Emojis have changed communication. With a single keystroke, we can boil down complex emotions or moods to one digital image. All too often we repeat this oversimplification in life outside our phones as well. Analyzing and articulating my emotions? Hard work! Letting my moods dictate my day? Easy! But the truth is, life according to “eMOODjis” comes at a cost. Your life will turn into a rollercoaster ride, making you a hostage to fleeting feelings. That’s no way to live. And luckily, we don’t have to. God has given you the ability to control your “eMOODjis” before they take control of you. It’s work, but it’s worth it!

Why are we talking about feelings? Isn’t that topic more apt for a self-help seminar instead of a sermon? Well, the fact is feelings can be either the greatest help or the greatest hindrance in our walk with Christ. Faith doesn’t live in a vacuum, and unchecked emotions and moods will stall maturity. The sooner we realize our faith should inform our feelings, the better life will become

I'm hoping I'm not too rusty. It's been since May 16 is the last time I preached, and I don't want to, you know, I need to shake off the rust. So be gentle with me today. Whenever we were on vacation, we were throwing the football around on the beach. And the first day we had a beautiful day out, you know, throwing the football around for about 30 minutes was just awesome. I hadn't thrown a football around in forever. The next day, whenever I woke up, I was sore as like, all get out like my neck was so sore. I woke up and like, man, I must have slept wrong cause I kind of pulled something. And then it dawned on me. No, I'm 33 and I threw a football for 30 minutes without warming up. That's what happens. Like, it's just, I'm like, man, this is not I don't like this getting older thing. It's not good. So hopefully I don't pull anything today, easing back into preaching.

But today we have our brand new series, starting up our brand new series, "eMOODjis" Say with me, "eMOODjis". We're coining a brand new word here at Cornerstone today. And I want to let you know what the inspiration for the series was. It's going to be today and then in the next three weeks as well. And here is the inspiration for the series. Maybe you have been in one of these situations as well, recently, anyone's scroll their social media feed recently, right? If you're watching online, you probably did it right before you log on to service, scroll through your social media feed, waiting in a long line at Walmart, like the return line or something which there's always a long line at Walmart for return items. Maybe you've been at a family dinner recently. And in all of these situations, one common theme has come back up every single time. And that is there is a lack of emotional maturity in our world. Right? We see it all over the place. We see it on social media, we see it in lines at grocery stores in supermarkets, we see it at family dinners, time and time again, people having just a complete and utter lack of emotional health, a complete and utter lack of emotional maturity. They say things and they post things and you're going oh, why would you say that? You're oversharing you're saying too much? No, we don't need to know that. Or no, you don't talk to people like that. All of these different ways that people's lack of emotional health crops up in we need the church, man, we need to be so aware of how we come off. From an emotional standpoint. We need to make sure our emotions are in check and that we are emotionally healthy people.

One of the things that happened while we were on vacation, and my daughter Eden, she's seven. She I mean, it's all family there. There's all family there. She's just been in the pool and she was getting ready to change and we're just up at the top level. You know, the kids keep running in and out of the pool. We change them seven times a day, right like this. I want to go back in the pool. I'm done with the pool. I want to go back in. So it's like change number five. I'm not going back to the room every time we're not just doing that whole song and answer we're just changing right there. We're like alright, go ahead and hop out. And while she was changing, Uncle Aaron walked by to go to his room. Eden was mortified, like just completely and utterly mortified. Just like you know, just all sad. I wasn't up there. So I come around the corner. And Jessica's like it's not a big deal honey, we're all family, and it's a big deal. And Eden's like oh, and I'm like what, what happened? Eden says I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. My five year old daughter Evelyn though her little sister did want to talk about it. She happily offered up what happened. Uncle Aaron saw Eden's butt. Eden's like, oh, no Evelyn. Stop, stop. Don't say anymore. Don't say anymore. I'm like, Oh, honey, Uncle Aaron's family here. You're fine honey. He was just walking by he wasn't looking at you either. He's just walking by. She goes, I don't know. I don't know. And she kind of paused for a second. She said, I think I just need a little bit of me time. Which first off I don't know where she's ever heard that I don't think I've ever uttered that phrase before. I don't know where she's hearing this. But she needed some me time. And so she went off like she went downstairs she like grabbed her towel cover, walk down the stairs and just was gone for a little bit.

