Faith Is Not Feeling

Like me, do you ever find yourself searching for feelings and experiences of God, at times forgetting the truth of God’s Word in the moment? I know I have been there, wanting to feel something when God wants me to simply trust, believe and obey.

Of course God made us emotional beings and uses our feelings. However, our emotions do not always line up with His truth. Sometimes they change faster than the weather. At other times, they are misguided and misinformed—the result of wrong perceptions regarding people, situations and other things.

In those times, we can rely on God’s truth in spite our feelings, taking Him at His Word. We can choose to let His Word define us and the choices we make in our lives. Because truth can rarely be based on our feelings, we must continue to study God’s Word. We need His truth and to be transformed by it.

When our foundation is in God, we can share the Gospel while truly being examples of how God is changing and growing us to be more like Christ in love, humility, kindness and self-control.

In this we can also be better witnesses to the Gospel. Because our lives look more like Christ, non-believers will see the difference. The opposite is true when we live by our emotions: In that case, we will not look much different than the world around us.

Let us choose to live by faith and not our feelings, to become more like Christ Jesus, Who gave His life for us. Let us study God’s Word, seeking to love Him and others, and be witnesses for Christ in every way. Let’s refuse to let feelings define us, our trust in God being ever the more apparent.

2 thoughts on “Faith Is Not Feeling

  1. I totally agree in the sense that God uses both, but we must be careful not to rely on feelings above the truth of God’s Word. This is important because what we feel the Holy Spirit is making known to us may not be the Spirit after all but instead be our own thoughts and feelings. The Word provides the litmus test for finding out the answer in those cases.

    For example, if I feel completely distant from God, I can know that feeling is not the truth because His Word tells me that He will never leave or forsake me. If I decided to go by what I was feeling instead of God’s Word, it would not help me at all. But in looking to God’s true words to me, I can be at peace despite how I’m feeling in that moment.

    Like

  2. I believe you are right that we need to study God’s word regularly as the Word is the way that God speaks to us by his Holy Spirit. However, the Spirit speaks to us many times by feelings and promptings that we know can only come from God. These experiences with the Spirit serve as an anchor in times of struggle.

    So I would say yes to studying the word of God and yes to feelings, experiences, etc. as we need both.

    Like

Comments are closed.