Rabbi Schneider - Are Your Emotions Keeping You From Maturity?
Beloved, one of the things that we need to master is living above our emotions. You know, emotions are kind of like the weather-we can't control the weather. Neither can we control our emotions. I mean, sometimes we wake up in the morning and we feel fairly refreshed. Other times we wake up in the morning and we just kind of feel beat up. We can't control it. We don't even know why sometimes. We have to learn to operate in the Spirit, in the word, and in faith regardless of what our emotions are.
You see, beloved, until we learn to operate by our will rather than by being controlled by emotions and circumstances, we'll never be mature sons and daughters. In fact, the Lord will actually bring us into times of testing that cause us to face difficult emotional challenges and difficult circumstantial challenges just so that we can rise above these challenges and operate through our will by faith.
Think about Jesus. The first thing He experienced after coming out of the Jordan River and hearing the Father say to Him, "You are my beloved Son, and in you I am well pleased," the first thing Jesus experienced after that was the Spirit of the Lord led Him into the wilderness where He was assaulted by the devil for 40 days. But Jesus, having passed that test, came out of the wilderness in the power and the fire of the Ruach HaKodesh.
I want to encourage you today, be strong, rise up, be a warrior, practice operating through your will, through the word, in faith even when you're facing challenging circumstances and challenging emotional realities. God loves us. God's got a good plan for us. Let's practice His presence at all times. And as a result, beloved, we'll be tried and tested and be made strong. And when you get strong, you'll be happy.