Dr Greg Bahnsen - Proverbs: Proverbs 14:10, 13-14 (In the Mood) (Part 58)

Please turn with me in your Bibles this morning to Proverbs the 14th chapter. We continue expounding this very helpful book of wisdom from God's word by looking this morning at the subject of being in the mood, or in the moods, depending on how many you want to count. Proverbs the 14th chapter. I'll read for you verses 10, 13, and 14, and we'll continue through the book during the time of Exposition. Proverbs 14. Hear now God's word at verse 10. The heart knows its own bitterness, and a stranger does not intermeddle with its joy. Even in laughter. The heart is sorrowful, and the end of mirth is heaviness. The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways, and a good man shall be satisfied from himself. Thus far, the reading of God's holy word. Boy, you're really in a good mood today. Your football team must have won. That's what somebody says to Dr. Bonson at S.C. beach UCLA yesterday. And that's right, S.C. winning that football game did put me into a good mood. I'd be the first to admit that. You've heard expressions like that, though, in life, haven't you? You've probably heard the opposite. Someone who says, boy, watch out for the boss today. He's in a terrible mood. Don't even get near him. You know people who will say, or you have said, sometimes I'm waiting till she's in just the right mood before I make this request. So we recognize that moods affect life. They affect our experience. Life is full of moods. Life is full of emotions. And human beings are quite obviously subject to feelings. There is no such thing as a generic human experience free from all emotion, any more than there's any such thing as a generic tape or video recorder free of all modes of operation. So you can't get the generic VCR experience, and you can't get the generic tape recorder experience. It's going to be a recording that is done in one mode or another, one speed or another, one quality or another. And life is like that for human beings. Human life operates one mode or another, or to put it better, operates in one mood or another. Every particular experience we live through, we live through in a particular mood as well as in a particular attitude or mentality with certain beliefs. Human beings were made subject to emotion and to feeling. And there are widely differing views of feeling, widely differing views of emotion or moods among Christian teachers and writers. I'm sorry to report that I feel that most of the views that are set forth in popular Christian literature in our day, about emotions or about moods are foolishly over simple, many times very misleading and certainly unrealistic. Indeed, some of the things that Christians have to say about emotions and about moods are downright embarrassing. I wouldn't want outsiders to look at it and say, you do you really think human life is like that? We can be so artificial when we talk about moods. The book of Proverbs isn't like that, though. I'm not embarrassed at all by what we're going to see in the book of Proverbs. It is so down to earth and so helpful in the wisdom that it gives us about our emotions and about the moods that we obviously go through, how we're supposed to handle them, what we're to think of them. Before we look at Proverbs, let me give you a couple examples, though, of the sort of thing that we get even in the best of Christian writers. I'm going to use examples like that I purposely take from two of my favorites and two men that I commend to you in just about everything in terms of what they have to say in their reading. But they have also written on this area of emotions and moods. And just to let you know how we can kind of get misled by one perspective and make it the whole picture, if you'll look at what is ordinarily a just fantastic book by Martyn Lloyd Jones entitled Spiritual Depression, and if you've ever felt spiritually depressed, and my guess is that applies to all of us, it's some time or another, there could hardly be a finer book apart from God's Holy Word to look at. It's just an excellent treatise on the subject of spiritual depression. But in his chapter on feelings, Dr. Lloyd Jones wants to insist that we cannot make ourselves have certain emotions. We cannot make ourselves have certain emotions. And since we can't control our emotions, Dr. Lloyd Jones says they cannot be commanded. You cannot command certain emotions. And the thing that's embarrassing about that is that it's one not only psychologically false that you cannot control your emotions, but it is scripturally false that you cannot command emotions. But Dr. Lloyd Jones has a way of dealing with that. I think it's extremely artificial. I want to lay it before you. Let's take a verse like in Philippians, where Paul says, rejoice in the Lord always. And again I say, rejoice. That's a command. He says, you are to rejoice. Dr. Lloyd Jones writes, and I quote, there's all the difference in the world between rejoicing and being happy, goes on to say, you cannot control being happy, but you can control your rejoicing. And so God commands the one, he doesn't control the other. And you look at that and you say, what? There's all the difference in the world. And that's a big expression, all the difference in the world categorically different. 