Apologetics

Emotions And Ministries

by Olawale Ogunsola
03/01/24
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Emotions And Ministries.
"Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil." Psalm 37:8.

Emotional feelings cannot be divorced from human beings. One important thing is that every emotion must be tamed and brought under the control of the Holy Spirit. An emotional feeling may be positive or negative. Each must be tamed to avoid any evil that may result from it.

Let us consider one of the negative emotions that easily destroy what is good. This emotion is that of anger. It has its positive use sometimes but it must not be regularly employed, it must not be the first weapon to use and when engaged, it must be with moderation. Anger and its senior sister, wrath do not work the righteousness of God. It can even destroy the work of God.

We have an example in the Scriptures.

Moses and the tables that were constructed by God.
In His deep love for His people, God of Israel purposed to give His people laws that would regulate His relationship with them. He constructed two tables on which He wrote the Ten Commandments and handed them over to His Servant, Prophet Moses.

Soon after, the Lord told him about the backsliding of the people of God who had prepared a golden calf to replace the Lord their God. At those words, Moses decided to descend from the mountain to visit the people. The Scriptures disclose,
"And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount." Exodus 32:19, King James Version(KJV).

The tables were the work of God's hands. He constructed them and He wrote the commandments on them. When anger possessed Prophet Moses, he unwillingly destroyed the work that God did, the construction, and the writings. Moses was not involved in any of the works.

What he received on top of the mountain, he destroyed at the base of the mountain.

God is a merciful God and He is a God of second chance. As a result of His love for His people, He came up with an idea of how to have the two tables back in place. This time around, He chose to involve Moses so that he would also have a first-hand experience of what it takes to put it in place. He instructed him,
"And the LORD said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou brakest.
And be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me in the top of the mount.
And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Moses rose early in the morning, and went up unto mount Sinai, as the LORD had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tables of stone." Exodus 34:1-2,4.

Moses destroyed the work that God did with an emotion of anger. Not only that, he went through the pain of doing tedious work that was not designed for him. One sure thing is that hewing tables of stone was not an easy job to do. He must have undergone serious sweating.

However, the merciful God did the writing again. Let it be reiterated that both times spent on reconstruction and rewriting would have been invested in some other ministry assignments if anger had not been allowed to do its evil work.

Beloved, if Moses who was attested to, to be the most humble on the Earth in his generation (Numbers 12:3) could be used or overcome by the emotion of anger to do evil, who else is free?

Beloved, let the Holy Spirit rule your life perfectly well and be in control of your emotions so that you will not allow your emotions to destroy the Ministries the Lord has committed into your hands. Moses had a second chance but not everyone may be that lucky. May our emotions not ruin our Ministries in Jesus' mighty name. Stay blessed and prepared for the imminent coming of the Lord.