Your Emotions Serve a Purpose

[Your Emotions Serve a Purpose]( Current Teaching Series [Transformed]( [Listen to Today's Broadcast]( [Your Emotions Serve a Purpose]( By Rick Warren — 01/13/2022 [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Pinterest]( [Email]( “The most important commandment is this . . . ‘You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.'” Mark 12:29-30 (NLT) Jesus says God doesn’t want you to just kind of love him. He wants you to love him passionately—“with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength” (Mark 12:29-30). Do you hear the emotion in the words of Jesus? He wants more than your head knowledge. He wants an emotional relationship with you. Here are some things you need to understand about emotions: God has emotions. Yes, God is emotional. He feels joy, grief, anger, and pain. He even feels hatred toward sin. You have emotions, too, because you’re made in God’s image. If God wasn’t an emotional God, you wouldn’t have any emotions. Your ability to feel is a gift from God. Emotions make you human. Your emotional ability allows you to love and create. Your emotions help you to be faithful, loyal, kind, and generous. Your emotions help you experience all the feelings that are attached to the good things in life. Your emotions may not always seem like a gift, but even negative emotions have a purpose. There are two emotional extremes to avoid. One extreme is emotionalism. Emotionalism says the only thing that matters in life is how you feel—not what you think or what’s right or wrong. With emotionalism, everything in life is based on your emotions; emotions control your life. The other extreme is stoicism. Stoicism says feelings aren’t important at all, and the only things that matter are your intellect and your will. Christians who follow this approach downplay their emotions. The truth is, God gave you your emotions for a reason. And he wants you to worship him with all your heart as well as your mind, soul, and strength. [PLAY today’s audio teaching from Pastor Rick >>]( Talk It Over - How do you sometimes worship God more with your head than your heart? - Are you more of a “gusher” or a “stuffer” with your emotions? How can you see the results of that in your life? - Do you find it easy or difficult to bring your emotions into your relationship with God? Why? The post [Your Emotions Serve a Purpose]( appeared first on [Pastor Rick's Daily Hope](. [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Pinterest]( [Email]( [Get the Transformed Study Kit when you give a gift to support Daily Hope]( If you want a life of passion and purpose with freedom from your struggles, healing from your hurts, and relief from your troubles, God is the only one who can give that to you. Discover the timeless truths of God’s Word that can powerfully change every area of your life with Pastor Rick’s Bible study, Transformed. This engaging 7-week DVD and workbook study shares the biblical principles that can lead you to real transformation—spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, relationally, financially, and vocationally. [LEARN MORE]( [Complete Audio Series (Purchase)]( Includes 8 full-length messages from Pastor Rick's series Transformed. [LEARN MORE]( [Series Summary]( Message 1: Setting Personal Goals by Faith Message 2: How to Get Closer to God Message 3: From Stressed to Blessed Message 4: Change Your Life by Changing Your Mind Message 5: How to Deal with How You Feel Message 6: Facing the Fears that Ruin Relationships Message 7: Transforming How I See and Use Money Message 8: Facing Giants in Life and Work [PLAY TODAY'S BROADCAST]( Pastor Rick Warren [Facebook]( [Instagram]( [Linkedin]( Enjoy today's devotional? Listen to Pastor Rick’s daily audio teaching at [PastorRick.com]( Did someone forward this devotional to you? [Subscribe to Pastor Rick Warren's Daily Devotional.]( As the founding pastor of Saddleback Church with his wife Kay, Dr. Rick Warren leads a 30,000-member congregation in California with campuses in major cities around the world. As an author, his book [The Purpose Driven Life]( is one of the best-selling nonfiction books in publishing history. It has been translated into 74 languages and sold more than 50 million copies in all formats. His book [The Purpose Driven Church]( was named one of the 100 Christian books that changed the century. Rick also founded [The PEACE Plan]( to address five global issues—spiritual emptiness, self-serving leadership, poverty, disease, and illiteracy—through the power of ordinary people in the local church. You can listen to Pastor Rick’s Daily Hope, his daily 25-minute audio teaching, and sign up for his free daily devotionals at [PastorRick.com](. © 2022 by Rick Warren. All rights reserved. Used by permission. You can unsubscribe by clicking the link below. Sent to: {EMAIL} [Unsubscribe]( Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, 23182 Arroyo Vista, Rancho Santa Margarita, CA 92688, United States