A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance [face]: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken Proverbs 15:13.

We all have emotions; they are strong, complex internal responses that result in bodily changes.

Emotions can be both helpful and hurtful at times. They come in positive and negative, whether you’re a believer or a nonbeliever. Emotions can make you laugh one hour and cry the next. Not wanting them doesn’t stop them from coming, and wanting them doesn’t make them come.

We will always have emotions, and it’s not a sin to have them; it’s when we follow them that we often get into trouble when they are negative. Emotions can be controlled when we learn how to recognize our feelings and realize where they are trying to take us.

Emotions, or feelings, are part of our soulish realm. We are spirit, we have a soul, and we live in a body. Our soul is the intangible area between our spirit, the place where God lives, and our physical body. The soul is our mind, will, and emotions. It tells us what we think, what we want, and how we feel. Out of the three areas of the soul, it’s our feelings that lead us into temptations.

Once our emotions have taken control, our minds can be deceived. When this happens, the voice of our conscience, which operates out of our spirit, is denied its normal standards of judgment. In other words, our God-given inner voice of insight and understanding becomes drowned out by the cries of our emotions.

In this unstable state, we don’t know God’s will for our lives, and we become confused about what we should and shouldn’t do. The minute we become confused, we should know we have allowed Satan permission to bring confusion because God is not the author of confusion.

When we allow our emotions to be in control, we speak words that damage relationships and destroy friendships. Once words are spoken, they can’t be retrieved. Words can encourage, hurt, and damage. We can control our emotions simply by taking the time to examine what we’re actually hearing before speaking.

When feeling depressed, examine your thoughts. What were you thinking about to bring yourself into depression? Thinking about past hurts and disappointments will allow your emotions to take you into depression.

We can’t go forward thinking and living in the past. Emotions will make one miss out on the good things in life when they carry baggage from the past into their future. One way to control our emotions is to submit ourselves to the Spirit of God, who will lead and guide us in His righteousness. His Spirit will enable us to know when emotions flare up, whether they are good or damaging. He will empower us to control our emotions by His Spirit.

As Christian women, God does not want us to be led by our emotions, but to be led by His Spirit.