And I tell you that because today is going to be a little bit of me time for every person in this room. Everybody watching online, everybody under the sound of my voice. And what I mean by that is this. This is me time. This is you time. As you hear the sermon today. Don't nudge somebody or think of someone that man I wish they were here listening to this. Oh, they needed here. They don't need to hear it. You do. I do. I need this sermon badly. This is something that we all need for ourselves. So this is some me time that we're getting into today. Because let me tell you, emotional health is one of the most important crucial critical things in a person's life, it's that important. It's that important. So if you would, let's bow our heads real quick. Let's pray. And then we'll jump into the rest of the sermon. Father, God, thank you for the truth of your word. As we get ready to dive into it today, God, we ask that you would illuminate it, that you would help us to see it, to read it to reflect on it in new and fresh ways. So that what we hear today wouldn't just be words that we heard on a Sunday at church, but that they would be truth, your truth, and that we would take them and not just hoard them and save them up for knowledge for ourselves, but that we would actually take what we learned today and put it into practice, put it into practice, see how it changes our life and how it makes us more and more like your son, Jesus. That's what we're here for God, we're here for you, to worship you to honor you. And to become more like you. Help us as we do that, and we'll give you all the praise all the honor, and all the glory and it's in your name that we pray. Amen. Amen.

 Well, today is kind of going to be foundational for the next weeks coming up. Today's title for the sermon is "In My Feelings." Does anybody in here do you guys use emojis on your phone? You use emojis? Anybody online, you might be using an emoji to let me know that you use emojis, you might be a little hands up or thumbs up, right? I didn't used to because I wasn't sure. Like emoji etiquette like do dude's use emojis or like do do we not like I don't I don't know. But once I started using them now I use them all the time. I'm giving thumbs up and smiley faces. I do all that kind of stuff. I love, love, love emojis. And culture loves it. I mean, there's there's a movie based on emojis. Like they're all over the place. Right? We love, love, love emojis. And I think one of the reasons we like it so much why we love emojis is because what they allow us to do is they allow us to articulate and convey a pretty complex thought, with just one image. Right? With just one little tiny image, we can communicate a pretty complex idea or a thought that may take a few words if we were to actually type the whole thing out. But hey, I can just find the perfect emoji for it. They're releasing new ones like every other month, if there's an emoji for whatever you're feeling whatever mood you're in, whenever you're trying to communicate. There's an emoji for it. In fact, my kids they love on Disney Jr. They'll do little shorts, where it'll be an entire Disney movie, condensed into five minutes. And it's told all through emojis. Like there's, there's no, there's no talking. There's no communication, except for little emojis coming up on the screen, and telling the whole story and they love it. They love it. Society, we love emojis, they can articulate these complex ideas with one image.

Now the thing is, emojis are relatively new. But that idea of wanting to get something complex across in just one simple thing. That's not new. That's not new idea. We've wanted to do that for a long time. And we do that for a long time. Like, let me let me give you an example. Turn to the person next to you and ask them how are you doing? Online, why don't you tag somebody tag them and ask them how they're doing real quick. All right. Now, if you were asked how you're doing, if you haven't respond yet, go ahead and respond to the person. Tell them how you're doing today. All right, how many people how many people responded with? Good, fine. doing okay? Let's see those hands. Yeah, a lot of people, a lot of people a lot of hands up. But how many of those people, how many of you who just said yep, doing fine. Like 10 minutes ago, just before service started, you were leaving a chaotic, crazy situation like you were you were holding on to your sanity by like one stream, right? Like, you were just in a car with kids losing their mind on the way to church. You're like, I'm going to I'm going to like light you both up. You're going to cut it out right now. You're going to stop right now. And then here, 15 minutes later, you're in service and I say how are you guys doing? Good. Doing good. Doing all right.

