Emotional Healing - Moving Beyond Treating the Symptoms, Part 2

You know that cross that some of you have around your neck or that cross that you see in the Bible? While you were yet a sinner, while I was yet a sinner, Christ died in your place. God demonstrated His love for you. He cares about you. He is for you.

And what I have put here is a number of lament psalms so when you feel depressed, doubt, and circumstances: Psalm 13.

When there’s guilt and shame, when you have really done something wrong, in Psalm 38, he just talks about: I have sinned, I have been in folly, I did this, I did this. And he talks about all of his emotions and then he stops. But he remembers God’s character and His forgiveness and His love. And then he resolves to trust.

In Psalm 56, he is persecuted. It’s unfair.

In Psalm 73, he is getting a completely raw deal. And he comes to God and he says, “Surely You are good to Israel, but today, I almost checked out of following You.” Why? Because I am watching evil people get good stuff and I am getting killed. I tell the truth, I’m being pure, I’m following You, I’m doing what is right, and my life is going this way; and they lie and they cheat, and every sin you can imagine. And their lives are going great!

He says, “My foot almost slipped.” See, if you don’t process those kinds of thoughts, then what happens is, down inside, this little voice says, You know, living a Christian life, it’s not worth it. All those other sales reps, they are lying. You know some other people in business? They are padding stuff. Those people over here…and God says, he processes that.

And he said, “I would have betrayed all the people that will come after me,” the generation of my children. My testimony would have gone down the tubes. My relationship with You. He said, “But then I perceived their end when I went into the sanctuary of God.” And God revealed, It looks good now, but He pulls out the rug, bang.

And at the very end, to God he says this, he says, “Lord, my heart and my flesh may fail, but You are the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” He says, “On earth there is nothing I desire besides You. As for me, the nearness of God is my good. And I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I could tell of all of His works.”

There is not another person, there is not an event, there is not money, there is not success, there is not something or someone out there who can fill the deepest void and the hole inside your heart and your soul. It is designed for Me and Me alone. And that’s why we talk so much about surrender.

Because unless you make room for Him to be all, He isn’t in your life. He just becomes your little self-help genie so you can get God to do what you want Him to do, to work out what you think will work for you.

And have you noticed that doesn’t work? And then we get all this anxiety as we are trying to…it’s really hard to manipulate the God of the universe, have you noticed that? But as you get raw and honest, as you remember His character, that’s what God wants. That’s what He wants, that’s how healing occurs.

There’s a second kind of prayer that God uses to fill your emotional tank.

There’s a prayer that helps us when we’re down, but notice he says to us, “If anyone is happy,” and you know what? When we are happy, sometimes we get all jazzed up and so we’re: Zoom! Zoom! Zoom! Zoom! Zoom! Ha! And you want to start doing all kind of stuff.

And there’s something he wants individuals to do, not just corporately, but alone and with Him that allows you to capture the happiness and the goodness and the love and the acceptance and to take it from an intellectual thing that you believe and something that you have now experienced, and let it pour down into your heart and build up a reservoir so that all the painful withdrawals of life that are going to come, that you would just have this sense of reservoir of life.

And I don’t understand, psychologically or even spiritually how it happens, but there is a correlation between truth going from your head to your heart through the process of singing, especially singing about who God is.

In fact, Ephesians chapter 5, you might jot it down, 18 to 21, we are commanded to be filled with the Spirit. And then he says, “The evidence,” or, “the overflow of the Spirit is speaking to one another in songs and hymns, singing and making melody in your heart toward the Lord.”

Colossians 3:15 and following will take the same structure and say, “I want you to be filled with the Word of God. Let the Word of God richly dwell within you.” And then when the Word of God, the truth of God is richly dwelling within you, guess what? Singing and making melody in your heart toward God.

These kind of prayers that fill our emotional tanks have three parts as well.

And they are called Psalms of Praise. Psalms of Praise.

In these, you recount gain. You recount, Wow! This is what God did!

Second, then you recall God’s character. The pattern all through Psalms of Praise, fifty percent or about seventy-five of the one hundred and fifty psalms are psalms either of declaration or prescription of the praise to God.