180 degree separation between rejoicing and being happy. Now, what leads a person to say something that is so artificial as that? Well, it starts with the premise God cannot command our emotions because we can't control them. But that's not true. We can control our emotions. You take another writer like Dr. J. Adams, who does understand that we are subject to God's commands about our emotions. And nevertheless, when he writes, he says that properly speaking, and I quote him here, one does not feel such things as inferiority. Dr. Adams says, we don't feel inferior. Rather, we judge that we are inferior, and then we feel sad about that. So that when someone comes to me for counseling, he says I should tell them when they say, well, I'm feeling inferior. And that's, that's, you know, one of the problems. I should say, no, the problem is you believe that you're inferior and you feel sad about that. I don't deny that. I mean, the reason an intelligent man like Dr. Adams can say that is because often that is the case. Often it is a matter of simply trying to deal with the reasons a person has for judging or believing that he is inferior and then dealing with the sadness that accompanies it. But it's not always the case. And I've done enough counseling to realize that there are times when a person does not believe that he is inferior, but is wondering why he feels so inferior. You see, I don't need with some people to go through all the things they can do well and all the accomplishments they have and why people feel good about them. I do need to deal with that dysfunction that takes place when they know that they're not inferior and yet they're down about themselves. And so it seems so artificial to me to overgeneralize these sorts of things. Another example from the Christian Counselor's manual by Dr. Adams is he says feelings are not so directly related to reason as our judgments. Feelings in most cases can be altered only indirectly through change of attitude and action, which of course is why some people say this is a Christian form of behaviorism. You change the behavior, you change the feelings. Once again, there is a large measure of truth in that. In many cases, getting up and changing your behavior, or reasoning with a person to change his judgments, his reasoning will change his attitudes, his feelings. But you know, what is not taken into account and what is over simple about this is that it works the other way too. Sometimes our behavior and sometimes the judgments we draw are affected by the way we're feeling. I get up and I'm in a bad mood. And therefore I read a particular author and a really critical mindset. Now let's say I'm in a bad mood because SC lost it's football game. If that were to have happened. And let's say that I'm reading a Christian author who's writing on a subject and I need to see the truth of what he's saying. But because I'm in a bad mood, I'm just being so overly critical that I just tear everything apart. I say, no, there's nothing to this. Now, is there really a connection between SC losing the football game, the reason for my bad mood, and my tearing this author apart? No, there's not. That is a dysfunction of emotion, not a dysfunction of reason. And so what we need to recognize is what Dr. Adams says, that my thinking and my behavior affect my emotions. But we must also recognize that my emotions affect my thinking and my behavior. It's not so simple. As sometimes even the best of authors put it, I'm afraid that Christians can make the mistake of overestimating and placing too much emphasis upon mood. Moods, emotions, feelings. Obviously moods are unreliable, they're not constant, and they're affected by a large variety of factors. The Christian life is to be formed by the word of God and centered on the Word of God. And that word of God is addressed to our minds. The Christian life is not formed by nor based upon emotional fluctuations. That is a crucial message. Christians easily fall into oversimplification about emotions, I think how we get them, which ones to get, what to do with them once we get them. And that's part of what is so right about the Reformed approach to Christianity is we look at what is just so much fodder on the tv, so much emotional Christianity, and we are properly repulsed, I think, intellectually and emotionally by the emotionalism of that Christian approach. And so emotions can be overestimated and put too much emphasis on. And yet there's an equal and opposite error that we have to deal with. And that's that Christians can make the mistake of underestimating and placing too little significance upon their moods and their emotions and feelings. Because the Bible teaches us that moods have a tremendous impact upon our lives. They have a tremendous impact, impact upon our experience and they should do so. It's not just that, oh, we're stuck with these human bodies that have all these emotional responses built into them because of our glands and everything else. And oh, won't it be wonderful when we get rid of the terrible body and go to heaven and just be free spirits before the holy presence of God? You know, that kind of Christian talk is Platonic. It is not biblical. That type of Christian talk is based upon Greek philosophy, not biblical philosophy. The Christian life should not be reduced to intellectualism, a Platonic exaltation of the mind or the Platonic exaltation of reason over everything else. As though spiritual things are more important than bodily things, or that among the spiritual things reason is more important than will or reason is more important than emotion. That is not a Christian view of life. And yet, I'll tell you, you have to look long and hard in our day and age to find anyone who doesn't fall into that kind of trap and that kind of thinking. You see, man was created as God's image. All of man was created as God's image. I am in the physical world with a body on the created order, a reflection of what God is, not in the created order. Everything about me is the image of God. God, not just my mind, not just my spirit, but my will and my emotions are made in the image of God too. And just as man was completely made in the image of God, man completely fell into sin. The depravity of man is not just the depravity