In October of 2010, I purchased a book named “When People Are Big and God is Small: Overcoming Peer Pressure, Codependency, and the Fear of Man”, by Edward T. Welch (1997, P&R Publishing, New Jersey). For me, the fear of others has been a big feature in my journey of life and it’s often obscured my connection with God, and when I heard Mark Dricsoll recommending this author during a sermon, I wanted to see what Welch had to offer. The latter isn’t exactly the most gripping writer and some of his examples are bland and fail to adequately illuminate his points. At first glance, he seemed to have done a thoroigh job at looking at the reasons behind why people fail to fear God.
Yet, on pages 82-91, he spends a great deal of time either discounting the role of emotions in human connection with God; I would go as far as to say that he has almost no understanding of the role of emotions in a Biblical or a practical sense. Perhaps my judgement is too precipitous and best left until I finish the book but some parts of it were somewhat disturbing:
1) “Certainly, the Psalms encourage us to speak honestly to God in our suffering, but today we are told to ‘embrace legitimate suffering’ and ‘enter into grief’. Such interest in personal pain drive us into ourselves rather than outward to a biblical understanding of God, his grief, and heavenly things rather than earthly. ‘Get in touch with your feelings’, is a sound-bite from the 1880s. If just took a while to catch on“ (pp. 82-83);
2) “Listen for the popular question at Bible studies, “What do you feel about this passage?” Is it possible that our feelings are often more important to us than faith? Too often, if our faith is weak, we don’t see it as a serious problem. It is only when our feelings are distressing that we decide to ask others for help and prayer” (ibid, p. 83);
3) “…the unpardonable sin in today’s culture if to either ‘deny’ or suppress your emotions. Emotions point to needs, and to deny your needs is to deny something God-given and God-like. Can you hear the way our culture encourages the fear of man? ‘Needs’ or ‘right’ lead inevitably into fear of man.” (ibid., p. 87);
4) “…a number-one best seller in the Christian book market made this ‘needs’ assumption central to its understanding of the person. Its view of the person is similar to a cup – an empty, passive vessel waiting to be filled. The authors [of the book 'Love is a Choice' by R. Hemfelt, F. Minirth, and P. Meier] say, ”There is a God-given need to be loved that is born into every human infant. It is a legitimate need that must be met from cradle to grave. If children are deprived of love … they carry the scars for life”. [In other words] if our needs cup is filled with the love of others, we are happy. If our cup is empty or only half full, we will be plagued with bad feelings” (ibid., p. 88);
5) “… Jesus does not intend to meet our needs, but that he intends to change our needs” (ibid., p. 88).
My concern with all of this is that Welch- a purported leading figure in Christian psychological circles in many Reformed circles, has little but contemptable disdain for emotions and their role in human life and experience of God. He is in denial. As I understand God, our needs are the same from the cradle to the grave: they need no changing, only meeting. Not everyone had loving parents who filled the cups of their hearts with love and affirmation and, like children, people need constant reminding that they are indeed loved and wanted by their heavenly Father. Who doesn’t want to know that they’re loved and wanted? Welch’s theology of emotions is horribly deficient because he hasn’t understood or been ever shown how they can fit in with a personal relationship with Christ.
On his first point above, I firmly believe and know from experience that God cares very very deeply about the griefs and sorrows of His children. Isaiah 53 said that was what Jesus died for. Welch tries to pull a shifty on emotions with a tactlessly worded sentence that goes along the lines of “Sure, people got emotional in the book of Psalms, but bringing your feelings to God and being in touch with your feelings makes you a selfish, demanding prat. Focus on God and stop dwelling on yourself”. Yes, it is important to think about God’s grief but God never ever asked anyone to leave their emotions at the door. Emotions are signals of what is happening deep in the soul of people, including their unmet needs, that require them being met in Christ: if someone suppresses their feelings and doesn’t know what the needs are behind those emotions, how do they know what’s missing? How then can they ask God to fill the hole in their heart to bless them? Being in touch with one’s emotions and bringing them to God doesn’t mean people will necessarily be controlled by them: it means that God will listen to them and meet them where they’re at.
On Welch’s second point, it’s a natural question to ask in Bible study about a passage. What do you think and what do you feel are natural questions. Being a Christian is a relationship and behind every intellectual question is a heart issue. God is interested in human hearts because He knows we’re not robots or animals. The Christian who leaves his heart at the door when he interacts with the Bible is someone who forgets his own humanity and wants to be something that God didn’t make him to be. I put it to Welch that foresaking one’s own feelings when interacting with the Word can actually weaken faith in God because you’re not giving God all that you are; God wants all of His people, even their feelings (the good, the bad, and the ugly) so they can be redeemed. Not every need or feeling is a selfish one and having needs met is not necessarily selfish, though that can be done in selfish ways.
In his third point, the dangerous word there is “inevitably”. Connection with one’s emotions doesn’t make anything inevitable, except for a greater awareness of oneself. That might sound selfish, but rather it’s a healthy element to being a human. Jesus Himself was aware of His emotions, and He showed His indignation, anger, frustration, grief, humour, and other emotions very publicly. That didn’t make Him selfish at all.
Emotions are signposts: A person who feels aggrieved at being left out of a conversation in a group may be feeling angry. It might have reminded them of being ignored when they were children and the feeling of being unloved and alienated. Those fears are real and need healing, to be brought to the feet of God. A woman may be overly sensitive and shows her emotions inappropriately in public. Why? Because she grew up being told to suppress her emotions and as an adult tries to compensate for what she lacked before… Only she does it to elicit pity and sympathy because noone’s ever listened to her story and cried with her over her pain. If she knew that God cared about her that would change everything and lead to a deeper relationship with Him. Being aware of emotions allows people to own their relationship with God and claim Christ for themselves. Instead of always thinking ‘God loves the universe and the guy next door’ I can say ‘God loves me and I don’t just know it, I sense it’. That’s a very real and powerful thing to have.
On the fourth point, I have to say that R. Hemfelt, F. Minirth, and P. Meier have hit the nail on the head; I’m living proof of it. Obviously, Welsh needs to read Jeremiah 2:13, which says, “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” Having a thirst is not a sin, but making a cup for yourself and living without Jesus is and the cup will always be broken and empty. God does fill that cup and only proud and deeply insecure people are unwilling to admit that they have an empty cup inside them that needs to be constantly filled every day with the grace of Christ. God can fill and mend those cups because He can and wants to.
Emotions are terrible tyrants when they control and master people, there’s no doubt about that. But they can also be helpful servants. Tragically I see many well-meaning Christians denying their God-given humanity by denying their feelings. Denial of feelings, at least superficially, seems noble and godly, but it’s profoundly unhuman and completely unecessary. God cares about needs and feelings, and why wouldn’t He?