Survival Guides
Perhaps you are familiar with one of the many survival handbooks in bookstores. It is the Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook. The one I have here is the Extreme Edition. The handbooks are a lot of fun to read because they give very clear directions. I’m not sure, however, how practical they are.
This particular edition has the following sections, among others: How to Escape from a Charging Rhino (no, not ‘take away his credit card’); How to Avoid a Vampire Attack; How to Land a Runaway Hot Air Balloon; How to Survive Nuclear Fallout; How to Clean and Cook a Squirrel; How to Take a Bullet; How to Deal with a Quadruple Blowout; How to Survive When Stuck on an Opening Drawbridge; How to Survive When Trapped in a Sewer; and How to Free Your Leg from a Bear Trap.
Maybe not helpful, but at least the advice is amusing. Take the first chapter, for example, “How to Survive and Elephant Stampede:”
- Take available cover. Elephants stampede when they are startled by a loud noise or to escape a perceived threat. If the elephants are running away from a threat but toward you, do not try to outrun them. Elephants can run at a speed in excess of 25 mph. Even while charging, they can make sharp turns and are able to climb steep slopes. Seek a sturdy structure close by and take cover.
- Climb a tree. The elephants are likely to avoid trees when running. Grab a branch at its base and use your legs to power yourself up the tree, keeping three of your limbs in contact with the tree at all times as you climb. If you cannot climb the tree, stand behind it. Elephants will avoid large obstacles when running.
- Lie down. Unless the elephant is intent on trampling you, because you are hunting or the elephant thinks you are hunting, elephants typically avoid stepping on a prone human being, even while charging.
What would this look like? A picture is provided.
He not only knows about them, but He cares about them. Jesus came, not just to set the captives free, but also to bind up the broken hearted. How you feel emotionally is a big concern to Him.
- God created your emotions.
God made you a physical being. God made you a spiritual being. God made you an emotional being. It is not a flaw in the programming. He did it on purpose and for a reason.
- God is emotional.
To some people this may sound blasphemous. Someone might say, “How dare you accuse God of being emotional. He is perfect!” Again I say that emotion is not an imperfection. God is emotional.
All through scripture God shows emotion. He is angry at His stubborn people. He suffers the pain of rejection when they turn away from Him. Because of His zeal for God’s house, Jesus chases the moneychangers from the temple. The shortest but perhaps most poignant verse in the Bible tells us that “Jesus wept.” (John 11:35)
God is emotional and we are emotional. He made us ‘imago Dei’, in the image of God. Emotions are a wonderful, unseen part of that image.
Mankind’s superpowers
Imagine the very earliest days of creation when mankind was created and they were discovering things about themselves that they didn’t know before, things that made them different from the rest of creation.
I think of Adam, Eve and the first family discovering these emotions that were in them like Spiderman discovering his superpowers. That is my favorite scene in the movie, when he reaches for a falling tray in the school cafeteria and web comes shooting out. He had to be thinking, “What is that?” The school bully takes a swing at him and because of his spidey reflexes it’s as if it’s in slow motion. Then he takes a swing at the bully and knocks him across the room. This was all new stuff.
Later he learns how to control these new superpowers and he is a superhero.
In Genesis 1:18-20 God said, “It is not good for man to be alone,” and loneliness was recognized for the first time. When Adam looked around at all of creation it says that there was no suitable companion for Adam. He may have felt a pain inside that had never been felt before and thought, “Oh, so that is loneliness.”
Then God created Eve and Adam felt another feeling that had never been felt before.
In Genesis 3, after they ate of the forbidden fruit, Adam and Eve felt shame for the first time, because they knew that they were naked.
Genesis 3:10 is the first time fear comes into the picture: “I was afraid, so I hid myself.”
In Genesis 4:5 Cain, Adam and Eve’s son, was angry because his offering was not accepted. That anger, uncontrolled, led to murder. And in Genesis 4:9 Cain tries to cover his guilt over what he had down to his brother with lies.
We are emotional people, from the very beginning. Emotions can be superpowers, but we have to learn to control them.
SURVIVAL TIP: Expect the ups and downs of emotions.
Look at that verse in Ecclesiastes again. You will see an interesting pattern.