of his thinking or as some people even in Presbyterian circles have written recently, is the depravity of his will. The depravity of man is total. Remember the Calvinistic, distinctive total depravity that never has met man is as wicked as he can be. Total depravity means he is depraved in everything that he is in all walks of life, in every aspect of his human experience. He is sinful, but not as sinful as he might be in every one of those. The totality of depravity is its width, not its depth. But now, having said that and reminding me you of that, how then can we make the mistake of thinking that emotions or intellect or volition or any other way you want to cut the human cake are more important or less important than one another? They are all made in the image of God. They are all subject to the effects of sin. And admittedly there are many variations of moods. I Am not going to bother this morning to try to give you a catalog of all the moods or emotions that we are subject to as individuals. I think the most basic ones, the ones we're going to talk about from the Book of Proverbs are happiness and sorrow. And just about every other mood you can talk about turns out to be a variation of one of those. So in the broadest terms, our emotions, our moods, our happiness, feeling up about things, rejoicing about things, and on the other hand, sorrow, being down, as we say, or being depressed. Each one of these has a place in life. Does that surprise you? You know, that somber approach to Christianity that says we're supposed to howl over our sins and be in misery about our defections from the truth and transgressions of God's law? That's true. We are. You know, James says that. James says, weep, you sinners. Turn your laughing into sorrow, he says, because you are adulterers and you've compromised with the world. Repentance calls for a broken heart. Have you ever had days when you're just so down because you look at your life and you say, it stinks, it's wrong, it's out of order, it's not right with God, and that just brings you so low. And it should you notice, the Bible commands you to feel those emotions of sorrow and depression over your sins. There is a place for sorrow in the Christian life. It's also a place for joy. As Paul says, rejoice. And again I say, rejoice. We are supposed to be sorrowful. We are supposed to rejoice. But this morning's message is we're supposed to understand how we're to respond to each of those, what we're to think of, emotions, how we're to deal with them. Each has its place in life, but each needs to be sanctified in the same way that my decisions, my volition, needs to be sanctified and set apart by the holy direction of God's Word. Just as my mind needs to be sanctified and set apart by the holy instruction and truth of God's Word, so my emotions need to be sanctified as well. And when I evaluate not only my life, but from a pastoral and shepherding standpoint, the life of the sheep in this congregation, I should not be concerned. Concern merely that our people read better theological treatises and that they have more Bible knowledge. I should be concerned for that. And it's a deplorable, I think, indictment of the Christian church in the 20th century, that we don't care about those things anymore. But what I want to add is I should also be concerned to see emotional growth in God's people. I should see sanctification of emotions so that we are less prone to be sad when we shouldn't be sad, and more prone to rejoice when we should. And also more prone to show sorrow when it ought to be shown and shown in the right ways and so forth. That is, there should be growth and maturation. There should be sanctification of our emotions as well as of our minds and of our wills. And so, with that, by way of introduction, I'd like to look at four important lessons that we can get from the Book of Proverbs about moods, about being in the mood, as we might say. The first is that moods carry a significant impact on life. The second is that moods are not constant, however. Thirdly, that these moods are determined by a variety of factors. And fourthly, a point that I think will be very important for all of you, for me, is that moods are a very private experience. Let's look at these in order. First of all, moods carry significant impact on our lives. Proverbs 15:13. Proverbs 15:13. A glad heart makes a cheerful countenance. But by sorrow of heart the spirit is broken. Moods make a big difference in life. Proverbs tells us something very down to earth and very practical when it tells us that a glad heart makes for a cheerful countenance. You know what a cheerful countenance is? We don't use the word countenance the way they did in Old English days, and so forth. Countenance is the appearance of your face, okay? Or what you take into consideration, what you see. To countenance something means to put it before your face. And your countenance is the appearance of your face. What Proverbs says is that a glad heart will make for a cheerful face. It is possible to look at some people and you know this is true, right? Sometimes you look at somebody and say, you look like you swallowed the canary. I mean, what is it that's making you so happy inside? Come on. And that's true when your heart is glad, when something has taken place, some change or some relief has come to your life, some good news, whatever it may be, that makes you really, really happy inside. That shows. It shows in your demeanor. I'm going to expand this a bit because I think Proverbs doesn't intend us to restrict it simply to our. Our happiness shows in our gait, the way we walk, the way we Carry ourselves. It shows in our body language. Happiness is something that comes from inside and just. It glows outwardly. And you don't have to come up to