The Mind and the Emotions

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God- this is yours spiritual act of worship.
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is- his good, pleasing and perfect will." Romans 12:1-2

We live in a world where there is a lot of emphasis placed on one's emotions or feelings. The maxim of life seems to be, "If it feels good, do it!" Movies portray love as more of a feeling than a commitment; divorces are on the rise. More and more people are having pre-marital sex or extra-marital affairs because they feel good. People everywhere are spending more on material possessions and expensive vacations to feel good. Whether something is morally right or not is not as important as how it makes us feel. Hedonism- the pursuit of pleasure- has become an art. The famous atheist philosopher Bertrand Russel once responded to a question about how he would judge whether something was morally right or not, "On the basis of how I feel, how else?"

We see a similar phenomenon in today's Church, where spirituality seems be judged more by how close we "feel" to God than anything else. The emphasis is on large services with elaborate bands and powerful, heart-stirring music so that the congregation may be caught up in the feeling of worship. If you don't feel close to God, then you are not worshipping. If you don't "feel" the peace of God in your heart, something is wrong.

But in the Bible verse above, the Apostle Paul states the way to discovering God's will is not through the emotions, but through the "renewing of your mind". Why does he say this?

Our spiritual lives, and our lives in general, need an anchor. And it would be great folly to make that anchor our emotions. The emotions are volatile and notoriously fickle. One moment I can be praising God with happiness overflowing and dedicating myself to him; the next moment I can find my emotions being seduced by some worldly desire. One moment I may be feeling so thankful about His love; the next moment I may be filled with anger against someone for hurting me. Emotions rise and fall like the waves of the sea, tossed by the winds of circumstance.

I know because for a long time I thought that life, and spiritual life, was all about feeling good. In my life I placed a high premium on finding time to "enjoy life" and do things that made me relax and feel good. I went on many travels to find those good feelings. In my spiritual life, in retrospect, many times I was seeking more for the feeling of peace and joy that God gives, rather than God Himself. And as a result of all this my life often went haywire. Emotions would flare over small and silly things; one moment I would find myself exuberant and blissful, and the next moment I'd be grumpy, impatient and downright unhappy.

And another danger is, when we let emotions take over our heart, they don't just stop there- they take over our mind as well. Our feelings have a way of finding their way to our minds and convincing them that what we want to do is what we ought to do. We are all too familiar with this. We want badly to do something, so our minds start to connive reasons to justify our actions, sometimes even under the pretense of righteousness or wisdom. Dig deep and we find the root often lies in our emotions.

So now we can appreciate why Paul makes no reference to the emotions, but instead talks about the mind. What is the mind? Well to put it simply it is the part of us that is able to think, read, process, imagine and reflect. Of all Creation, humans are the only creatures made in the image of God, which means that our minds are made in the image of the Mind of God. But since the Fall our minds have been alienated from Him, so that the things that we think about are no longer the things of God. "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned." (1 Cor 2:14)

And so, our minds desperately need renewal. Our minds need to return and connect to the Mind that conceived and created us all. How do we do this? It would take way too long to discuss fully what is required, but in one word it is this- discipline. The discipline to spend time reading and meditating on God's word, reading good solid Christian books, listening to godly speakers. The discipline of quiet reflection and submission, allowing the Word and Truth of God to permeate our minds and transform our world views and perspectives. The discipline of "bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ." (2 Cor 10:5)

The emotions do not like discipline. They like to run free like wild horses, unbridled, unhindered. But we need to make a willful effort to submit our emotions to God, and persevere in spite of them. If we do not control them, they will control us. The wonderful thing is, as our mind begins to be transformed and renewed by the truth of God, our emotions start to follow suit. The truths in our minds begin to stir the emotions in our heart, so that our emotions now become God-centred. It is a great and wonderful thing! From the head to the heart, not the other way around.

Try it! I guarantee you will not be disappointed.

"For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?
But we have the mind of Christ." 1 Cor 2:16


**A good book I would recommend that talks about the discipline of the mind (and many other disciplines) is Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster.