Unreliable Feelings

Faith is not a feeling - it is complete trust in God’s Word. Faith believes before it sees, obeys before it understands, and stands firm knowing God is faithful to keep every promise He has made. On the other hand, feelings are an emotional state or reaction. Faith does not necessarily produce an emotional state. If we spend time in the Psalms we will come to understand this. King David, considered a man after God’s own heart, wrote many of the Psalms. He doesn’t hold back his emotional state. Take, for example, Psalm 4. David starts this Psalm with these words, “Answer me when I call to you, my righteous God. Give me relief from my distress; have mercy on me and hear my prayer.” (v 1). These aren’t the words of someone who is feeling a positive emotion. David is distressed, and he is asking God to give him relief. 

“Faith is not the presence of warm religious feeling. It’s the knowledge that you walk before the God who hears.” (Welch - Depression: Looking Up From The Stubborn Darkness, Pg 47). In Psalm 4, David isn’t experiencing any warm religious feelings. In fact, it appears he isn’t experiencing any warm feelings at all. Notice though what is evident here. David in his distress is calling out to God. Why? As Welch writes, faith is “the knowledge that you walk before the God who hears.” Why is David calling out to God? Because his faith is that God is there and hears him. David is showing us that no matter the feeling God is still there, and He is listening to us. 

We don’t need positive feelings to believe in God. Emotional religious feelings aren’t necessary to our faith. I’m not discrediting emotional religious feelings. We can’t judge our faith, or the faith of others, on emotional religious feelings. Our feelings are unreliable. Just look back across your day and identify all the different emotions you had. I’ll bet you had multiple mood swings. However, regardless of your mood at any particular time during your day, you probably still had faith in God. When you were angry, God was still there. We you were down, God didn’t leave. Anxiety, depression, addition, God is present. 

Now let’s jump to the last verse in Psalm 4. “In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety.” (v 8). David’s faith didn’t stop because he was distressed. Instead he closes Psalm 4 acknowledging that God is with him and hears him. David wasn’t basing his faith on his feelings. If anything his distress pulled him closer to God, who never left. We can have the same faith. We can, in spite of our feelings, we can have faith that God is with us, and He is listening to us. We can believe that as we call out to God, He hears us. Our faith isn’t based on emotional religious feelings. Regardless of our feelings, our faith tells us that God is real, and He will never leave us, nor will He forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). Don’t let your feelings rob you of your faith.