Reliance on feelings is more synonymous with paganism than with Christian faith. In the world of human religion emotion has often directed belief. George Lucus had it completely wrong when he led Obi-Wan and The Force to tell Luke, “Trust your feelings”, and very many people have fallen into that trap. Perhaps it’s a trap we all fall into at times, but when it becomes a way of life and a basis for faith, it’s a spiritual illness. Instinct may be God-given, but feelings and truth are sometimes in complete opposition.
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“There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death” (Proverbs 14:12 ESV). So wrote Solomon, the man to whom God gave abundant wisdom. HIs own feelings led him away from that wisdom. Sometimes your feelings and your own sense can get you into a world of trouble, and the most obvious example of that is in the realm of sin. You can “feel” so strongly that the one you are attracted to is the “right one”, or that a physical union with that one will bring fulfillment and “must be” from God. It can “feel” powerfully right, but later you may find out, as countless millions have over the centuries and millennia, that the person you thought was so wonderful and perfect for you actually turns into your worst nightmare.
Feelings are not faith, and as Paul declared, “Everything that does not come from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23). That’s not to say that all feelings are sinful, but depending on them is. Feelings can be sensual, physical, temporal and fallible. They can be useful and wonderful tools and a great blessing, but they can also regularly get us into trouble. The antidote to this uncertainty is the Word of God. Here God tells us what’s good and what isn’t; what’s true and what isn’t; what leads to happiness and what doesn’t. Bypassing the profound and eternal truth of God for what seems to be right is sin. It arrogantly assumes that we know best and God doesn’t.
The temptation to follow feelings is as strong within the Church as out of it, and an entire movement, passing itself off as a movement of the Holy Spirit, is being built upon feelings: faulty human sensations being mistakenly welcomed as the voice and direction of God’s Spirit. Perhaps God will occasionally give us a sense that one direction or another is right or wrong: this is, after all, our God-given conscience. But going by this alone is a mistake. This has been the failing of many religious movements throughout the existence of humanity. It’s the guide of superstition and imagination. It’s sometimes the tool of the enemy of our souls and his minions. They know how to play on our emotions, how to make something look good, how to twist our thinking with a little tingle down our spine, how to make us think we’re “in love”, and how to convince us that something is right when in truth it’s the exact opposite of the will of God.
There’s even a concentration on feelings or emotion as “evidence” of the presence of God. This is flesh in operation. This is absolutely not the Spirit moving, but if you think about it, it’s an attack on faith. Faith is believing what we do not see (Hebrews 11:1). Faith is believing despite the apparent evidence and even how we feel, and faith is sometimes believing without any evidence at all. Hard evidence can indeed reinforce faith, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but feelings are not hard evidence: they are subjective and unreliable.
Joy, peace and so on are fruits of the Spirit, says Paul (Galatians 5:22-23). They are products of true faith, not the substance of it. Emotion can be one of the products of faith and of worship. We can all welcome it and enjoy without being ruled by it. Faith must come first: faith in the truth of God, in His presence and His faithfulness.
The writer of Hebrews tells us that “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). He did not say, “Without feelings it is impossible to please God”. Millions in the Church around the world are being encouraged to worship and judge by their feelings. If they “feel” good or if they feel happy or moved-they think, God must be present by His Spirit. Doubtless, worship and faith can and does produce deep, sometimes profound emotion and a sense of wellbeing, but this is the correct and healthy way of things: faith, love and worship sometimes produce healthy emotions, and thank the Lord for that.
To rely on emotion is a gigantic mistake. To believe that God is not present just because you don’t “feel” moved or “feel” his presence is not of faith at all, and it is therefore sin.
There are times when doing what we know to be true is the last thing we really want to do. There are times when worship seems to be dry and unmoving. There are times when we wonder where God is. To question His presence, His motives and His faithfulness in these times is lack of faith and therefore sin. In all of these situations God is present. How do we know? Because He said he would be. Jesus told his disciples, “I am with you always, even unto the end of the world”. Faith is believing He is with us, even and especially when we don’t “feel” like he is. He also said, “Where two or three are gathered, there am I in the midst of them”. When Christians say that the Spirit must not be present because no-one is falling over or weeping with joy or laughing hysterically is a complete lack of faith and akin to rank paganism. Pagans look to be tickled in their emotions and their physical senses: Christians are to live by faith in God and in what He has said.
If you were to search the New Testament-in which the Holy Spirit is seen to be given to the Church-you will find no occasion on which apostles or disciples observe or speak of their emotions or feelings as a gauge of their experience with God. When we’re told in Scripture to have joy in the Lord, it isn’t to be gained by looking for emotion or experiences. Feelings are never mentioned as a goal or an imperative in Scripture, instead they are sometimes a natural product of that faith and obedience.
“Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there” (Psalm 139:7-8).