somebody and say, you know what? I'm happy today, because they'll be able to tell even without you saying it. The opposite is true. Sorrow of heart breaks the spirit. I'll bet you've seen people and maybe you've looked in the mirror some days and you say, boy, there's a person with a broken spirit. There's a person who's just been beat down by the disappointments of life, by the betrayal of friends, by the trials, turmoils of sickness or not having enough money or whatever it may be. And that shows in our demeanor, the broken spirit that comes because our hearts are sorrowful. And so moods carry a significant impact, don't they? Gladness is apparent, and sorrow breaks the spirit. Look at Proverbs 15:15. All the days of the afflicted are evil, but he that is of a cheerful heart has a continual feast. How often do I need to turn to this verse in counseling? What Proverbs tells us is that if you are of a broken spirit, if you're one of these people who's afflicted with that depressed feeling, then all your days are evil. If you were honest with yourself, if you could do an objective analysis, I'll bet there are days in the last month that you were really down. And yet if you were to look at the things that happened to you, you'd say, my emotions didn't match the objective condition of my life. And yet, because I was depressed, even a day that I didn't need to be depressed, I was depressed anyway. Motions, emotions, moods tend to perpetuate themselves. And so if I'm really sad about something that happened yesterday, I get up today. And I tend to carry yesterday into today. Even though Jesus said, sufficient to the day is the evil that of I said, no, I'm going to keep looking back at yesterday. Now, God gives me some really wonderful, blessed things that happened today. Or maybe he gives me a life that just doesn't have the same problems that I had yesterday. But what I do is I say, I'm sorry, the evil of yesterday I'm going to bring over into today. Because all the days of the afflicted are evil. When you're down in the mouth, you tend to project that depression onto everything. But you know people, and I hope you know the experience as well, that those who have a cheerful heart, it doesn't seem like anything can knock them off course, you've got a cheerful heart. Things come into you. It's a continual feast. You know how to evaluate that. You know where to place the problem that comes into your life. You know how to respond to it. And your cheerfulness generates more cheerfulness, which generates more cheerfulness. Your moods have a lot to do with how you're going to experience life. If you feel afflicted, all your days are going to be affliction. If you feel cheerfulness, it's going to be a continual feast. And you better believe that's something you can control. That's something that I need to say to even those of you who have not been in the pastor's study to be counseled. You need to develop a cheerful heart that can respond to things and still say it's a continual feast and not be so down in the mouth that even the blessings of God cannot lift you out of the doldrums. Our moods condition our outlook. By the way, our moods condition our health too. Here's a real surprising thing. The book of Proverbs teaches us something which only recently modern medical science is beginning to look into and to appreciate and understand. Proverbs 17:22, verse 22 of chapter 17 we read, a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones. What that is getting at is if you're really down and depressed. The drying of the bones is an ancient way of saying the marrow dries up. It brings death to you. It's destructive of liveliness and vitality. A broken spirit has its effects in your. Some people with a broken spirit get ulcers. Some people with a broken spirit get heart problems. Some people with a broken spirit create, even if it's psychosomatic. I mean, that never has impressed me when people say, oh, it's only a psychosomatic problem. The problem is real the way you deal with it. Maybe you have to go to the spirit of a person, but the fact is the broken spirit does something to the body. And what's of interest is that medical science has recently found with people that are terminally ill that laughter is a great medicine and that their vital signs improve. People who have a cancer that's eating away at them, they've actually seen cases, I don't mean to say of total remission, but they have seen cases of remission, the arresting of the growth of the cancer, and of the improvement of their vital signs. When they watch comedies instead of movies make them blue. Our emotions affect our bodies. The book of God's Word told us that many years ago. A cheerful heart is good medicine. So you want a continual feast in your life. You want to be able to approach life with a good spirit. Be happy day by day by day. You want to have good health. The Bible says, develop a cheerful demeanor. For you see, your spirit is the crux really in your life. The spirit, the emotion, the mood that you're in is the crux of your life. Proverbs 18:14 says, the Spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a broken spirit no one can bear. There you have it. It all rests on the condition of your spirit. If you have a spirit that is healthy, it will sustain you even in infirmity. The ancient Stoics and the ancient Cynics, two different schools of Greek philosophy having to do with man and attitudes toward life, were dead wrong in what they had to say in their recommendations about living. But they were right in this degree. They said, the condition of your life will be affected by your inner attitude. Not the external conditions, but the inner attitude with which you receive. Those external conditions will affect the quality of your life. And the Bible says