But the fact is, you're like losing it. Like you're this close to just blowing up, right? So you're saying you're doing good, this very simple thing. But there's a lot of complexity there. Because you're kind of doing good, but you're a little bit tense from the hard morning. You're thinking about Monday tomorrow and going back to work and it's kind of stressing you out a little bit but but you're good. Right? A lot of complexity, but we sum it up into this one little idea. You see we're living emojis. We are living emojis. We are living complexities that we try to sum up into this one little neat, "doing good." Yeah, all right. I'm doing okay. You see me like for example, you ask me, How are you doing? Um, you just got back from vacation. How was it? I might respond. With a awesome, awesome vacation was awesome, right? This indicates the sunglasses somewhere Sunny, like vacation. It was great. It was awesome. And I sum up, I sum up a lengthy vacation with just that one word. Awesome. But guess what happened on that vacation? Yeah, a lot of awesome stuff. We went to Jackie's Ridge like the largest natural sand dune, in the United States, like on the eastern part of United States really cool. We were on the beach, and we're on the ocean, and we had some really great days. But guess what else happened? There are a lot of tense moments with the kids. Because I have three kids. My brother has four kids, my sister has two kids, and we're all in this one house. And it gets pretty crazy, right? We've got a one and a half year old who whenever he doesn't get his naps is... look out, right. And we're trying to get him a nap in while kids are running by the door and slamming doors. Everyone's loud. And you're like, please be quiet. Like don't wake him up. Please don't wake him up like, right? Everything's, everything's tense. And there was a couple days down there that was just super rainy. And we're all on top of each other. And we're all like, oh my gosh, can it just like clear up so we can get outside of the house, get these kids out so they can get some energy out. And there's all these little things. And I mean, you're on vacation. So you're spending money and you get back home, you look at the finances, you're like, okay, you overspent a little bit. Gotta tighten it up real quick. So all of that's going on. But vacation was awesome. You see, there's a lot of complexity there. There's a lot of nuance, there's a lot more going on below the surface of awesome, right? We're complex, we need to give ourselves some credit. We're complex people. Our life situations are very unique. They're very complex, there is a lot going on. But what we routinely try to do, and I know, I'm not talking about whenever we try to save time, or niceties, I'm talking about whenever we really try to deal with our emotions, we create emojis, we get these moods, we get these feelings, we get these emotions. And rather than truly wrestling with them, with getting down below the surface and looking at all the complexities and the nuance and everything going on that may be causing these, these feelings, these emotions, these moods to rise up. Instead, we're just now I'm doing fine. Doing good. I'm all right. We're living emojis. And that's what this this word that we've coined emojis, that's what it means when we try to take these complex emotions, these complex moods and feelings that we have. And we try to act like they're simple. They are not. They are not our moods and our emotions, man, they are not simple. The feelings that you have, they are anything but simple and easy to navigate. They are hard, they are difficult, they can be taxing, to work through analyzing our emotions is hard. And if I'm being honest, most of us, me included, don't want to do the work. Sometimes, we don't want to go through the pain and the frustration that it can be to truly work through our emotions, we want to keep it we want to keep it simple. We want to keep it simple. I just want to feel... I'm not having too great of a day today. And leave it at that. I don't really want to dive into why I'm not I don't want to I don't want to face the stresses that I'm under, I don't want to face the depression I'm feeling I don't really want to get down to the bottom of it. So I'll keep it nice and simple for now.

But it doesn't work. Because as we keep things simple, and we never work through our emotions, we never gain the emotional intelligence, the emotional strength, the emotional fortitude that we need to have. If we're going to live a fulfilling life, we need to have it. And if we're always surface level, we're always keeping it simple. We will never ever get there. And man if I if I'm honest with you guys, I gotta say I was a little hesitant to preach this series about emotions. Because I was kind of getting in my own head about it and I was thinking to myself, I wonder if anyone's going to be out there thinking like really? Preaching about emotions? Is this a sermon or a self help book? Like what are you talking about certain feelings? Like this feels like a Dr. Phil episode or I don't I don't want to talk about feelings and emotions and and moods. This is just weird. But the more I thought about it, the more I prayed, I realized man that's that's the enemy feeding stuff. That's the enemy trying to knock this off course. Because the fact of the matter is the worry I was having that people would think maybe this isn't deep enough. Where's theology? Where's doctrine? Let's talk about things like that. Man. As I was praying on I felt God just kind of, you know, nudging me forward and saying no, no. Talking about emotions is so deep. We could have content for the rest of the year. We could preach from now to January 31 about emotions because there's that much complexity in they truly are that important. They're truly that vital.

