In several of my previous articles I alluded to the fact that feelings have become of the utmost importance in our society. This is at the cost of reason and common sense, but supposedly supported by science. In this article I would like to search for God’s opinion about feelings and reason, so we can be better prepared to ward off the attacks on our faith.

History

The enlightenment in the late 17th and 18th centuries was a European intellectual movement emphasizing reason and individualism rather than tradition. It was heavily influenced by philosophers such as Descartes and Locke and its prominent exponents include Kant, Goethe, Voltaire, Rousseau and Adam Smith. All these people have become household names in our culture.

Following this in the 19th century we got the theory of evolution, liberal theology and ‘God is dead’ philosophy. The idea was that we could explain everything with our own brains and we closed off to the spiritual realm. Humanity would figure out what was real, what was best for themselves, and faith in God was to go.

But human beings are incorrigible and if faith in God was out, faith in science could replace it. Science became the explanation of all things, from our origins (evolution) to our religion (our egos), to our psychology (Freud). Therefore faith in science became essential.

If you stop and think about this for a moment, you start to realize how all-comprehensive this faith in science has become. When the climate changes, we look at science for answers. When a new pandemic hits the world, we look at science for solutions. When people are sick, either physically or mentally, we put our trust in scientific developments. Technical science gives us our gadgets, our comforts, enough food, machines that do our job—hasn’t science proven it is worthy of our trust? This is a trick question that I’ll come back to.

It is not wrong to accept reasonable answers from skilled scientists, but we always should look to God first.

Not only is science being presented as an entity in itself, something we should put our faith in, but the practitioners of science (called scientists) are being presented with an aura of knowledge, as the new priests who will pass on to us what science has decreed. Suddenly we need to believe everything that scientists say and when they happen to disagree among themselves, we need to take for truth what the majority of the scientists feel is correct. Here we enter the realm of feelings.

Feelings

Because apparently people were not completely happy with science as their savior, we see in 19th century Romanticism and in the sixties of the last century a longing for more feeling, more sentiment, sensitivity, knowing how things feel like. This is an area not covered by science but it is an essential part of our being nevertheless. So it was embraced by our culture, a culture that by now had excluded God altogether.

Feelings became an objective in itself. Drugs were very helpful in this process. And feelings became the ethical measuring tool in our lives: if it feels good, it must be good. Commerce was happy with this development and uses it to no end: this product makes you feel good (buy it); you deserve it (buy it); you want it (buy it); it makes you happy (so buy it); you like it. . . . .

Hence also the endless number of emotions on our phones. Emotions are what we live by.

Should our feelings be led by our trust in science? We should be weary of this. The question ‘hasn’t science proven it’s worthy of our trust’ is a fallacy, because science is personified here. Science is what’s being practiced by people and not different from anything else that’s being practiced by people, like riding your lawn mower, or working in an office, or . . . fill in your favorite activity. Your lawn mower is not in control and you are not putting your trust in it to take you to the right places. Your trust is in your own capability. So it is with science: it is an art that can be practiced by people. They can be good or bad practicing it, and the better the people are that do it, the better the results. Any feelings related to practicing sciences are not related to the results, but should be related to the people doing the work.

   

God’s Words

Is the enlightenment wrong in telling us that we have the capability to reason? Of course not, but it is the ultimate intention that counts. The christian intention is not a feeling, but an appeal to our God-given reasoning skills. God says: Come now, let us reason together (Isaiah 1:18). The emphasis is on together. God created us in his image, which means we have some of the reasoning capabilities that God has. But we must keep God in the equation and not shut him out. When we do that, we will be healthy in our reasoning. This is called common sense and it starts with God: the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight (Proverbs 9:10).

When the culture tries to reason God away, this is what happens (Romans 1:28): And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.

Is God against feelings? Of course not, but why should we believe in the feelings of scientists? Because feelings have become the norm? In Strong’s Concordance there are only two references to the word feeling. Both were replaced by other words in the ESV translation, but both places are still telling.

Ephesians 4:19 talks about the gentiles who are ‘past feeling’ with the consequence that they ‘have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.’ Note the truth of this in our day and age.

God created us with feelings and all through the Bible we see God’s own feelings. Although God does not have feelings the same way humans do, the Bible does describe Him as having anger, regret, delight and even humor. We see that Jesus our Lord had feelings too. What Jesus does for us is mentioned in the second of Strong’s references, namely Hebrews 4:15. 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. Compare this to the ‘priests’ of science.

Fear

A strong negative feeling is fear. God does not want us to ever have it. According to a Facebook post there are more than 365 times in the Bible that God tells us not to fear: one for each day.

A beautiful remark by Jesus himself is Luke 12:32. Fear not, little flock for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. It summarizes the main reason why we, as weak sheep in a minority (little flock) are nevertheless being led by our own shepherd (Jesus). We are completely safe in His care, because the God and Creator of the universe, whom we may call Father (in Jesus) delights in us and wants to give us his massive kingdom to enjoy forever. If you want to talk about feelings of fear, meditate on this verse.

It may be clear that feelings without the foundation of faith are just that: sensations that are either fleeting or take hold of us. This is fodder for the powers of darkness. Fear can lead to panic and panicking people cannot think straight and are very easy to manipulate. They can be easily put in any kind of bondage. The corona crisis comes to mind again.

God tells us to fear him, but that’s a different kind of fear, related to awe and respect for an all-powerful God. Jesus’ words about this are in Luke 12:4–5: “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him!” But in the same paragraph Jesus said: “Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows”(vs.7). So clearly the fear of God will bring peace in your heart.

In summary we can see that when we have our faith in God and not in science; when we put our trust in Jesus and not in feelings; when we keep God in our thoughts at all times; and realize that ‘no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account’ (Hebrews 4:13), 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 (Hebrews 4:16).

Annemarieke Ryskamp was born and raised in the Netherlands. She graduated with a master’s degree in Dutch Language and Literature from Utrecht University and worked for the Dutch l’Abri and as a secondary school teacher at United World College in Singapore. She was married to Dr. Richard Ryskamp and was widowed in 2015. They raised two sons who are both in graduate studies. The family are members of Dutton United Reformed Church in Dutton, MI.