Emotions and the Bibleনমুনা

Joy

Psychologist Paul Ekman conducted a study in which he discovered that human beings have six basic emotions: joy, sadness, fear, anger, disgust and surprise. These are basic emotions that all human beings have. They are not learned emotions, they are innate. If these emotions arise at the right time, they are beneficial for the human being.

In some churches, there is a tendency to give more value to certain emotions and to try to forcefully repress other emotions. Speeches from the pulpit encourage believers to fall into one of two radically opposite types of people: on the one hand, they describe a human being with almost no emotions, as someone stoic or indifferent to everything, and on the opposite hand, they describe a human being who is always happy and who seems to find everything to be a cause of joy for that person.

Not even Jesus, according to the Gospels, was always happy. Jesus can be seen as upset (Mr. 11:15-17), sad (Jn. 11:32-35) and afraid (Mt. 29:39-44) throughout the biblical texts.

That being said, in these three days we will look at some emotions that are mentioned in the Bible.

Joy, as can be seen in the fourth chapter of the Letter to the Philippians (Phil. 4:4-7), is part of the Christian character. But it is not a joy that ignores everything else and is given as a placebo for any inconvenience. Rather, it is a joy that recognizes and understands everything that is happening and still manages to find peace and tranquility in the Lord. It is a joy generated in the confidence that, above all, God is in control.

Many biblical texts were written with the purpose of giving hope to those who listened to or read them. “Rejoicing in the Lord” when we are going through very sad times or “not worrying about anything” when it seems like our whole world is falling apart is difficult and almost impossible. But hearing someone say these words to us gives us a little encouragement to find peace even in the midst of it all. We are told that we are part of a body (where the head is Christ) and if we know that someone is going through difficult times it is our duty to give at least a word of encouragement and if we can help in some concrete way we should do so.

If Paul writes those words it is because he most likely also felt sad or very worried at stages of his life. And although he cannot be present with them, he sends a letter to give a message of encouragement to his brothers in Christ. Although what I am going to say is pure supposition: it may be that Paul himself, at that moment, needed to remember or hear his own words to endure everything he had to endure.