If we are going to have a successful life, we have got to have emotional fortitude, emotional awareness, emotional health. Listen to this. This is what the Apostle Paul says, if you have a Bible want to follow along, if you don't have a hard copy one man, I recommended the YouVersion app while YouVersion. You can download the Bible on there. You can take notes, you can highlight scripture passages, copy and send it to people. It's just awesome. I love that app. I use that to read a lot and to take notes. I would encourage you started doing that man. We just heard it from Pastor Scott Tuersley a couple weeks ago about God speaking through His Word. If you want to grow emotionally, you want to grow as a Christian man, be in the word. Listen to God, listen to him speak to you. That's what we're going to do here in a second, we're going to be looking at the book of Philippians 4, if you would like to follow along Philippians 4. This is a letter that one of Jesus's earliest followers, one of his most influential followers, the apostle Paul, he wrote this letter to a church in the city of Philippi, to encourage them to tell them like hey, just keep pressing on. Just keep doing what you're doing. He actually wrote this letter from prison to he was under arrest for proclaiming the gospel. And he wrote this letter to the church, listen to what he says. And I really want you to focus on how the Apostle Paul is stressing and focusing on emotions in these verses. Listen to this, this is what he says, starting in verse one. "Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love, and I long for, my joy in my crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way. I plead," and then he names specific people I plead with you, Euodia, and I plead with Syntyche". Those are some names. If you're a young couple you're pregnant, you're looking for names for your kid might want to just store those ones away. Those just roll right off the tongue just beautiful.

"I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord." See, he's right here off the bat. He's saying, hey, look, be of the same mind. Make sure your your feelings, your emotions, your moods, the way you're conducting yourself is of the same mind. Verse 3, "Yes, and I ask of you, my true companion help these women since they have contended at my side and the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers whose name are in the book of life." And then hear from verse 4 to verse 9, pay attention to all of these feelings, all of these emotions that Paul is talking about. "Rejoice in the Lord always I say it again. Rejoice. Let your gentleness be evident to all the Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything but in every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God," you hear all that? Rejoice, gentleness, Thanksgiving, don't be anxious. All of this focus on moods on feelings and emotions. And this is what Paul says, "If you do those things, if you make these choices, the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable. If anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." You see what I see in this what I see in the Scripture? There's so much it's such a rich section of verses from Scripture.

But one thing that really stands out to me here, moods matter. Moods matter, our emotions, matter the way we conduct ourselves in relationships matter, our feelings matter. Think of it this way. This should be a shocking statement and it's intended to be a shocking statement. People would prefer to be around emotionally healthy non believers over emotionally crippled Christians. I'm gonna say that again, just in case you missed it. People would prefer to be around emotionally healthy non believers, people who know nothing of Jesus, people who don't follow Him, people who don't worship Him, people who don't make decisions based on Jesus being the Lord of their life. Most people would rather be around those kinds of people, as long as they're emotionally healthy. Then people who claim Jesus, people who say they know him, but are so emotionally crippled. They can't handle their moods, they can't handle their emotions, they can't handle their feelings. You want to know how I know that's true, that people would prefer that? Because I'm people and you are too. You're people too, because I would wager just about everybody in here. If you had to choose to work for an emotionally crippled Christian boss, or an emotionally healthy person who's not constantly swinging from one mood to the other, who comes in angry with you one day and counting on you the next day, which one would you rather have? Exactly. In fact, I would wager there's some of us who would say, man, I'm, I'm married to an emotionally crippled Christian. And there are a lot of days where I feel like our marriage would be in a better place if I was married to a non believing emotionally healthy person. Because it's constantly one thing to another, it's constantly I don't know where the moods are going to be, I don't know where the feelings are going to be. They hate me one moment, they love me the next they're depressed, they're angry, they're all over the place with me because they're not dealing with their emotions.