as much. It says, the spirit of a man can sustain his infirmity. You have the right inner attitudes, emotions and feelings. And no matter what comes your way, you can be sustained. But what happens when you break a man's spirit, when you break a woman's spirit or break a child's spirit? What happens when there's a broken spirit? That spirit which could have sustained you through all the pressures of life, can't sustain you in even the least pressure of life. A broken spirit can't bear anything. Who can bear a broken spirit? Have you ever had days like that? I'll be the first to admit, not with any sense of pride, but just so you'll be honest with yourself. Your pastor has days where he has a broken spirit. I have days when I just want to say, why go on with this? The problems are such, whether they're my own personal problems or family problems or church problems or what have you, I get down in the mouth and you know, at that time you threw something else into my life. I wouldn't be able to bear it. There are other days when my spirit is healthy, and boy, I can take just about anything. And so I know that fluctuation which the Bible speaks. I don't pretend to tell you that we are always up and always down or what have you, but the Bible tells us the condition inside emotionally is going to affect what you can take. Moods carry a significant impact, but the second thing we learn from Proverbs is moods are not constant. Our moods, and this is probably one of the healthiest things you can recognize when you get into a mood, be it a good one or a bad one, recognize that our moods are not immune from their opposites. What I mean by that. Turn to Proverbs 14, 13, Proverbs 14. At the 13th verse, we read, even in laughter, the heart is sorrowful and the end of mirth is heaviness. The book of Proverbs says there's no one constant emotion that you have. That's one of the reasons why you shouldn't live your life by emotions, because they fluctuate. They're not constant. And I don't think they were made by God to be constant. So recognize what you're dealing with here. Even in laughter, there is sorrow, and the end of mirth can be a dreadful thing for you. Moods are not permanent, and they cannot be the solid foundation for living. And might I just say here, because there are so many schools of discipleship and Christian teaching that tell you the opposite, that we must be honest about ourselves and about. About the teaching of God's Word. Now, it's very unrealistic to think that the Christian life is one unending experience of joy and happiness. You probably know people that are always, you know, hyped up to be happy or hyping others up to be happy. This kind of bubbly disposition and what goes with it is usually a teaching that if you're down in the mouth that something's going wrong, then obviously you've done something wrong in your life. You're not living the victorious Christian life if you ever get down in the mouth, Because Christianity is just a rose garden. It's just always one happy experience after another. That is not what the Bible teaches. The Bible does teach us the way to joy through sorrow. We'll come to that. It does not teach there's no sorrow. In fact, Proverbs tells us even in laughter, there is sorrow. You can't just get rid of that out of your life. Not in this fallen world anyway. We live in a fallen and sometimes tragic world. I've had to counsel people and comfort people who have lost a loved one, someone who has lost a child to a senseless bicycle accident. Now I want to know, would it be appropriate for a Christian who understands the word of God and the nature of life in this fallen world to go and say, oh, just be happy about it. It's really okay. That is not what God's Word teaches. There are tragedies in this world that should break our hearts. And we should learn to weep with those who have occasion to weep. The book of Ecclesiastes suggests, as a matter of fact, that sorrow may in indeed be the more likely emotion in this life. Apart from redemption, the nature of life in this world under the sun is always a coming back to what the vanity of things and the sorrow that overcomes people. So please remember that the appearances of happiness you see around you, especially in unbelievers, these appearances can be very misleading. Like the song says, they're like the tears of a clown. You never know by the outward impression what's going on inside. In much unredeemed happiness and much unsanctified happiness. In this world there is a world of grief and bitterness to be dealt with. And you have to remember there's always the long run, too. Even those who do hide their bitterness and their grief from themselves, those who are unbelievers have got to deal with what will become coming in the future. Jesus said it this way in Luke chapter six. Woe unto you that laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. Praise God. The Christian life reverses the order that is mentioned here in Proverbs. In Proverbs, as in Ecclesiastes, we look at the nature of life, natural life apart from redemption. And there we read. Laughter. Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, but the end of mirth is heaviness. In the Christian life it seems to go the other way, though the Christian life reverses the order of that. Because for us, we don't have sorrow at the end of joy, we have joy at the end of sorrow. Just think of what Jesus said to his disciples in John 6:16, verses 20 and 22. Very apt illustration of this principle. He says, of course, this is the upper room discourses. And he says, verily, verily, I say unto you that you shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice. You shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman, when she is in travail, has sorrow, because her hour has come. But when, when she is delivered of the child, she remembers no more the anguish for the joy that a man is born into the world. And you therefore now have sorrow. But I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one will take away from you. Significance of that, of course, is that Jesus was going to the cross, and he's saying, you're going to be very sorry. You're going to be Very sad. You're going to lament like a woman who's giving birth to a child. You're going to be an agony and sorrow. But I'll see you again, and when I see you, you're going to rejoice. And I'll give you a rejoicing the world will never take from you. The Christian reverses the natural order of things. You see, for the unbeliever, even through joy, sorrow is at the end for the Christian, even through sorrow, joy always awaits him at the end. That's why James says in chapter, chapter one, verse two of his epistle, count it all, joy, my brothers, when you fall into manifold trials, the Christian can count even the adversity of life, an occasion of joy. And where Jesus said in Luke 6, Woe to you who laugh now. You will mourn and weep. He also says, blessed are you that weep now, for you shall laugh so. Remember, moods are not constant. Emotions are not constant. There's a fluctuation in life, especially in this fallen world. There's a place for sorrow and a place for joy. And praise God. The relationship of the two is different for the Christian than for the non Christian. A third thing we learned from Proverbs this morning moving ahead, is that our moods and emotions are determined by a variety of factors. We mustn't think that moods are determined just in one way. And so there's this real simple manner of dealing with the moods that we're in. Let's look at some of the things that affect our moods. Proverbs 14:14 tells us that our inward condition actually conditions the quality of our life. The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways. That is the nature of your own spiritual existence. You're a backslider in heart will fill you with what is appropriate to your own state of heart. And on the other hand, a good man shall be satisfied from within himself. Our moods have a lot to do with our spiritual condition. Are we backslidden in heart? Are we good in heart? Because we're going to fill our lives with the quality of our lives is going to be filled up by the nature of our spiritual existence. We emotionally, if you will, reap what we sow. But it's not just our inward condition condition that affects emotions. Proverbs 27:7 says our outward expectation and condition also affects our outlook. Proverbs 27, verse 7. The full soul loathes a honeycomb, but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. That's one of my favorite proverbs I guess I understand that in terms of my eating habits so well, don't you? There are days when. When you get so full that even the sweetest things are loathsome to you. I can't eat another bite. We have a day coming up this week where probably you'll know that experience. You'll get so full you don't even want dessert that day. Any other day, you'd just be jumping for joy to have a piece of pie. But there'll be some of you here. I predict this. I'm not even a prophet, but I'll bet you there are some of you here who will not eat dessert on Thanksgiving Day because you'll get so full. Proverbs understands that. But you see, of course, there's a deeper message. That's just the illustration. When everything is all right in our lives, when we seem to be filled up with things, and even the sweet things in life may seem like we don't want them. On the other hand, when we're desperate and wanting and full of expectation in the physical world, if I get really hungry, I'll even take fast food in the place of a nice meal at a restaurant. And after my surgery, my stomach. I'm telling you, I'm getting a lot further away from being willing to take fast food. It just doesn't do so well with me. But when I'm hungry and even. You see, how does it put it here? To the hungry soul, even a bitter thing is sweet. Even something you wouldn't desire. Ordinarily, you'll take in your hunger. You probably had days when you thought you had one of the best meals in your life. And it's only because you were out working in the yard and you got so famished that anything would have said, satisfied you. At that point, Proverbs says, recognize that about life. A lot of our response, our emotional give and take, has to do with the condition of our life externally, how satisfied we are, what our expectations are. So our inward spiritual condition and our outward circumstances of life affect our emotions. Be realistic about that. Moreover, Proverbs says, often our emotions are determined by things that. That we have nothing to do with. We are cheered by things that are outside of us. Proverbs 15:30. The light of the eyes rejoices the heart, and good tidings make the bones fat. Well, I have to explain this, don't I? The light of the eyes. That doesn't mean the light of your eyes. It means the light of someone else's eyes. When you encounter somebody who has a cheerful countenance. In Hebrew, the expression, the idiom is the light of the eyes. When you encounter that, it will rejoice your heart. Just like good tidings make the bones fat, gives health to you and vitality. Sometimes other people have a lot to do with the way we feel. I really don't like those schools of Christian counseling that suggest that your emotions are just completely under your own control, that whatever other people do doesn't have any effect on you. That is not biblical. Sometimes I am down in the mouth and sometimes I am up. Not because of anything I've lumped up inside of myself or pushed down inside of myself, but because of what I have encountered