Healing For Damaged Emotions

April 21, 2017

Healing For Damaged Emotions

Give your burdens to the Lord,

    and he will take care of you.

    He will not permit the godly to slip and fall.

Psalm 55:22

In Psalm 55, King David was distressed because of the betrayal of a trusted friend. The fallout from the deceit within the inner courts of the King had spread throughout Jerusalem. This personal lament of David challenges us because the norms of our Western culture teach us to conceal our deepest thoughts and emotions. If our national leaders chose to bear their souls with such a lament, their fall from power would be spectacular. Even so, we can learn much from David.

In counseling sessions, the therapist helps their client dig deep into the recesses of their memories and process buried emotions. The process can be painful, especially if the memories have been long-repressed. However, there is healing for damaged emotions when the memories are opened to the light of God’s unconditional and redeeming love.

When Jesus said that “unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew 18:3), he may have been thinking of King David. David models complete honesty with himself as he takes his lament to God. David confesses his strong feelings of both fight and flight in response to the betrayal of his friend, and he also bears his deep emotional hurt to God.

Perhaps one of the best lessons we can take from David’s psalms is to own our need to explore our deepest emotions. Take a leap of faith, heed David’s affirmation, and trust God with your fears, hates and anxieties; “Give your burdens to the Lord, and he will take care of you” (Psalm 55:22a).

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.