Emotional health, is one of the biggest helps or hindrances to our faith. It truly is. Emotions matter. Emotions matter. I can tell you some of the most kind, uplifting words I've ever received, words that were affirming and words that helped me and they put steel in my backbone make me feel like a better person came from whenever I worked at Allstate. I worked at Allstate for a period of time as a communications consultant there. And some of the people I worked with amazing people, but non believers, non believers, they probably believe in like some idea of God, but not Jesus is God, certainly. But man, they were kind. They had their moods in check. Vast majority of them, you knew what you're gonna get with them, because they were just steady, reliable people. And you want to know what's heartbreaking? Some of the most damaging hurtful words I've received, have come from people who have claimed Jesus, but their emotional health, their emotional maturity, the way that they handle their moods, and the way that they handle their feelings, completely cripples them.

And you know it too. I'm looking around this room, and I see a lot of faces of people who used to go to church, and thank God, they found Jesus here at Cornerstone because the church that they went to before, had a lot of emotionally crippled Christians in it, who hurt them, who said things to them, who treated them in certain ways. And that is heartbreaking church, that's not supposed to be us. That is not supposed to be us. It is a hindrance to our faith, it's a hindrance to our witness, whenever we do not have control of our emotions. In the biggest way we lose control is when we act like they're simple. When we act like they're simple, when we treat our moods, like they're emojis, just send this off, and that that that encapsulates everything about what I'm going through right now. No, no, you are far more complex. The issues you are dealing with are big issues that really need dealt with. Image these complex emotions and moods treated like they're simple. They hurt us, they hurt our witness, man, they make us no fun to want to be around. Whenever we're a person who's emotionally crippled.

This is one to know how you might be an emotionally crippled Christian. Do people routinely send you to voicemail? Yeah, it's kind of an uncomfortable one, right? You're like, well, you know, maybe they just don't have the time. There's certain telltale signs, where you have to kind of sit back and go, man, am I? Am I constantly swinging from one mood to another? Am I really dealing with my emotions? Or am I so emotionally unhealthy that I am just sucking the life out of the people around me, makes us no fun to be around and makes us unsteady and reliable to others. People can't count on us because they don't know what us they're going to get from day to day. Like man, I would love to be able to rely on you. I would love to be able to count on you. But I don't know what you I'm going to get. I don't know if you're going to let your day be thrown off because you've gotten traffic to start it off. And then there's the rest of your day is ruined. I don't know what you I'm going to get. And if we're not careful, if we are not vigilant about this, guys, that's how we'll just live our life. Our default to how we live life becomes just hey, whatever happens, whatever happens if we do not put in the work without working. Emojis just dictate our day. They just tell you how our day is gonna go they just from the start dictate how your day is going to be. And that leads to a life that is just a roller coaster ride. Right? If you've ever been there before, and I've been there before, whenever I just kind of let my emotions go and I just follow my emotions and my moods and my feelings, man. It's it's just up and down, up and down because something good happens and you're high, something bad happens and you're low and you're just all over the place. Your mood just dictates your day and what happens is you become a hostage to fleeting moment by moment. With situations we all know someone like that.

Maybe we are that someone and God's putting that and he's impressing your heart right now to realize that's me. That's me. That's where that's where I'm at right now. Let me tell you that is no way to live. And not just that we at Cornerstone, we talk all the time about wanting to help people find the father, a family and a fulfilling future. That fulfilling future is found whenever you know Jesus, and you're emotionally healthy. That's what a fulfilling future is, is knowing Jesus and allowing him to guide you into emotional health. And you will never get there if you don't get below the surface level of just fine. No, I'm all right. I'm doing okay. We're more complex than that. And we have got to deal with it. Moods are strong. Moods are strong. Here's something I want to ask you guys. You know how strong our moods are and how they can dictate our day? Here's a few situations I'm going to ask guys just to see who does these. Does anyone like workout exercise? Even if it's just trying to get walks in stuff like that? Okay. What about, does anybody have any like tough conversations coming up? Like at work? You've got like a review meeting, right? You got a review meeting or like, there's like a friend who you're like, man, I know I need to talk to her. And it just, it's something that you see on your schedule, and you're like, you just don't want to talk about it. Right. And it's hard. It's difficult. Anybody going out to eat anytime relatively soon? Place you love, right? And it's always good. Now, all of those things. Let's let's go back and review them real quick. So for people who work out, if you do that early in the day, man, I just kind of like sets your day, doesn't it? You feel good. You're like, man, I got it done. I got an accomplished, it just feels good. The rest of day. If you have a tough conversation, it just torpedoes your day. You're just if the call is that to like you're just watching the clock, like it just it just stresses you out and silly anxiety inducing your whole day, you're probably short with people, you're probably frustrated, because you're just looking forward to that. And then on the flip side, if you're going out to your favorite place to eat later at night with like a couple of friends, man, you're probably kinder to people, you're in a better mood. You're like in traffic. No, you go ahead you go, like because you're just you're feeling good, right? You got something to look forward to. Now here's the thing that we do so often. This is me too. We think that those moments, like working out in the morning makes my day or that tough conversation is going to ruin my day, or going out to eat late at night, it's going to be the perfect capper and make my day. Those situations do not make or break our day. Our response to those situations is what makes or breaks our day. The mood is on us, right? The mood is on us. Those are just situations that happen in life. But the mood is on us.

That happened to us whenever we were when we were on vacation. There was one day, it was so funny. We were messing with my mom about it because there was a little bit of rain the day before. Then we wake up it's the next day. My mom and cousin had gone out to a wildlife refuge thing and drove around a little bit and on their way home. She sent everybody text to say like hey, everybody just wanted to see what we wanted to do the rest of the day. It looks like the weather is supposed to be, and in an all caps she put GREAT. Looks like the weather supposed to be great today. What do we want to do? I kid you not, it was a torrential downpour and like just a downpour. We're all joking with her. Like do you want to go lay out on the beach, it looks like it's great outside today. Like it's just, it's awesome. Like standing water all over the place is terrible, terrible rain. And it would have been easy in those moments, and we did for a little bit feel like that was just gonna ruin our day. Well we're just inside now today, everyone's just gonna kind of soak and well hopefully tomorrow is better. What we were doing in that moment, is allowing a situation to dictate our mood. And that mood to dictate how we would act to each other, be a little bit shorter with each other be a little bit more like no, no, no, you go get it just be a little bit more than we normally would be right? All because of our mood. All because of our mood.

If we are not careful. If we do not work without working our moods will dictate our days. Your moods want to move you one direction or the other. Your feelings want to force you to go one way or the other. It is constant work to fight back on those to fight back on those urges. And those temptations they want you to be a moment by moment hostage. But here is the fact, the truth of the matter. And this is for every single person in here everybody watching online. You are not your feelings. You're not those moods that come from moment to moment. You are more than your mood. You're more than your mood. In fact, why don't you turn the person next to you and say, I'm more than my mood? Let's just declare this and put it in the comments. I'm more than my mood. And you want to know why I wanted to have you do that and say that out loud and actually verbalize it? Because you constantly forget it. You constantly forget that you're more than your mood. And so do I. We are constantly just tripping over ourselves, feeling like our moment by moment, moods just dictate who we are. Well, this is the me that you're going to get today because I was stuck in traffic. This is the me you're going to get today because I was late to work and it just threw off my day. This is the me you're going to get today because I you know, I'm just I'm not feeling it. We get so captivated, so taken in by our moment by moment moods, but the fact is, we are not our moods, we are more than our moods, we're not an emoji. We are deeper than this. Give yourself some credit. You are a nuanced complex person. This ain't you. There is more going on there. There is more going on there. And we have all got to dive down below this surface and actually wrestle and work with our emotions with our moods, with our feelings.