outside in the cheerfulness of an associate or the good news that has come to me. Another example of this, Proverbs 25:25. As cold waters through a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country. You get news from a loved one far away. You get news that you couldn't have expected or in any way controlled from a far country. And that can be like refreshment to your soul, like cold water to a thirsty throat. Sometimes we just need to hear some good news, don't we? Ever had that feeling where you just wanted someone to tell you something that would pick you up? Sure. Ya. Proverbs recognizes that you need cold water to your soul, refreshment to your soul. Sometimes other people put us in a bad mood because they don't know how to approach our emotions. It becomes a problem to perpetuates itself. I'm in a bad mood. I have something that is causing me to be down, and then I need someone to respond properly to that and they don't respond properly. And that makes me even worse. That's why cheap counseling is sometimes not as good as no counseling. I've been through a lot, I think. I mean, I'm not trying to complain, but I've been through a lot in terms of disappointment in life and. And physical problems and that sort of thing. And I can assure you that there are some Christians, though they mean well, say just the wrong thing at the right time. They really do. Proverbs 25:20 as one who takes off a garment in cold weather and as vinegar upon soda, so is he that sings songs to a heavy heart. It really hits hard. Please don't have prepackaged counseling answers for everybody. Please don't give out cheerfulness and mirth when what the Bible would really call upon you to do is to weep with someone. And I hope you don't Think I've left anything about my emphasis on Reformed doctrine and the value of the mind in education. I say sometimes the most valuable thing I can do as a pastor is hold someone's hand and cry with them. I'll probably say a few words along the way, but I really believe that it's going through the experience with him. You don't sing songs through a heavy heart. Have you ever had a heavy heart and had somebody try to cheer you up? That way you know what happens. It makes the heart heavier. It does not draw you out of your heaviness. It pushes you down further. You know how to respond to people, you affect their emotions. And we've had some cool mornings. You can use that as an illustration. But I've also at looked it in snow climate. You go out in the snow and take off your garments and see what that feels like. And that's what you are like when you sing a song to a heavy heart. So the point here in all of these proverbs we've been looking at in the last few minutes is that emotions are determined by a variety of factors. It is a very dangerous thing. To oversimplify why people are feeling the way they are to suggest to them one simple answer to that their inward spiritual condition affects affects it. The satisfaction of their life at a particular time affects their emotions. What they hear from outside of them affects their emotions. The way people respond to their emotions affects their emotions. And finally, I want to take just a few moments before we close this morning to point out from the very first proverb we read a crucial lesson, that emotions are a very private experience. I hope that's a relief for you to hear that. I don't mean to say that it's a good thing or that it's a bad thing, but it is something that's very true, that emotions are a very private thing. We can give the impression in counseling again and dealing with other people that there is no individuality about our experiences, that we all just live some kind of generic Christian life or non Christian life or whatever it may be. But Proverbs 14:10 puts it this way. The heart knows its own bitterness, and a stranger doesn't intermeddle with its joy. The solitariness of our emotional life and the individuality of it has got to be recognized. Let me point out, by the way, that in my translation and also in yours, if you have the word stranger, then in Hebrew the word stranger there simply means another, another person. Like in Job 19, verse 27. It does not suggest that if you have someone who's not a stranger, maybe a well known friend, that he can intermeddle with your joy, fully participate in it. That's not the teaching of the proverb. The proverb is saying only your heart fully knows the intimacy of your sorrow and your joy. People can't mess with that. They can't intermeddle with that. Our inmost heart and individualized feelings are impenetrable to outsiders. Those feelings are unique to us and they cannot be fully shared, they cannot be fully communicated, they cannot be reproduced in another person, because the only person who actually suffers or rejoices can intimately speak of his own feelings. Now, at this point, I want to help you to think clearly. I do not say that your trials are unique. It's very important to remember that in First Corinthians 10, verse 13, Paul says, there is no temptation, actually trial, there is no adversity that's come upon you, but such as is common to man. God has not somehow shaped and created some idiosyncratic, completely unique, stylized difficulty for your life that no one else has ever seen. That's not true. Our trials are common human trials. But the Book of Proverbs says our emotional feelings about those trials are unique. Our feelings and our moods as they are elicited by our trials are individually our own. And it's very important to take that individual uniqueness and inwardness into account when we deal with our friends, when we deal with them as counselors. Please don't ever say to somebody, I know exactly what you are feeling. Because if they're real, really feeling something, they're