I want to give you permission to feel. To engage your emotions. To dig a little deeper. To press in. To find your true self. To not settle for living divided, but to pursue wholeness.

I want to give you permission to befriend your feelings. To sit with them and ask questions. To discover why pain or sorrow or ______________ is present.

All too often what we bring to the outer world doesn’t match our inner world. We’re told to bring our best self – but is it always our true self?

You matter. Your soul matters. Your feelings matter. This journey matters.

Don’t hide your feelings behind your Bible. Hold them both. Find out why that feeling is there, then bring Truth gently alongside.

In Leaving Egypt, Chuck DeGroat speaks of “Band-Aid theology” and references Jeremiah 6:13 (The Message):

“Prophets and priests and everyone in between twist words and doctor truth. My people are broken—shattered!—and they put on Band-Aids, saying ‘It’s not so bad. You’ll be just fine.’ But things are not ‘just fine’!”

It’s where pain is minimized and managed instead of faced and understood. It happens in our homes, and it happens in our churches. It can even happen in therapy.

Chuck writes, “Instead, a kind of haloed optimism dominates, and many churches seem to grow because of their capacity to help people feel better about themselves. Yet Scripture unapologetically embraces the full range of human emotional experience” (page 33).

God can handle your honesty. People might not (and that’s okay). Jesus was fully God and fully man – He understands.

Jesus wept. Jesus got mad. Jesus was lonely. Jesus felt our shame.

God is not void of feelings. We can come to Him by faith with all of our feelings. It’s not sin to have feelings or emotions. (Ephesians 4:26 says “In your anger do not sin”… it doesn’t say that anger is sin.)

Sometimes it’s possible to even act on our feelings without sinning (ex: Jesus overthrowing the tables in the temple, yet He never sinned).

“Spiritual bypassing is not what Scripture recommends. (See Job 42:7-8, Isaiah 53:4; John 11:33; Matthew 5:3-5, etc.) Jesus welcomes the beat up, downtrodden, hopeless, even doubting souls he encounters. He does not exile them. Likewise, don’t exile your own emotions. They are telling you something about yourself and your experiences.” – Alison Cook, Ph.D. (click for here the full article)

I’m learning that feelings are important indicators to things below the surface. They are neutral; they can become destructive if unaddressed, but they can also be incredibly helpful.

We can come to Jesus, by faith, with every single feeling. God is not void of emotion, and we are created in His image and likeness.

It’s time to stop stuffing. Quit coping. Refuse to numb the pain. Cease striving. Come out of hiding. It’s time to begin again the hard work of heart work. Start caring for your soul. Wake up. Be aware. Identify the feeling. Name the pain. Ask questions. Get quiet. Be still.

In the words of Walt Whitman (quoted by Ted Lasso): “Be curious, not judgmental.”

Be kind to yourself, and patient. It takes time and intentionality to work through our feelings. But it’s worth every moment.

We can grow through our pain instead of relegating it to the depths of soul. We think it’s safe there, buried out of reach – until we wake up one day to find that we’re imprisoned by it.

Feelings left unattended will only become bigger stumbling blocks. Unresolved issues have a way of keeping us chained and burdened. Rich Villodas wrote in The Deeply Formed Life, “Sooner or later the stuff we ignore will explode when we least expect it” (page 95).

So today, I want to give you permission to feel. It’s okay to feel your feelings. It’s okay to grieve. It’s okay to rejoice. It’s okay to ______________. I would argue that it’s more than okay – it’s essential.

Prioritize moments in your day (every day) to tend to your feelings. Invite God into these valuable moments. It’s worth your time, effort, and struggle. It’s up to you – no one else can do this for you. It’s an ongoing process, not a one-time event. So don’t grow weary, don’t give up. Beautiful growth is part of the journey, too.

Suggested Books:

• Boundaries for Your Soul by Alison Cook & Kimberly Miller
• The Deeply Formed Life by Rich Villodas
• Leaving Egypt by Chuck DeGroat
• The Book of Waking Up by Seth Haines
• Get Your Life Back by John Eldredge