And they talk about what He has done and they recount His works. And then that moves them to recall His character.

And then, finally, to resolve to thank or to praise Him. Forty-one times in the psalms alone we are commanded: “Sing unto the Lord,” “Sing unto the Lord,” “Sing unto the Lord.”

And I don’t know how it works and just confession for all the people who did not raise their hand. I feel weird when I sing out loud, personally. And I feel weird singing to God. It doesn’t come naturally.

But as I have learned to praise God as I sing and praise God, something very powerful happens in my emotions. Something happens in my perspective.

There’s a strength and a filter that I begin to look at life and difficulty and pain and problems and because all of a sudden, I am praising and affirming the goodness of God and the wisdom of God and the power of God and the love of God.

And I am taking that from an intellectual knowledge to down deep in my soul, this is what is true. And it’s not just true out there. It’s true in me! And the Spirit of God takes the Word of God and the songs and He begins to bubble up emotionally inside of me and you.

It’s why I think Paul and Silas, in the midst of great adversity, they are in prison. And they are realizing God is in control. He’s got this. And they start singing, remember that?

Sometimes singing births forth great power. They sing for a while, then the earth starts shaking and there is an earthquake. God wants to bring some breakthroughs in our lives and I would encourage you, maybe it starts with you singing some songs to Him.

The other thing it does, singing to God is a very intimate thing, isn’t it? I think maybe that’s why I’m uncomfortable. For years, I have listened as my wife has put our little kids to bed and now grandchildren. And I can hear the rocker and I can hear her voice for all these years into the ears of those babies. And I watch what happens to them as she sings.

Zephaniah 3:17, this is phenomenal. Not only do we sing to God, He says He sings over us. Is God that personal and that intimate?

See, I think, He’s not a formula. He’s not “the force.” He’s not out there. He lives within you. It says, “The Lord God is mighty. He quiets you with His love. He rejoices over you with singing.”

And so I put here some times that we feel very encouraged and if you would, open your Bible to Psalm 103. It’s probably the classic psalm, at least for me, or maybe it’s the one that God has used the most when I have been so discouraged.

And Psalm 103 gives us the pattern of recalling His acts, then shifting to His character, and then giving thanks.

“Praise the Lord,” or, “bless the Lord, O my soul; and all of my innermost being, praise His holy name. Bless,” or, “praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not one of His benefits.”

Now he lists them, “Who forgives all my sins, who heals all my diseases, who redeems my life from the pit and crowns me with love and compassion. He satisfies my desires with good things so that my youth is renewed like the eagle’s. The Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed. He made known His ways to Moses, His deeds to the people of Israel.”

And then notice, he is listing, “He has healed me, He has forgiven me, He has strengthened me.” He is looking at all the acts. And then he has this shift where he goes, “He made known His ways, what He is really like, to Moses. He made all of His acts: the Red Sea, the manna, the water out of the rock, to Israel.”

Who is faithful? Who, after it all got said and done, who continued to follow? See, God’s acts will never sustain you. You feel like if He would do a big miracle, if He would heal your leg, if He would bring your son to the Lord – some big miracle, some big thing – if something would right-size up instead of down in terms of your finance, if He would just do some big miracle…

I’ve got news, a month from now, you would have another big one He really needs to do. It’s God’s ways that sustain you. But the way you learn His ways is you recount the specific things that He does and then you step back and you look at His character.

Notice what He says now. He says, “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness. He will not always accuse, nor harbor His anger forever; He doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on His children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him.”

You see where he went? He went from: God did these things, to: This is who He is. And when you begin to sing and you would begin to believe that, are you ready for this? He is not down on you. Didn’t He say that? The Lord is compassionate, He is slow to anger, He is the most patient Being in all the universe.

Just as we as human fathers have compassion on our children, so the Lord has compassion on us as we fear Him and walk before Him.

Some of the guilt and the shame and where you have been and what you have done, as far as the east is from the west, when God sees you on this day in this room, He has removed them. He loves you! He looks at you through the blood of Christ, the righteousness of Christ. You are precious, loved, adopted, empowered. He has got a plan for you. He is abounding in steadfast, loyal love and kindness. When you begin to sing that, you’ll start to believe it and you’ll start to feel it.

