Do you remember what yesterday was like? Can you recall the range of emotions you experienced? Did you get angry, enthusiastic, discouraged, or tired? Were you frustrated? Happy? Lonely? Excited? Worried? Scared? Embarrassed? Overwhelmed? Did you feel guilty? Inadequate? Were you grieving over a loss? Did someone hurt your feelings? Did you laugh or cry? Were your motives always pure? Did you end the day with regrets over words said or left unsaid? Did you long to reach out to someone in love? Was your heart aflame with a budding romance? Were you criticized or ignored?
How did you handle it all?
Most of us don’t stop long enough to think about the amazing range of human emotions we experience every day. How does the human mind and body deal with them all? How can we possibly cope with all that’s going on within us?
Sometimes we can’t. God knew we needed a book of the Bible like Psalms.
Psalms becomes a favorite book of the Bible for most believers because it expresses the deepest feelings of us all. Leaping off the page, the psalmists’ words cry from the depths of their souls, reach for the heights, and do it all with a spirit of candor that is wonderfully refreshing.
Not only can we relate to most of the emotions and feelings expressed in these poetic hymns, but we can also discover how the psalmists worked their way through them. Some of these emotions and feelings are not God-given but are a result of our sinful human nature. The psalms help us work through these emotions and understand how to channel them into productive service for God – or how to recognize those that spell danger for us. The psalms teach us that we don’t have to hide our feelings from God. In fact, God encourages us to talk through our anger, pain, frustrations, joys, and triumphs with him. In doing so, we begin to know the mind of God himself, and our hearts will be moved to praise our Creator for making us so wonderfully complex and responsive to all that goes on around us.
Read the Psalms to come face to face with your own emotions and to better understand them. Read them also to learn ways to work through them with the help of the God who created them within you. Read them to discover how to talk to God. Memorize some of them to help you better express yourself to God. (Wow! I’m excited to dive into the book of Psalms and discover a better me and build a closer and more communicative relationship with the Lord!)
Discover and appreciate the incredible range of human emotions within you that allows you to respond to life in so many ways. And then remember the ultimate goal of each psalm: to praise the God who created us. (Touch Point Bible) (Yes!!!)
Lord, thank you for your Word today! Help us grow our relationship with you and learn about ourselves as we read the book of Psalms. We are magnificently and wonderfully made by you, with a complex set of emotions. Help us learn to manage them. Lord, we love you!
May the Lord bless you and protect you. May the Lord smile on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord show you his favor and give you his peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26)
….AND MAY WE ALL PRACTICE THIS WITH ONE ANOTHER.
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