emotions on The Soul

To you, O LORD, I lift up my soul. (Psalm 25:1 NRSV) When I’ve read this line previously, I’ve sometimes assumed that the main way I would lift up my soul was in personal prayer or corporate worship. ...

It’s not just what you eat that matters, it’s what eats you. You can have all the right macrobiotics and organic food, but if your body is filled with resentment, worry, fear, lust, guilt, anger, bitt...

Many of us assume that our spiritual heroes do not have to experience the same inner-wrestling that we do. Mother Teresa, beloved across the world is one such figure we might “assume” didn’t have to d...

Let us love the Lord God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and all our strength. Let us love Him with all our understanding, powers, and fortitude. Let us offer to Him our every effort, ...

By Bill Gaultiere Many Christians are stunted in their spiritual growth because they don’t understand or express their deep emotions and desires. As pastors, ministry leaders, caregivers, or parents...

One of my continual battles is the one that happens in my own heart and mind. I continue to discover and fight negative patterns of thought and emotion that are shaped less by Jesus and more by the wo...

When J. K. Rowling created the Harry Potter universe, she naturally drew on her own experiences to flesh it out. This is true even for such alarming creatures as ‘dementors’. These are soulless beings...

All profound things, and emotions of things are preceded and attended by Silence. . . . Silence is the general consecration of the universe.

The spiritual discipline of honoring the body helps us find our way between the excesses of a culture that glorifies and objectifies the body and the excesses of Christian tradition that have often de...

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart”

O Holy One, we call to you and name you as eternal, ever-present, and boundless in love. Yet there are times, O God, when we fail to recognize you in the dailyness of our lives. Sometimes shame clench...

Dear Lord Jesus, we feel our sins. They bite and gnaw and terrify us. Where shall we go? We will look to You, Lord Jesus, and believe in You. Although our faith is often weak, we look to You and find ...

To ignore, repress, or dismiss our feelings is to fail to listen to the stirrings of the Spirit within our emotional life. Jesus listened. In John's Gospel we are told that Jesus was moved with th...

But it’s not so simple, that sort of “quiet hour”. It has to be learned. A lot of unimportant inner litter and bits and pieces have to be swept out first. Even a small head can be piled high inside wi...

Emotions make our minds speak to each other. They are the most faithful reproduction of our inner worlds, broadcast externally in the expression of our faces.

Descend upon our hearts, Spirit of God, For our wills are weak, and we need your power. Our spirits are dry, and we need your refreshment. Our minds cannot comprehend, and we need your enlightenment....

Every one of our sinful actions has a suicidal power on the faculties that put that action forth. When you sin with the mind, that sin shrivels the rationality. When you sin with the heart or the emot...

The famous medieval reformer and mystic, St. John of the Cross, wrote about some of the differences between the early days of a new convert and the long road of obedience that makes up the spiritual l...

Dear Lord, Today I thought of the words of Vincent Van Gogh. It is true that there is an ebb and flow but the sea remains the sea. You, oh God, are the sea. Although I experience many ups and downs i...

But when the cross is working deeply a believer comes to know himself. He realizes how undependable are his ideas, feelings and desires.

Too often we are given a choice—emotions or faith and belief. Yet as Dan Allender and Tremper Longman observe,  Emotion links our internal and external worlds. To be aware of what we feel can open ...

I want to feel what I feel. What’s mine. Even if it’s not happiness, whatever that means. Because you’re all you’ve got.

We can rest knowing the Lord’s presence transcends what we feel. Just like the flow of the air, he is moving even if his movements cannot be perceived. And where God is not just felt but known, faith ...

The more one probes the workings of an emotional life the more he will be convinced of its vacillation and undependability. No one should wonder that a child of God who walks by emotion rather than by...

Loving God, we confess today: We don’t even know what love truly is. We talk about love when we talk about favorite television shows and foods. We talk about love as if it happens to us. We describe l...

So, how are you feeling?  It’s not a trick question. But it’s more complicated than it sounds. We’re always feeling something, usually more than one thing at a time. Our emotions are a continuous ...

Have you seen The Good Place ? You should. The afterlife comedy TV show, starring Ted Danson and Kristen Bell, offers a quirky take on heaven and hell which offers plenty of grist for the mill fo...

Many of us tend to be passive with our thoughts and feelings. We treat them like they rule us, like they are in charge of us, and not the other way around. We forget that our thoughts and feelings are...

I am spellbound by the intensity of Jesus’ emotions: Not a twinge of pity, but heartbroken compassion; not a passing irritation, but terrifying anger; not a silent tear, but groans of anguish; not a w...

The key to a well-lived life is to have trained the emotions to send the right signals and to be sensitive to their subtle calls.