I found myself in like manner a few days ago, and I didn’t call them a psalm of praise but actually I mix them. When I feel my emotions starting to go down and me starting to feel like I’m losing perspective, Hebrews 13:15 says, “Let us offer a sacrifice of praise to God – the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.”

And often when I can feel, you know that blue funk? You’re not depressed but just, Ahhh. You know what? And you can kind of feel like, I’m just about one person’s bad attitude away from not having a very good day. Does anyone not have that? One traffic light or someone who cuts in front of me, you can just feel the little edge building.

And you think to yourself, I don’t want to have a day like that. What I find is I do something like this, and just as quickly, and just jot them down: Jason, my son, called me Sunday – thank You, Lord. Preaching calendar, You gave it to me as I have been praying the last four or five weeks. I’ve got it laid out through Thanksgiving. Thank You, Lord. I was able to actually sit down and record Coffee Break. Thank You, Lord. You gave me real clarity on my unique contribution for the future as I have been reading and thinking. Thank You, Lord. Jerry called and offered to help and partner with a big project. Thank you, Lord. Dr. Chung’s generosity and kindness and time with the icepacks, the pillows, the nutritional supplements. Thank You, Lord. I’m improving physically! Thank You, Lord. I had fun and connection with Theresa yesterday, Friday, and Saturday. Thank You, Lord.

I was moved to ask a few friends to actually text in their social media since I don’t do that stuff to promote the book. Thank You, Lord! They did. Thank You for speaking to me when I was praying – thank You, Lord – through the memory verses. I listened to this series on how the best get better, and You showed me specific application. Thank You, Lord.

I’ve got another whole page. I’ve got another whole page. When I got done, my emotions were completely transformed.

God wants to fill your reservoir.

And so you’ll notice, I put some passages for you to get you going. God’s goodness and love, Psalm 136. God’s mighty acts, Psalm 145. God’s faithfulness in creation, Psalm 146 to 150.

Now, turn the page and I want to summarize because people drift into areas that I think get dangerous. So let me bring balance.

Number one conclusion is ups and downs are normal. In fact, I used to be really upset because I feel like my life and my emotions, and then I read the Psalms and realized, Guess what? Welcome to the NFL. Everybody is. No one is doing great all the time, or feeling great all the time. So if you have ups and downs, welcome to humanity.

Number two, emotional health demands we move from the silencing of our symptoms. What we want to talk about is, you can’t silence your symptoms. Ask yourself, What are the things that you do to just quiet it down? And whether it’s eating or work or addictions and just say, You know what? That’s really not the problem. Prescription drugs is not the problem. The Internet is not the problem. Work is not the problem. Your ex is not the problem. Your kids are not the problem. Your health issues are not the problem. There is something feeding that. And God wants to heal that.

Three, emotional healing is a gift from God. So go to the Counselor before you go to many counselors. Before you pick up the phone and share your story and share in a group and share it here, share it there – go to the Counselor. It’s not either/or, but go there first.

Number four, getting stuck is also normal. And God uses people in conjunction with prayer to mend our emotional wounds. We are competent to counsel one another. Life change happens in small groups. Professional, biblical counselors are necessary and wonderful. We need one another. It’s not, Oh, you only pray. It’s, Yes, I come to God first, but He is going to use people in multiple ways and He is going to use me in their life.

And finally, extreme wounds, at times, demand extended and specialized care. Some of these things are physiological. Some people need antidepressants and should be on them. Some people need specialized treatment.

We have this idea, is it emotional? Is it mental? Is it physical? Answer: Yes. Yes. Do you realize the power of what is going on in your mind and how it affects your body and how what you’re thinking affects your relationship with people and God?

You are a wholeness. And so, it’s complicated. So, we need the best medical attention, the best spiritual, and the best emotional. And I don’t know what’s going on with you and you don’t know what’s going on with me. So, let’s not judge one another about the processes, where they’re at, and the kind of care they might need.