Trust your faith over your feelings. Feelings are fickle and always changing, but your faith is constant.
When you’re feeling down, know that God’s Word is still true and that He is still with you because His Word says so.
Psalm 42:5 gives us each step we need to take to move from being ruled by our feelings to being led by faith in God.
Have you ever woke up and just felt off? You just didn’t feel like yourself in your heart and mind was bombarded with anxiety and fear even before your feet hit the floor. Then those feelings followed you throughout the day.
Too often, we think feelings are out of our control, but the Spirit of God gives us control of our hearts and minds. This means we don’t have to be led by our feelings. The Bible tells us to be led by the Spirit (Galatians 5). We cannot be led by both. We can face a barrage of emotions that are very real. How do we choose not to be led by feelings but faith instead.
First we must understand and process our feelings. Don’t ignore your feelings or act like they don’t exist. David spoke to his soul saying in Psalm 42:5, “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me.”
David didn’t pretend like he felt fine when he doesn’t. He was honest about feeling down and we need to do the same. We can’t control our feelings if we act like we don’t have feelings. At the same time we can’t control our feelings if we only acknowledge how we feel and stop there. God calls us to be led by Him does not mean we ignore how we feel. That’s why in 1 Peter 5:7 He tells us why He calls us to cast our cares on Him.
Taking time to pray to God and pour out our hearts, being honest with Him about how we feel and knowing He can take it releases a lot of weight off our shoulders. The first step isn’t about being led by our feelings it is to first realize how we feel and process why we may be feeling that way. Once you’ve processed your feelings, don’t stop there, if you do they can stay with you.
The next step is redirecting your focus. The next line in Psalm 42:5 is “Hope in God.” David feels his feelings, but then he tells his soul to “hope in God.” Feelings, come and go and they do not have control of our actions. We still get to choose how we respond and what we do. We can say. “Yes I feel down today, but I choose to trust God.” Feelings may pop up unexpectedly, but we get to choose what we believe and what we focus on.
Psalm 42 teaches us to focus on God, and place our hope in Him. We can shift our focus to Him because the truth is He is bigger than any feeling we have and He is greater than any circumstance that may be causing us to feel the way we are feeling. Because He is greater we can praise God anyway.
Psalm 42:5 goes on to say, “Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him, my salvation.”
I like the progression of this verse. First David is downcast. Then he decided to have hope anyway. And finally he tells himself that he will praise God. Don’t let your feelings stifle your praise. Not only can praising God‘s shift our feelings, praising Him will lead us to having the right feelings.
We don’t have to wait until we feel good or life is purpose to praise God. We would be waiting forever if we do that. But we can focus on God and praise Him despite our feelings. Freezing God doesn’t have to be during worship songs. It’s doing the next right thing in spite of our feelings. Faithful lives aren’t led by feelings, but by God.
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” – Hebrews 13:8
From Pity to Praise 