Ecclesiastes 3:4 (NKJV) 4 A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance;
Emotions are equated with ups and downs. “A time to weep.” When someone weeps we refer to them as being ‘down.’ “A time to laugh.” If someone is laughing, then they are ‘up.’ “A time to mourn.” Whoa! Back down again. “And a time to dance.” And then we cruise back up again. Emotions themselves are not only tricky to deal with, but so are the transitions, the ups and downs, from one to another. We refer to this sometimes as the rollercoaster of emotions. Sometimes it’s not very fun.
Hang on
There will be ups and downs. You can count on it. Knowing that, you can hang on and brace yourself for the ride. On a rollercoaster, you’ll sometimes see people riding with their hands up in the air to get more motion out of the ride. But they are buckled in and ready for what’s coming. If you’re not ready and not buckled in, you’d get thrown off.
Hang on so that you won’t get thrown and so you can help someone else who is being thrown around on the ride.
- Emotion is a currency to be shared.
Romans 12:15 (NKJV) 15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep.
Emotion is also something that we can share with someone else. It is a very valuable commodity. There are not many greater acts of love than to share emotions with someone else. If someone rejoices, rejoice with them. If someone is hurting, hurt with them. We are to care about other people and their emotions and about how they feel.
*** Video: Welcome (3:00) ***
In that clip, what was being given that was so meaningful to those who received it? It was a gift of emotion. It was caring. The final line: “They hand out cookies. But, frankly, the smiles, the hugs and the handshakes are a whole lot more important.”
SURVIVAL TIP: Know what the Bible says about emotion.
This is what we are going to be doing over the next weeks together. We are going to explore what the Bible says about emotion. The Bible is our ultimate users manual. It answers our questions on every issue of living, especially this one. Some people may see faith and emotion as two separate, unrelated topics. I disagree. I really disagree. I emotionally disagree.
Our faith should have an emotional response. It shouldn’t be just emotional, for sure. But if I am not emotional about my faith, then I think that something needs to change.
- The greatest challenges of faith play out on the field of emotions.
Great men and women of faith were men and women of emotion.
“Do you struggle with that?”
A was talking with a woman who was experiencing a real difficulty in her faith. She came back to relationship with God through her time here at New Hope. She has grown in her faith over the last few years and has loved getting to know Jesus. She has consistently felt His presence in her life. She told me that when she lost two close family members at different times, she made it through because of this church and because she felt God’s nearness.
Now things are going well. She is not facing any major tragedies. But she is going through a major faith struggle because, for the first time in many years, she doesn’t feel God right next to her. He seems distant. She came in looking for some wisdom.
And I delivered it! I listened to her, and I gave her some great wisdom. I shared some insight from my observations. I shared with her some biblical truth about the situation she was in. I really nailed it. But it didn’t seem to help.
Then, as our time together was winding down, she asked me, “Do you ever struggle with your faith?” I looked her straight in the eye and told her, “Yes. I struggle too.” Her countenance changed immediately and she said, “That makes me feel better.”
None of my theology or explanations could do what these three words could do: I struggle too. You’re not alone. I feel the same as you.
Mother Teresa
I was thinking about the impact of that when I read recently that even Mother Teresa suffered with the same emotions. A new book, “Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light,” is based on 66 years of her correspondence. The letters reveal a startling fact: For the last 50 years of her life, this iconic, holy woman felt spiritually abandoned, cut off from God. She felt no Presence. She felt alone.
"... The silence and emptiness is so great," she wrote in 1979, "that I look and do not see, - Listen and do not hear ..."
"... I am told God loves me," she wrote in an undated letter, "- and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul."
Those emotions are real. If you struggle with similar emotions, you may just be human.
Conclusion
God is emotional about you
In closing, let me return back to a point that I made earlier, that God is emotional. “What is He emotional about?” you might ask. Mainly, it is about you.
He refers to people as the apple of His eye. (Deut. 32:10, Psalm 17:8, Zech. 2:8)
Scripture says, “He will rejoice over you with singing.” (Zephaniah 3:17)
As Jesus neared Jerusalem He wept and said, “Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem. I have wanted to gather you together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” (Matt. 23:37)
Jesus said, “I have called you friends.” (John 15:15)
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. (John 3:16)
Perhaps you are familiar with one of the many survival handbooks in bookstores. It is the Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook. The one I have here is the Extreme Edition. The handbooks are a lot of fun to read because they give very clear directions. I’m not sure, however, how practical they are.
