The Benefits of Emotional Honesty
“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.
Ephesians 4:26-27
Think of your emotions as being to your soul what your ability to feel is to your body. Now suppose somebody had the power to take away the sensation of physical pain and offered it to you as a gift. Would you receive it? If you lost the ability to feel pain, your body would become hopelessly scarred in a short time. You soul would also be scarred if you never felt anger, anxiety or depression.
These God-given emotions are like an indicator light on the dash of a car. Covering the light with a piece of tape is like suppressing our emotions, which is dishonest and unhealthy. Stuffing our emotions will cause psychosomatic illnesses. Smashing the light is indiscriminate expression, and venting our rage is unhealthy for the people around us. So, how should we deal with our emotions? What we should do is look under the hood of the car. That is acknowledgment. Our emotional health is dependent on our emotional honesty. We can’t be right with God and not be real. If necessary, God may have to make us real in order to be right with Him.
When it comes to learning about how to deal with our anger, we can learn some valuable lessons from the story of Saul and David. Saul was jealous of David because he was getting more applause than he was. Like many insecure people, he grew angry because David was upstaging his social status. Saul certainly didn’t look under the hood, nor did he suppress his anger. He vented his anger on David. A little self-inventory may have prevented all of that.
David was the best friend of Saul’s son. David had saved Israel from the Philistine giant, and he had successfully done whatever Saul sent him to do (see 1 Samuel 18:5). Saul should have thanked God for David. David was secure because the Lord was with him (see verse 12). People who are secure in Christ are less prone to anger, because their identity and sense of worth are found in Christ, not in the success or failure of others or in the positive or negative circumstances of life.
Before Saul ever became angry with David, he was bitter as a result of his confrontation with Samuel (see 1 Samuel 15). Because of Saul’s rebellion and disobedience, the Lord had rejected Saul as king of Israel and told Samuel to anoint David as king. There is no evidence that Saul ever repented of his sin or forgave David for upstaging him. At the heart of angry people is a bitter spirit, and such unresolved anger gives the devil an opportunity. After venting his anger toward David, “The next day an evil spirit from God came forcefully on Saul” (1 Samuel 18:10). The same could happen to us if we do not forgive from our heart.
Paul advises us, “’In your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold” (Ephesians 4:26-27). Our spiritual and mental health depends on how well we learn to handle our emotions. It is not a sin to be angry, but in our anger we must not sin. If we wish not to sin, then we should be angry the way Christ was: we should be angry at sin.
a few questions to ponder:
How do we hurt ourselves when we suppress our emotions? How does that affect our communication with others, since most communication is non-verbal?
How can we hurt others if we indiscriminately express our feelings?
What was the root of Saul’s anger?
How did your parents express themselves emotionally? How has that affected you?
How does your ability to be emotionally honest reflect your security in Christ?
Neil T. Anderson is the founder of Freedom in Christ Ministries. He began the ministry in 1989 and continues to spread the message of freedom to this day.