Unnatural Emotions

Humans operate on emotions much of the time. It would make more sense, of course, to operate on reason, but we don't. According to the dictionary, emotions are the natural response derived from one's perceptions of one's circumstances, mood, or relationships with others. In short form, then, emotions are the natural response to your perceptions of your circumstances. We have them. They're built in. And they are not, on their own, good or bad.

Emotions are fairly common to most people. Just look at how we respond to movies. We all get teary eyed at a sad scene in a movie or laugh at the funny stuff. We are inspired by the heroic and angered at the evil. I'd venture to say that our emotional responses are, in fact, basically the same. The differences occur when we view events and circumstances differently. Sticking with movies as an example, while most of an audience will shriek with horror at one of those bloody scenes in a scary movie, the guy that sees these things as special effects might chuckle. Now, that same guy that laughed in the horror film would shriek if faced with the same perception of horror that the rest of the audience did at the movie. It's just that in this case he perceived it differently and, so responded differently.

The Bible is not without reference to emotion. However, the Bible presents a sometimes odd set of emotions for Christians. The emotions that a Christian might or ought to experience are not the natural emotions that a non-believer will encounter. Take, for instance, James's bizarre "Count it all joy when you encounter various trials" (James 1:2-5). "Ummm, James, 'joy' is not the typical response to 'trials'. I think you missed something there." No, he gives his reasoning. Trials produce patience and patience produces perfection. That's a good thing. So in this case, if we view events through God's lens, we will see that it is a good thing even though everyone else would see it as bad (and have a negative emotional response).

There is more, of course. Jesus's famous Beatitudes are a series of "Blessed are" statements which, frankly, make no sense on the face of it. The term, "blessed", means essentially "happy". So in what sense does the sentence "Happy are those who mourn" make sense? Isn't mourning the opposite of "happy"? Yes, in natural terms, it is. But the outcome of "poor in spirit" and "mourn" and "hunger" and "meek" and so on is an unnatural joy because God is at working doing something good in these things.

Paul tells his readers, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (Phil 4:6-7). Prayer and thanksgiving provide an emotional response that is not natural: "the peace of God". Indeed, this aspect is so vital and effective that he says elsewhere, " And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful" (Col 3:15). That is, peace is to be the governing principle in your heart.

This sense of unnatural emotions changes things for believers. While most of the world is working at acquiring a positive set of emotional responses via supposed positive circumstances, we can have these things apart from circumstances. The world, for instance, seeks happiness in marriage and, when they aren't happy there, terminate it. A believer finds joy in all circumstances and, therefore, doesn't require "pleasant circumstances" at all times in marriage since that is not the source of joy. They can then be the spouse they promised to be -- the spouse they are commanded to be -- even when the circumstances aren't as pleasant as they would have liked them to be. A group of believers encountering difficult circumstances can respond with peace knowing that God is in charge when everyone else is responding in terror and unrest. While the normal result of the diagnosis of terminal cancer would cause debilitating depression to many, a believing pastor can tell his congregation, "I've tried to show you how to live; now I'll try to show you how to die", can say with Paul, "To live is Christ and to die is gain." We have the remarkable benefit of a different perspective which provides love, joy, peace, and a host of other positive emotional responses to situations that would be negative to those without Christ. Knowing Christ has its benefits. You just have to accept them.