This particular edition has the following sections, among others: How to Escape from a Charging Rhino (no, not ‘take away his credit card’); How to Avoid a Vampire Attack; How to Land a Runaway Hot Air Balloon; How to Survive Nuclear Fallout; How to Clean and Cook a Squirrel; How to Take a Bullet; How to Deal with a Quadruple Blowout; How to Survive When Stuck on an Opening Drawbridge; How to Survive When Trapped in a Sewer; and How to Free Your Leg from a Bear Trap.
Maybe not helpful, but at least the advice is amusing. Take the first chapter, for example, “How to Survive and Elephant Stampede:”
- Take available cover. Elephants stampede when they are startled by a loud noise or to escape a perceived threat. If the elephants are running away from a threat but toward you, do not try to outrun them. Elephants can run at a speed in excess of 25 mph. Even while charging, they can make sharp turns and are able to climb steep slopes. Seek a sturdy structure close by and take cover.
- Climb a tree. The elephants are likely to avoid trees when running. Grab a branch at its base and use your legs to power yourself up the tree, keeping three of your limbs in contact with the tree at all times as you climb. If you cannot climb the tree, stand behind it. Elephants will avoid large obstacles when running.
- Lie down. Unless the elephant is intent on trampling you, because you are hunting or the elephant thinks you are hunting, elephants typically avoid stepping on a prone human being, even while charging.
What would this look like? A picture is provided.
Although I think this handbook may be a good idea, I don’t know if it is information I am really going to use. (At least I hope not.)
Oscar Wilde is quoted as saying, “Expect the Unexpected.” I think that is also the Boy Scouts motto. Funny thing about the unexpected, once you expect it, it isn’t the unexpected anymore. Think about it.
Instead of trying to expect the unexpected, how about we take on an easier task? How about expecting the expected? We’re not even very good at that.
If I were to write a Survival Guide, I would want to make it about something that we actually face on a regular basis. That is how we are going to be looking at the topic of emotions over the next number of weeks together. Emotions are one of those things that can be ever bit as scary as an elephant stampede, but is much more likely to be a part of our daily life. Enter our sermon series: “Emotions Survival Manual: Survival Tips You Can Use.”
Oscar Wilde is quoted as saying, “Expect the Unexpected.” I think that is also the Boy Scouts motto. Funny thing about the unexpected, once you expect it, it isn’t the unexpected anymore. Think about it.
Instead of trying to expect the unexpected, how about we take on an easier task? How about expecting the expected? We’re not even very good at that.
If I were to write a Survival Guide, I would want to make it about something that we actually face on a regular basis. That is how we are going to be looking at the topic of emotions over the next number of weeks together. Emotions are one of those things that can be ever bit as scary as an elephant stampede, but is much more likely to be a part of our daily life. Enter our sermon series: “Emotions Survival Manual: Survival Tips You Can Use.”
We will talk about depression, and loneliness, and joy, and anxiety, and other emotions that we actually deal with. But today is mainly an introduction.
Let’s begin by reading from a familiar passage. Ecclesiastes 3 begins with the phrase, “To everything there is a season; a time for every purpose under heaven.” Then a number of things are listed that are good and right within their appropriate context. What I’m interested in is verse four:
Ecclesiastes 3:4 (NKJV) 4 A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance;
There are four expressions of emotion listed in this verse: weeping, laughing, mourning and dancing. Each one, according to this verse, have their purpose. They are all appropriate at some time or another – though not all at the same time. Can you imagine someone weeping and laughing and mourning and dancing all at the same time? That would be an emotional stampede. You might as well lie down and cover your face.
SURVIVAL TIPS YOU CAN USE
Throughout the course of this series I will try to give you survival tips that you can use. Though today is an introduction, let’s begin with some survival tips.
SURVIVAL TIP: Be emotional.
