Faith Not Feelings

Some days I go out to my barn to feed the horses and pray. And other days I go to pray and feed the horses. Let me explain.

Some days I don’t feel like praying. I don’t feel like putting my rubber boots on, and walking all the way out there to sit in my dirty, dusty barn. I don’t feel like sitting on the hard, narrow hay loft steps and staring out the window at the big pile of dead limbs that’s been sitting by the back door since July. And I especially don’t like to go out there when it’s very very cold, like today or when it’s very very hot, like the end of August. So on days like that, the reason I go out there is to feed the horses because they need to eat. And while they are eating, I pray. I do this not because I feel like it, but because I know it is the right thing to do.

 
Other times, I rush to get dressed and put on my rubber boots, because I feel a pressing need to be with my Lord. I’m hungry for His presence, I have a lot to pour out to Him, a lot to talk through and I feel a very strong sense of Him drawing me to Himself, to sit at His feet. So the reason I go out to the barn is to pray, but before I pray, I feed the horses.

 
Either way, whether I feel like it or not, I do the right thing and go out to the barn. I pursue intimacy with My Lord in a way that is not controlled by my emotions, but by what my free will knows and understands is right and good and profitable. Sometimes my emotions are in line with what I know is right, and sometimes they are not. And beloved, this is the very reason we cannot base our relationship with Christ on our emotions instead of what His words teach us are the right things to do and the right choices to make.

 
You see, when we are done with this life in the flesh, we will all stand before the One Who created us and give an account of our choices. Our conscious existence does not end when our bodies wear out. Our flesh is a “vessel”, but our consciousness is an “entity” that has been infused with a perpetuity that our flesh does not yet have. Thus, as our basic laws of physics show us, this perpetuity— this energy that makes up our consciousness— does not die, it merely changes form.

 
And one day, every conscious, sentient form will stand before its Creator and give an account of the choices we made with the time and resources we were given. And beloved, there is only one choice that will matter more than all the others: Did we choose Him?

(John 11:25,26) Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

(John 14:23,24) Jesus replied, "Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.”

(2 Cor 5:10) For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad.

(Matt 10:28) Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Instead, fear the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

(Matt 21:28-31) “But what do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first one and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ And the son answered, ‘I will not.’ But afterward, having repented, he went. