Emotions - Engaging God with All of You Part 3 - Jesus Felt Bad
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Jesus empathizes with us in our feelings of badness.
Jesus knows what it is like to feel bad.
In this sermon, we will explore how he experienced this emotion in the gospels without sinning.
We then take courage, for Christ Jesus is with us in our emotions, giving us the empathy and strength to process our emotions for his glory and our spiritual growth.
Church, may we come to God with all of who we are.
The feeling of badness for this discussion is not one of moral quality, but of low quality and severity.
Feeling bad would be used to describe the emotion of boredom, the emotion of busyness, the emotion of stress, and the emotion of tiredness.
Feeling bored, you may feel indifferent or apathetic.
Feeling busy, you may feel pressured or rushed.
Feeling stressed, you may feel overwhelmed or out of control.
In this sermon, we are going to look at when Jesus felt bad.
Do you feel bored?
We have no accounts of Jesus feeling bored in the gospels. This does not mean he is unable to empathize with us in our feelings of boredom. We just have to take Hebrews 4:15-16 at face value.
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Know this: Jesus understands your boredom. He understands your feeling bored with your job. He understands your feeling bored with school. He understands your feeling bored in relationships.
Whatever circumstance you find yourself feeling bored in, he understands and wants you to come to him in lament.
Church, may we come to Jesus when we are bored, finding mercy and grace and the needed rest we all long for.
Do you feel busy?
Jesus felt busy, like he could not get away even when he tried. We see this several times in the gospels. Please turn to Mark 6:30-34.
30 The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught.
31 And he said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat.
32 And they went away in the boat to a desolate place by themselves.
33 Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them.
34 When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things.
The school season has started back up. Many of you are starting off the school year tired. Your fatigue is being exacerbated by the busyness of the season.
Teachers, you have lesson plans to prepare, new kids to meet, school activities to organize, parents to communicate with... the list goes on. All the while, you are weary, trying to figure out what boundaries to set.
Parents, you have work, parenting, and getting the kids back into the school routine, figuring out who will do what activities, and balancing all the things in life. All the while, you are weary, trying to figure out what boundaries to set.
Students, you are coming off the high of summer, going back into the busyness of the school season, class time, homework, sports, and other school activities. All the while, you are weary, trying to learn how to set boundaries, but not sure what that looks like, and in some cases, a boundary you would like gets vetoed by a parent or teacher.
A lot of times, mercy and grace are the gift of boundaries and the strength to set them. In our passage, Jesus is setting boundaries, but the people are not respecting them. This happened to Jesus, and it happens to us. But we can’t let it stop us from setting healthy boundaries.
Church, may we come to Jesus when we are busy, finding mercy and grace to help in our busy schedules.
Do you feel stressed?
Jesus felt stressed. Please turn to Mark 14:32-36.
And they went to a place called Gethsemane. And he said to his disciples, “Sit here while I pray.” And he took with him Peter and James and John, and began to be greatly distressed and troubled. And he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.” And going a little farther, he fell on the ground and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. And he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”
Jesus felt the stress of facing the sins of the whole world on the cross.
He understands whatever stress you are in. He understands the stress of your job. He understands the stress of being ill. He understands the stress of being a parent. He understands the stress of being a teacher. He understands the stress of being a student.
Church, may we come to Jesus when we are busy, finding mercy and grace to help in our busy schedules.
Do you feel tired?
Jesus felt tired and weary. Turn to John 4:6.
6 Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour.
He understands weariness, calling the tired and weary to himself in Matthew 11:28-30.
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Church, may we come to Jesus when we are tired, finding mercy and grace and the needed rest we all long for.
He is not a task master calling us to do more. He is gentle and lowly, calling us into his embrace of compassion, where we choose to rest and trust him with the demands of the world.
Feeling bad tires us all out. If you are like me, you do not have time to feel bad. You do not like to feel bad, so you talk yourself out of feeling bad. You rarely take time to recognize how you are feeling.
When the emotion becomes so strong that it cannot be pushed away, then you feel guilty for feeling this way, instead of receiving the mercy and grace that Jesus is offering to us in empathy and compassion. We chose judgment and condemnation, misapplying verses like “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice.”
When we judge ourselves for these emotions, we are running to the enemy and not to Jesus.
Church, I implore you by the mercy of God, run to Jesus when you feel bad and receive his empathy and compassion, demonstrated to us on the cross, validated in the resurrection.