going to say, there's no way you could. If they were honest, they would say, no one could ever know exactly what I'm feeling. That doesn't mean you can't say, I have some idea of what it is to lose a loved one. I know what it is to be sorrowful because I've lost a job, or I know what it is to be happy because I'm proud of my children. Whatever it is, we do have a common experience. We do not have exactly identical experiences because we are different people and we respond in different ways. And I really have no idea what kind of mental framework you have when you're happy or when you're down. And for me to say, I know exactly what you're feeling would be to say, I've lived your exact life, but I haven't. Only the heart knows its bitterness, and only the heart knows its own joy. But before I end, I want to correct that not refute it. I do want to alter it just slightly, because, you see, a revolutionary change has taken place in the world with the coming of Jesus Christ into this world. Stop and think about that. Think about the revolutionary change that took place in judicial affairs. There was a day when human life was lived under the wrath of God. But because Jesus came into the world, there was a transition from wrath to grace. There was a time when the world lived in dark darkness and superstitions and religious rebellion. But there's been a transition from darkness to light with the Incarnation. There was a day when spiritually, we were nothing but dead in the eyes of God. But because of the Incarnation and the work of Christ, there is now life. You see, the coming of Jesus Christ in this world has affected things judiciously. It has affected the world. It's affected our spiritual condition. From wrath to grace, from darkness to light, from death to life. And that same revolutionary change has taken place with respect to moods and emotions. There's been a revolutionary change because prior to the incarnation, as Proverbs 14:10 says, Absolutely it was the case. No one could ever say, I know what you are feeling. And even after the Incarnation, that remains generally true. But it's not absolutely true, because after the incarnation, there is now one human being who has come into this world who does know what you feel. It's not me. It's not your best friend. It's not the most spiritual person you can find alive today. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. As the Book of Hebrews tells us, with the Incarnation, God entered first fully into human experience. And because of that, we do not have a high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who has been tempted in all points like us, yet without sin. Let us therefore draw near unto the throne of grace. What an incentive to come to Jesus in prayer. There is only one person who really does know your joy. There is only one person who really does joy. Know your sorrow inside. I can approximate it. I can rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. But I can never know your heart's bitterness. I can never know your heart's joy, not the way you know it, but Jesus can. He's been touched with the feeling of our infirmities. And for that reason, the immediate application of the author of Hebrews is so draw near when you're feeling down, pray. Come to Jesus. Because there is one person who, in the silence of your own prayer life, you can say, I know you feel what I Feel you understand me like no one else does. I can share this with you. In fact, I think the lesson we should gain from this morning's study is that our moods and emotions should prove to be springboards to praise and prayer. James 5, verse 13 puts it this way. Is any among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praise. Our moods, no matter what they are, no matter what is causing them, no matter how fluctuating they may be, our moods should always be a springboard to prayer and praise. Are you feeling down? Are you suffering? Do you have a feeling of infirmity about you? Jesus feels that so. Pray. Is any among you suffering? Let him pray. And James says, is any cheerful? You may think, when I'm cheerful and things are going all right, I don't need prayer as much. The Bible says, then sing praise. You must always, regardless of your mood, whether you're depressed or you're elated, bring all of your moods into the presence of God. All of our moods should be an incentive to live in prayer and praise before Him. And in that way, all of our moods will prove to be sanctifying. Let's pray. Our Lord Jesus, how we thank you this morning that we enjoy the privilege not only of seeing joy come through sorrow in this life because of your work for us, but even more intimately that we enjoy the privilege of talking to you as someone who, like no one else, truly understands and sympathizes with our moods because you've been touched by them, too. You made us. You understand us inside and out. And indeed, you've even taken human nature to yourself. And so you do understand the end. And you can help us in time of need. And thus we draw near unto you. And we use even our depressed days as an opportunity for sanctification because they're days that urge us to pray. And on those days that we enjoy great rejoicing when we have happiness all about us, that, too, is a spiritual springboard, Lord, because we learned to sing praise to you, we ask you to put a song in our hearts, indeed a song that we can sing in good days and in bad, when we're up and when we're down. Because we do have a high priest who understands us and loves us and encourages us not to flee because we have such strange and confusing emotions, but to bring them all to him to be understood, sorted out, and set straight. Lord, we thank you for these things from the bottom of our hearts. And with true joy we pray in your name. Amen.