how do you learn to control your emotions?
Let’s look at what God says should be the way our life looks if we are walking with him.
” the fruit of the Spirit [the result of His presence within us] is
love [ unselfish concern for others], joy, [ inner] peace,
patience [ not the ability to wait, but how we act while waiting],
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”
Galatians 5:22-23 AMP
It is pretty clear that this list contains things that we would categorize as emotions- if our emotions couldn’t be controlled then how could God expect us to have these as a natural result of growing closer to and yielding to him?
Here are the steps to learning to control your emotions:
Put them in their place- Step one
Emotions are like dessert- we shouldn’t indulge them all the time.
Sometimes you do what is right even when you don’t feel like it. Emotions are part of our reality and experience- but they are like a photo filter- they aren’t the picture itself, just a layer of our understanding. The picture itself is formed by truth. Deception would like nothing more than to distract our eyes from the picture truth forms and get us focused on how we feel. Our cultural message seems to be to live by whatever we feel at the time. This undermines loyalty, integrity, sacrificial love, every positive moral outcome- because living by our emotions is selfish. Emotions cannot be our rudder guiding us where to do. But emotions do make amazing smoke detectors telling us when something is wrong. Emotions should bring us to God to have Him take care of our emergency and return us to our impossible-to-understand state of peace (Philippians 4:6-7).
Put-off and Put-on- Step two
Seriously, I know you got on the web to figure out what to do about your emotions but you need to know that most of your emotional struggles are based on Deception. Deception will do anything to distract and overwhelm you. The steps to true peace are simple to know and so difficult to put into action. How do you fight Deception? With Truth.
But which truth? what truth? Let’s start with God’s truth. In 2 Cor 10:5 we are told “we destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and TAKE EVERY THOUGHT CAPTIVE TO OBEY CHRIST.” I think of it like a spam filter. All sorts of ridiculous and stupid thoughts come into my head. Most of them distract me from the truth. Your choices of what to watch, read, and listen to all contribute, both digital choices and physical choices. If you hang out around negative complaining people you will definitely struggle with complaining. This is true of all emotions, but most notably anger, and anxiety.
Stopping negative inputs is just the first step, you also have to replace them with Truth. Get into the Bible every day. Ask God to show you his truth and wrap it around you to help you live for him. Sign up for my email newsletter so I can continue to encourage you. Download Sowing Seeds of Truth: Escape Overwhelm-it’s free- meditate on the passages listed. Spend time listening to the audio Bible and praise music. Music helps set a tone in my household. It takes me out of my funk.
So put-off the things that aren’t strengthening and encouraging peace in your heart and mind.
Put-on habits, behaviors, and helpful inputs that encourage your soul.
Practice Faithfulness
Practice faithfulness. Most of the time we know what we should be doing we just aren’t feeling like it. Set a timer. Give God five minutes of faithfulness, see how he blesses your emotional state afterwards.
You truly can control your responses to emotion- it is a process, but God gives us the strength and knowledge to walk through it with HIM.
Why do you have hope?
I Peter 3:15 “But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect”
Did you see that? People will come to you and ask you why you have hope! You will get to share the glorious news that God loves them and wants them in his family! You are called to be a lighthouse and you shine out hope in a world that is getting darker and more dangerous.
So today remember to put your emotions in their place, put-off deception and put-on truth and practice faithfulness!
