The Sacrifice of Emotions
By Adesoji Fasanya
I’ll retell a story;
In the hostel of a Secondary School (or High School), a fight broke out between the final-year class and the penultimate class. Some of the latter students were in the hostel bathroom, they’d been in the bathrooms for a while. Having occupied everywhere, the final-year students were forced to wait outside with their buckets of water.
The ones occupying the bathrooms knew if they left, they would have to wait to spend extra time waiting while their seniors make use of the bathroom.
“Give us your buckets of water, so we can finish in time and you would come in”, one of the most vocal students in the 5th year said.
Amazed at the effrontery, a guy in the 6th year answered in a loud and frank tone, “And why would we do that? Give us the bathrooms”.
The underlying tussle for power had been ongoing for a while and here’s a perfect time for the expression of that tussle. Things got quickly heated and everyone in the final class felt ego bruised and angry, words started to fly back and forth. The juniors were not going to settle and allow them to have a go at them, they kept replying.
Emotions were high, and everywhere was boiling. Other juniors were beginning to watch as the scene unfolds. Suddenly, two out of the most respected students in the senior class came and were asking for decorum amongst their mates and instead of being quiet, they felt disrespected and wronged. “Shouldn’t you be telling the juniors that?” One said. Hurt by being misunderstood, the two of them started to exchange words with the whole class. The juniors who had initiated the whole scene couldn’t match the tense atmosphere and they eased away but the seniors kept on shouting at one another.
As I observe this scene, amazed at how quickly the victim could easily become the perpetrator the moment emotion is unleashed and/or ego is bruised, I heard these words, “We oftentimes hold too tightly to our emotions.”
You see, as men, our emotions (or mind) are very very volatile. We understand events and perceive events based on how emotions are stirred up in us. We want to have good experiences that stir good emotions. We want to always feel good or happy etc. We look for love and acceptance because we want to feel happy. This is probably why we give too much credence to our emotions and how we feel. We hold on to it like our life depends on it, well our lives depend on it.
However, a believer isn’t just called to serve God with his spirit, he is also called to serve God with his mind (which is the seat of emotions) Deuteronomy 11:13, Joshua 22:5, Matthew 22:37. The service of God with our emotions isn’t limited to tearing up while singing worship songs or giving expressive actions while singing to God. While we could add those to the list, what we often don’t always know is the call to sacrifice our emotions before the God we worship.
He was a child of his old age, having waited for the Lord’s promise for 25 years, the One who promised him has now given him a son at 100 years of age. So, it’s not surprising that Abraham would love his son so much. Just as his grandson, Jacob would love Joseph, he also loved Issac. Issac was the subject of Abraham’s emotions. He cared for him as no one else mattered.
But the One who gave Issac came one day and demanded for him. How heart-wrenching it must have been for Abraham. He was to go sacrifice him on a mountain somewhere. What do you think was going on in the mind of the Patriarch as he went up for three days searching for the mountain where Yahweh would meet him? A tussle of emotions! When the lad asked, “We have the woods, we have the knife, but where is the animal?” You could hear their emotions of Abraham dissipate gradually as he replied, “God will provide”. Ultimately, he didn’t sacrifice his son but he sacrificed his emotions. The war of emotions going through his mind from the night he heard God till he laid the lad on the altar was in fact, a sacrifice of his emotions. So Yahweh wasn’t looking for Isaac as his sacrificial meat, He was asking Abraham to give Him his emotions. It was about Abraham and the emotions he had poured on the boy, it was never about the boy (Hebrews 11:17–19).
Following in the footsteps of the father of faith, it becomes imperative for the believer to submit his emotions to God. We are called to sacrifice our emotions and not ‘hold on to it too tightly’. A man who has learned to submit his emotions can easily follow the leading of God. Our emotions make us lose objectivity so that when God is saying declare my judgment to that man (who is our buddy) we become sentimental and speak unfaithfully. The same is true when God sends you to a man or nation you do not so much like. Just as Jonah did, you would run away, not necessarily because you’re afraid but because you don’t want the person to hear and repent. I mean, you hate him or her, he has wronged you before, so he should remain in his sin and die when God is extending His mercy.
This is why anyone who will maintain prophetic faithfulness and steward purity in his work with God must not be easily offended or hold his emotions too tightly like it’s an award of some sort. Irrespective of your past, you must empty your emotions before the Lord and let him use you. One of the commonest traps of unfaithfulness in the prophetic is picking up offenses.
Repent today and be a vessel unto honor use.
Peace.
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