Now don't hear what I'm not saying today. Okay? Feelings, moods, emotions, they're good. They are a good thing. But we have got to choose. What's better. Right? We've got to actively choose again, listen to what Paul says in verse 8, Philippians 4:8, listen to the description he gives here. "Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable. If anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things." Meditate on such things. Try to be these things. How often do those words describe your mood? How often do those things describe my mood? Noble? Lovely, true, right? Pure, admirable? That ain't always my mood. And unless you people are just stunning people. That's not the mood that you're just always in. No, I'm feeling lovely today. Um, I'm feeling admirable, noble, pure. Like that's not. Those aren't just normal moods that come our way. And so what Paul is saying is, I know that you have emotions. I know that you have moods, I know that you have feelings, but you are more than your mood, choose something better, choose something more, choose something different. Choose what is noble, what is right, what is excellent what is praiseworthy, and you can choose it because you are more than your mood.

So what are moods and feelings and emotions, if they're not bad, if they're not a bad thing, what are they? This is this is my description, you won't find this in any dictionary, you won't find this anything like that. But my description, what I would say a mood is what a feeling is, what an emotion is, a mood is an alert to something you should be paying attention to. That's what a mood is. That's the way I see them in my life. That's the way I see them in other people's lives time and time again, whenever a mood hits me, when an emotion hits me, when a feeling hits me, it's like an alert, it's a little Ding, it's a bell goes off, and tells me this is something I need to be paying attention to. Because I'm feeling a certain way I'm having a certain specific reaction. And I need to pay attention to it. So what's that mean? That means our moods are alerts, they are not guides, they are not something to follow. They're just something that we need to notice and pay attention to.

For example, this is what I've seen this video going around on YouTube, it started to kind of go viral. The guy, the guy who posted his username is "Genetically Modified Skeptic." So you know, what have you. That's his name on there. He posted a video, I can't remember the exact title. But the whole idea behind it is obviously he's an atheist. He doesn't, you know, follow God. And he posts a video. He used to be an evangelical Christian. He posts this video talking about how churches emotionally prime you that God isn't actually present in this, that it's it's just emotional priming. And that's what the church is doing. And so then he walks through a worship service. And he breaks down how every aspect of it is emotional manipulation and priming people and you know, people in the comments are saying, oh, my goodness, it's just like, my church, this is crazy, this is the same thing as my church. And the guy is talking about, yeah, the pastor comes out and says a prayer and they play this kind of music and the lights are low and everything like that. And it's all emotional, you know, manipulation and emotional priming, and it gets to the end of it, and I finished watching it and I'm like, Okay, yeah, kinda, kind of to a point. It's not manipulation. But yeah, like we do those things and we do those things to pull on emotions. We do those things to pull on feelings and on moods. And you want to know why? Because moods are God given alerts. Moods are God given catalyst. They're supposed to grab your attention. Grab your heart, grab your mind, and draw you to pay attention to something. That's what moods are. That's what emotions are. And so whenever you come into church, and we have music playing softly below us, and we have the lights dimmed, and we're setting an atmosphere in an environment, it's because we are hoping to pull on your emotions, those God given emotions that you have those God given feelings that you have to pull on them and draw them back to where they're supposed to be on God. That's the whole point. That's what emotions are, they are God given catalyst. That's what moods are they are God given alerts, saying, hey, there's something here you need to be paying attention to. Don't ignore it. Don't settle for the surface level, dive beneath there is something you need to pay attention to.

