Psalm 43:5, 11
There was a great song by Roxette released in 1988 called ’Listen to your heart’ that I loved to listen over and over again.
When that song reached post-communism Albania I was in my early teens and all my identity was wrapped aroun the ’listening to my heart.’
My emotions were all over the place and to be honest, they were my life.
When I become a follower of Chris I noticed that in the church ( traditional and modern), heart and emotions were seen as something to hide and keep locked up. There is a ’fear’ surrounding the being ’too emotional’ as being out of control, so the expression of emotions was not encouraged.
What I have learned is that the message of the gospel never says and teaches us to ignore our hearts and emotions, neither, as the world affirms, that we are our emotions. The Gospel way is this third way that invites us to guard our hearts, to listen to our hearts and then speak to our hearts together with our emotions.
If we don’t listen too our hearts we can’t understand why we feel the way we feel. But if all we do is listening to our hearts, we soon will end up in depression or delusion.
Combining listening to our hearts with speaking to our hearts is the way forward. We speak the words of hope that the gospel bestows upon us and we ’argue’ with our emotion with the truth and light of God.
Have you thought recently why you feel the way you feel? Have you spoken to your emotion, soul, heart with what is true and the hope we have in God?