The Emotion of It All

If you haven't noticed, I talk a great deal about things being a balance...if you go off too far on one end of the spectrum or the other, then your world is off-kilter. Yep, you guessed it, I think about this and ponder it so much because I am completely UN-balanced! But...I'm a work in progress...

I was thinking about emotion the other day. At the exact same time I was ruefully asking God why He made me with so MUCH emotion, a friend was sending me an email with a beautiful line about celebrating emotion. Ironic, huh? I quickly quipped back to her in a short email that I wasn't exactly celebrating my emotion when I was rocking a baby to sleep, sobbing as I watched The Waltons because Daddy just didn't understand why Jason didn't want to go into the family business - he wanted to be a country music star! Even more ironically, when a gospel music show came on next, I didn't hesitate to roll my eyes at the elaborate show of emotion displayed.

So why can I display such emotion over some things and then hold others in disdain when they display similar emotion? I think one reason is my emotion scares me. I hate the roller coaster up and down feeling. I can certainly be ruled by my emotions and that is upsetting to a control freak like myself. I fear and am angered by the fact that in my humanness, I can be fine, positively giddy in fact, one moment and then feel like my life is topsy-turvy because of one insecurity. Because one person doesn't understand me. Because one situation in my life is not right. It could take one comment or look and I have dived from the mountain to the valley. This range of emotion scares me. God and I are working on this - He is teaching me a great deal about the reality of things and the fact that the only thing unchanging is...well, Him.

So maybe I fear that I will come across as someone who is keeling over in a faint, proclaiming the day of the Lord...yet, I realize that I cannot, as I try so often to do, contain the unfathomable mysteries and grandness of what makes our Christian faith. I cannot get it down to bare-bone facts.

You can't take the emotion out of the thing.

I don't want a faith that is based solely on emotional thrills. I have to be grounded in Scripture and know truth. Not just get carried away by the emotion of beautiful music or touching testimonies.

Yet, I cannot reduce Jesus and His truths to plain facts either. I must be well-versed in Scripture. I must study His Word faithfully and know the facts. But to become ritualistic or legalistic, or luke-warm in my faith, would be a great loss.

We serve a mighty God. An amazing God. And as He reveals more and more of Himself to us, as we learn more about Him and His Spirit, we will be filled with awe. Wonder. Spontaneous worship. A need to sing His praises. To write an emotion-filled blog. To share His love with an unbelieving world, tears in our eyes, gesturing wildly for others to understand.

So get the facts. Don't just let others tell you about Him or their philosophies, sell you on their brand of 'religion'. Pick up the Bible and find out yourself. Memorize Scripture. Get serious about Him. Be a scholar right there in your easy chair.

But don't be afraid to spontaneously lift your arms in praise, emotions overflowing and unashamedly praise Him. Because you can't put God in a box. You don't take Him out on Sundays or when things are really bad. Day in and day out, you will be amazed by this God who created us. And that is worth getting emotional about.

The Edge of His Cloak

Jesus Raises a Dead Girl and Heals a Sick Woman

 ⁴⁰ Now when Jesus returned, a crowd welcomed him, for they were all expecting him. ⁴¹ Then a man named Jairus, a synagogue leader, came and fell at Jesus’ feet, pleading with him to come to his house ⁴² because his only daughter, a girl of about twelve, was dying.
   As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. ⁴³ And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years,^[a] but no one could heal her. ⁴⁴ She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.
   ⁴⁵ “Who touched me?” Jesus asked.
   When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.”
 ⁴⁶ But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.”
 ⁴⁷ Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. ⁴⁸ Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”  Luke 8: 40-48

We studied this passage in Scripture this Sunday at church; it has always been one of my favorites. In my head I see this woman and  cannot describe her without a lump coming to my throat and tears blurring my vision.

She feels bruised and discarded. She walks alone, cast off by a world who cannot fix her, a world who deems her unclean. Rejected. Frightened. Tired. The bleeding her body endures has taken every last bit of energy and strength. Looks of pity, or of disgust, come from those who know her, from a people who does not see her, but instead her ailment. She walks a lonely, hard road; hope has long since fled. She lives a life, daily, of utter hopelessness. Devastating helplessness.
Until one day, she hears about a man, a remarkable man. A man traveling through their region. Curing the sick. Healing the crippled. Fighting hypocrisy and injustice. And a small flame of hope is rekindled in her heart. She holds fast to that hope as she plans to see this man. She plays his name over her lips. Jesus. Could this man help her?

She fights the jostling crowds who have Jesus covered. She can see glimpses of his face through the crowd as she edges closer. She feels panicked, unsure, but knows she must see him. But he is moving with a purpose; she has heard Jairus's request and knows he is on his way to heal another. Yet surely, surely he could heal her too! She desperately, uncharacteristically pushes forward toward the man she knows can help her. No doubt is left in her heart as she nears him. The flame of hope in her heart has fanned into a fire and she reachs out for the tassel on the corner of his garment, knowing that one touch can save her.

Her fingers brush against the fabric and grab hold before she quickly releases his garment and falls back, shock and joy radiant on her face. She feels healing sweep through her body and her bleeding cease. The man named Jesus stops. He searches the crowd, questioning the people, and his gaze falls on her. Love shines from his eyes and he looks at her and hears her story, though he already knows every word. And then he says the one word that heals the wounds that are far deeper than her physical ailment...

"Daughter."

Pure joy rushes through her as he smiles and commends her faith. She is healed. But most of all, she is His.

Friend, whatever situation has you desperate, He knows. No matter how many people tell you that you are beyond hope, He disagrees. He is waiting, beckoning. Asking you to take hold of so much more that the edge of His cloak. To take hold of the life He offers. To be a son or daughter. To be His.