This may sound silly, but it really isn’t. We have to begin by recognizing that we are emotional beings. It is in our wiring. Some people seem to think that being emotional is a weakness or a flaw in our programming. No, it is part of our programming.
Follow this progression of thought with me:
- God knows your emotions.
It is not a surprise to Him. You don’t have to hide your emotions from Him. King David certainly didn’t. Just read the Psalms.
- God cares about your emotions.
Let’s begin by reading from a familiar passage. Ecclesiastes 3 begins with the phrase, “To everything there is a season; a time for every purpose under heaven.” Then a number of things are listed that are good and right within their appropriate context. What I’m interested in is verse four:
Ecclesiastes 3:4 (NKJV) 4 A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance;
There are four expressions of emotion listed in this verse: weeping, laughing, mourning and dancing. Each one, according to this verse, have their purpose. They are all appropriate at some time or another – though not all at the same time. Can you imagine someone weeping and laughing and mourning and dancing all at the same time? That would be an emotional stampede. You might as well lie down and cover your face.
SURVIVAL TIPS YOU CAN USE
Throughout the course of this series I will try to give you survival tips that you can use. Though today is an introduction, let’s begin with some survival tips.
SURVIVAL TIP: Be emotional.
This may sound silly, but it really isn’t. We have to begin by recognizing that we are emotional beings. It is in our wiring. Some people seem to think that being emotional is a weakness or a flaw in our programming. No, it is part of our programming.
Follow this progression of thought with me:
- God knows your emotions.
It is not a surprise to Him. You don’t have to hide your emotions from Him. King David certainly didn’t. Just read the Psalms.
- God cares about your emotions.
He not only knows about them, but He cares about them. Jesus came, not just to set the captives free, but also to bind up the broken hearted. How you feel emotionally is a big concern to Him.
- God created your emotions.
God made you a physical being. God made you a spiritual being. God made you an emotional being. It is not a flaw in the programming. He did it on purpose and for a reason.
- God is emotional.
To some people this may sound blasphemous. Someone might say, “How dare you accuse God of being emotional. He is perfect!” Again I say that emotion is not an imperfection. God is emotional.
All through scripture God shows emotion. He is angry at His stubborn people. He suffers the pain of rejection when they turn away from Him. Because of His zeal for God’s house, Jesus chases the moneychangers from the temple. The shortest but perhaps most poignant verse in the Bible tells us that “Jesus wept.” (John 11:35)
God is emotional and we are emotional. He made us ‘imago Dei’, in the image of God. Emotions are a wonderful, unseen part of that image.
Mankind’s superpowers
Imagine the very earliest days of creation when mankind was created and they were discovering things about themselves that they didn’t know before, things that made them different from the rest of creation.
I think of Adam, Eve and the first family discovering these emotions that were in them like Spiderman discovering his superpowers. That is my favorite scene in the movie, when he reaches for a falling tray in the school cafeteria and web comes shooting out. He had to be thinking, “What is that?” The school bully takes a swing at him and because of his spidey reflexes it’s as if it’s in slow motion. Then he takes a swing at the bully and knocks him across the room. This was all new stuff.
Later he learns how to control these new superpowers and he is a superhero.
In Genesis 1:18-20 God said, “It is not good for man to be alone,” and loneliness was recognized for the first time. When Adam looked around at all of creation it says that there was no suitable companion for Adam. He may have felt a pain inside that had never been felt before and thought, “Oh, so that is loneliness.”
Then God created Eve and Adam felt another feeling that had never been felt before.
In Genesis 3, after they ate of the forbidden fruit, Adam and Eve felt shame for the first time, because they knew that they were naked.
Genesis 3:10 is the first time fear comes into the picture: “I was afraid, so I hid myself.”
In Genesis 4:5 Cain, Adam and Eve’s son, was angry because his offering was not accepted. That anger, uncontrolled, led to murder. And in Genesis 4:9 Cain tries to cover his guilt over what he had down to his brother with lies.
We are emotional people, from the very beginning. Emotions can be superpowers, but we have to learn to control them.
SURVIVAL TIP: Expect the ups and downs of emotions.
Look at that verse in Ecclesiastes again. You will see an interesting pattern.
