I'm a very emotional person.
To me there's nothing like a good cry. When my husband and I took a systematic theology class together the first day was overwhelming. It was so much information to process with ideas I'd never considered before. When we were done with that day of class I just wanted to cry. It's how I deal with a lot of things. If I'm happy, I cry. If I'm sad, I cry. If I'm frustrated, I cry. If I'm overwhelmed, overjoyed, or over the moon, I cry! It's who I am and who God created me to be.
All my life I've attended church and it's the one place where my emotion seems "out of place". This morning as I was doing the dishes choking back tears as I sang along to a worship song on the speakers, I pondered why we shut the emotion out of Church.
There are times that I sit in Church completely overwhelmed by the consuming love of my Savior. Tears burn my eyes when I allow myself to grasp at understanding His love and sacrifice. Every time I don't distract myself with children or other thoughts and I let the tears flow freely unashamed I get this question..."What's wrong?"
"What's wrong?", Really? "What's wrong?" Does something have to be wrong to cry? I don't think so. In fact, sometimes I feel like asking them, "What's wrong with YOU? Why are you NOT crying?" We serve an amazing God who gave up Himself in the most emotional way possible. A parent sacrificing their child. I can't even type the words without getting blurry vision. If our God were just a God of rules and regulations, then the ten commandments would have been focus of our story, but they aren't. I think about Ezekiel 16 when God is describing His love for His people and the pain of emotion behind their adulterous ways. I think about Jesus at the home of Lazarus, a man he dearly loved and could have healed from a distance when he heard he was sick. But instead he goes and mourns and weeps with his friends before giving Lazarus life again. Then at the foot of the cross, death at its worst, his mother stands watching with the Marys. I can only imagine the tears that flowed from his mothers face. Why make the story this way if there were not emotion behind it. And then to command his followers to remember the sacrifice each week as we gather together pulls upon the raw human emotion that was given to us by His own hand in the beginning!
Why do we close ourselves to this emotion? Is it because we fear the ugly tears, puffy eyes, snotty noses and unbecoming wrinkled faces of emotion? Is it because we don't want to be vulnerable with the areas of our lives that also consume these emotions; divorce, broken relationships, family hurt, unconfessed sin, anger, bitterness, sexual immorality? Is it because we don't want to draw attention to the fact that we are broken people? Is it because we think there has to be something "wrong" in order to cry?
I challenge you today. At some point during the worship service, open yourself to Him. Let your mind truly contemplate His love, His sacrifice, His joy over you. Let yourself be overwhelmed. And if tears flow... so be it.
To me there's nothing like a good cry. When my husband and I took a systematic theology class together the first day was overwhelming. It was so much information to process with ideas I'd never considered before. When we were done with that day of class I just wanted to cry. It's how I deal with a lot of things. If I'm happy, I cry. If I'm sad, I cry. If I'm frustrated, I cry. If I'm overwhelmed, overjoyed, or over the moon, I cry! It's who I am and who God created me to be.
All my life I've attended church and it's the one place where my emotion seems "out of place". This morning as I was doing the dishes choking back tears as I sang along to a worship song on the speakers, I pondered why we shut the emotion out of Church.
There are times that I sit in Church completely overwhelmed by the consuming love of my Savior. Tears burn my eyes when I allow myself to grasp at understanding His love and sacrifice. Every time I don't distract myself with children or other thoughts and I let the tears flow freely unashamed I get this question..."What's wrong?"
"What's wrong?", Really? "What's wrong?" Does something have to be wrong to cry? I don't think so. In fact, sometimes I feel like asking them, "What's wrong with YOU? Why are you NOT crying?" We serve an amazing God who gave up Himself in the most emotional way possible. A parent sacrificing their child. I can't even type the words without getting blurry vision. If our God were just a God of rules and regulations, then the ten commandments would have been focus of our story, but they aren't. I think about Ezekiel 16 when God is describing His love for His people and the pain of emotion behind their adulterous ways. I think about Jesus at the home of Lazarus, a man he dearly loved and could have healed from a distance when he heard he was sick. But instead he goes and mourns and weeps with his friends before giving Lazarus life again. Then at the foot of the cross, death at its worst, his mother stands watching with the Marys. I can only imagine the tears that flowed from his mothers face. Why make the story this way if there were not emotion behind it. And then to command his followers to remember the sacrifice each week as we gather together pulls upon the raw human emotion that was given to us by His own hand in the beginning!
Why do we close ourselves to this emotion? Is it because we fear the ugly tears, puffy eyes, snotty noses and unbecoming wrinkled faces of emotion? Is it because we don't want to be vulnerable with the areas of our lives that also consume these emotions; divorce, broken relationships, family hurt, unconfessed sin, anger, bitterness, sexual immorality? Is it because we don't want to draw attention to the fact that we are broken people? Is it because we think there has to be something "wrong" in order to cry?
I challenge you today. At some point during the worship service, open yourself to Him. Let your mind truly contemplate His love, His sacrifice, His joy over you. Let yourself be overwhelmed. And if tears flow... so be it.
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