When you feel that anger. Don't just say, man, I'm angry today. No, think about it. What Why? Why did that bother me so bad? what they said about me? That is it hitting it an insecurity that I have? Is it hitting on something in my past that I've never really resolved and dealt with? And that's why it's affecting me so much. Do not settle for the surface level. You're not simple. You're complex. And if you never do the work, you'll never get stronger, and you will never become an emotionally mature person. You're more than your mood. I'm more than my mood. Moods are just the catalyst. So whenever you feel that anger, you feel that happiness, you feel that grief, you feel that pride, you feel that hate, that is an alert, it's not something to follow you. It's something to say, hey, I need to be paying attention here. Why does that make me so jealous? Why does that make me so frustrated? Why does it make me so happy? Why does that give me such joy? And then dig in, and then wrestle with it. Wrestle with your emotions and figure out what is going on there. You are more than a mood. They do not define you. They don't define me. What you need to do is analyze them articulate them. Wrestle with them in it is hard. It is work. But man, is it worth it. Every person in your life that you look up to, that you know enough about them, that you know a little bit of the skeletons in the closet, but you still admire them, they're still a stabilizing force in your life, you still look up to them. I guarantee 100% of those people are emotionally healthy. They're emotionally healthy, I don't know a single role model that I have, that I know a little bit about the skeletons in their closet. And I still respect them, because they're emotionally healthy. That's huge. It is that important. It is that vital. And if you want to be that kind of person, which every single one of us should be striving to be that kind of person. If you want to be that kind of person, you have got to get below the surface and actually wrestle with your emotions. So that's my last charge to all of us today. Do not be emotionally crippled Christian, don't do it. You are doing, you're doing so much harm to the name of Jesus and you don't even realize it. We do so much harm to the name of our Savior and our Lord whenever we claim him. But we are just going around tearing people apart and setting things on fire because of our moods, or our feelings or our moment by moment emotions. Do not be an emotionally crippled Christian. Refuse to let your moods dictate your day, by remembering you are more than your mood. You're more than your mood.

Don't settle for the surface level. Investigate it, see what's really going on and within your heart. And when you do that, again, this is the promise from God. "The peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Isn't that incredible?  Don't you want that kind of peace? I want that. Like, I cannot speak for you. I can speak for me. I want that in my life. Like I want that situation in my life where I can I can feel a certain way I feel anger, or bitterness or depression or jealousy starts to rise up and I go you know what? No, I'm more than this mood. Well, what what this mood is this is an alert. There's something I need to pay attention to. Why am I feeling so depressed? And then I can dive into it and I can wrestle with and I can look at and go man, am I am I really over that breakup? Am I really over my mom's death? Am I really over this and this and I can wrestle with it with the Holy Spirit, with God partnering with me and when that happens I will see the peace of God come into my situation. And it it just passes all understanding.

I've had a buddy who had his wife, she was unfaithful to him. When he found out about it. He was kind of rough, rougher guy. He said, I'm not kidding, if you would have told me that I would find this out, I would have told you I would have killed her. And I'm not kidding. But in that moment, in that moment, I had been working on my anger, I had been working on this issue. And so when I found out when she told me, it's amazing, not only was I not ready to kill her, I wanted restoration. I wanted things to work, not months down the road, right then, like in that moment. That is because God's peace passes all understanding. And when you do the work, and when you partner with him, and you get below the surface, and you really deal with your own emotional issues, something amazing happens. God works in your heart, you become a steady person, a stable person, a kind of person that the people around you look to, and look up to, and man what a witness, you become. I want that for me. I want that for you.

Let's pray together about it. All right. Heavenly Father, thank You for the truth that we are more than our mood because man, so often it doesn't feel like it. I know personally, that I can let events, situations circumstances completely uproot and throw off my entire day, just letting my mood dictate what kind of day I'm going to have. But God, I'm more than my mood. I'm more than that. And so help me help us help everyone in the sound of my voice to remember that when we are in our feelings, when we're in our emotions, when we're in our moods, that we would see them for what they really are, that they are an alert, they are a bell, they are a notification telling us, hey, there is something you need to pay attention to. There's something you need to look at, there's something you need to wrestle with here, and that we would do it, that we would partner with you through the power of the Holy Spirit. And that we would wrestle with our emotions that we wouldn't settle for the surface level that we would dig in, do the work and see ourselves become more and more like Jesus, in the way that we act and the way that we speak in the way that we talk. Because we know when we do that we will become emotionally healthy, mature people who become a rock of stability. Someone who is steadfast in the midst of the turbulent world that we live in, and people will look at us and they will see our witness see that we only have this stability, we only have this steadfastness because of you and because of the peace that you give. Help us to do that God help us to be your people in this world that we would shine your light so brightly people couldn't help but see you in the midst of it. And we will be sure to give you all the honor all the glory and all the praise. It's in your name that we pray and everybody said in agreement Amen.