Ecclesiastes 3:4 (NKJV) 4 A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance;
Emotions are equated with ups and downs. “A time to weep.” When someone weeps we refer to them as being ‘down.’ “A time to laugh.” If someone is laughing, then they are ‘up.’ “A time to mourn.” Whoa! Back down again. “And a time to dance.” And then we cruise back up again. Emotions themselves are not only tricky to deal with, but so are the transitions, the ups and downs, from one to another. We refer to this sometimes as the rollercoaster of emotions. Sometimes it’s not very fun.
Hang on
There will be ups and downs. You can count on it. Knowing that, you can hang on and brace yourself for the ride. On a rollercoaster, you’ll sometimes see people riding with their hands up in the air to get more motion out of the ride. But they are buckled in and ready for what’s coming. If you’re not ready and not buckled in, you’d get thrown off.
Hang on so that you won’t get thrown and so you can help someone else who is being thrown around on the ride.
- Emotion is a currency to be shared.
Romans 12:15 (NKJV) 15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep.
Emotion is also something that we can share with someone else. It is a very valuable commodity. There are not many greater acts of love than to share emotions with someone else. If someone rejoices, rejoice with them. If someone is hurting, hurt with them. We are to care about other people and their emotions and about how they feel.
*** Video: Welcome (3:00) ***
In that clip, what was being given that was so meaningful to those who received it? It was a gift of emotion. It was caring. The final line: “They hand out cookies. But, frankly, the smiles, the hugs and the handshakes are a whole lot more important.”
SURVIVAL TIP: Know what the Bible says about emotion.
This is what we are going to be doing over the next weeks together. We are going to explore what the Bible says about emotion. The Bible is our ultimate users manual. It answers our questions on every issue of living, especially this one. Some people may see faith and emotion as two separate, unrelated topics. I disagree. I really disagree. I emotionally disagree.
Our faith should have an emotional response. It shouldn’t be just emotional, for sure. But if I am not emotional about my faith, then I think that something needs to change.
- The greatest challenges of faith play out on the field of emotions.
Great men and women of faith were men and women of emotion.
“Do you struggle with that?”
A was talking with a woman who was experiencing a real difficulty in her faith. She came back to relationship with God through her time here at New Hope. She has grown in her faith over the last few years and has loved getting to know Jesus. She has consistently felt His presence in her life. She told me that when she lost two close family members at different times, she made it through because of this church and because she felt God’s nearness.
Now things are going well. She is not facing any major tragedies. But she is going through a major faith struggle because, for the first time in many years, she doesn’t feel God right next to her. He seems distant. She came in looking for some wisdom.
And I delivered it! I listened to her, and I gave her some great wisdom. I shared some insight from my observations. I shared with her some biblical truth about the situation she was in. I really nailed it. But it didn’t seem to help.
Then, as our time together was winding down, she asked me, “Do you ever struggle with your faith?” I looked her straight in the eye and told her, “Yes. I struggle too.” Her countenance changed immediately and she said, “That makes me feel better.”
None of my theology or explanations could do what these three words could do: I struggle too. You’re not alone. I feel the same as you.
Mother Teresa
I was thinking about the impact of that when I read recently that even Mother Teresa suffered with the same emotions. A new book, “Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light,” is based on 66 years of her correspondence. The letters reveal a startling fact: For the last 50 years of her life, this iconic, holy woman felt spiritually abandoned, cut off from God. She felt no Presence. She felt alone.
"... The silence and emptiness is so great," she wrote in 1979, "that I look and do not see, - Listen and do not hear ..."
"... I am told God loves me," she wrote in an undated letter, "- and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul."
Those emotions are real. If you struggle with similar emotions, you may just be human.
Conclusion
God is emotional about you
In closing, let me return back to a point that I made earlier, that God is emotional. “What is He emotional about?” you might ask. Mainly, it is about you.
He refers to people as the apple of His eye. (Deut. 32:10, Psalm 17:8, Zech. 2:8)
Scripture says, “He will rejoice over you with singing.” (Zephaniah 3:17)
As Jesus neared Jerusalem He wept and said, “Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem. I have wanted to gather you together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” (Matt. 23:37)
Jesus said, “I have called you friends.” (John 15:15)
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. (John 3:16)
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