I’ll be the 4th person to tell you that I’m a bit emotional. If you want confirmation from the first 3, just let me know and I’ll put you in contact.
I have a tendency to let my emotions get the best of me in both good and bad ways. Emotions can make us think we’re completely invisible one day, and the person the earth rotates around the next. They can cause tremendous pride to well up inside while at the same time begin to nurse a smidgen of anxiety that’s just starting to creep its way into the mind.
Emotions can also help us to be grateful, joyful, hopeful, in awe of the world, and loved.
Emotions are funny.
The problem I find myself in on occasion is letting my emotions become my reality. A guy without a ring on his left hand shoots me an eye and precious little smile and I assume we’ll be engaged within a week. Same guy can glance past me as I’m sitting in a corner talking to a friend and I’m extremely aware of how he doesn’t even know I exist. The I sit in those feelings and lose focus of who I am in Christ. I forget that God made me an emotional person for a good purpose – not so I could dwell on a dude’s brief interaction with me.
As a single lady in the church, I think it’s also easy to get really wrapped up in what others have to say about the guys in our lives. It’s easy to listen to people telling me, “Well, you know he’s single and he really loves Jesus so you two will probably end up together,” and then fantasize about what our wedding pictures will look like.
(I should take a moment to mention here that I am highly exaggerating these instances & responses for effect. Don’t think I’m too much of a basket case.)
We need to be careful and aware of our emotions. As cliché as it might sound, we need to know that God has made each of us in unique and beautiful ways. It’s okay for me to be an emotional person, if I’m emotional in a way that moves me towards Christ and understanding who He has made me to be. It’s okay for me to be emotional if I’m becoming more aware of my neighbors & their needs, drawn into service of those around me.
It’s not okay for me to be emotional if I let anxiety, insecurity, fear, and doubt rule my life and become my reality.
Y’all, we can’t let the feels become the reals. Know that who you are in Christ will never change. He has died for you – and all of your emotions – so you can rest secure in knowing that His redemptive reality is the most true thing we can know. Let the words of Paul be your reality. Feel this deeply today:
If anyone is in Christ, (she) is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself…for our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:17, 18, 21)
*Watch Darlique & Barney have some fake fights here! (or are they?!)
Kayla Smith 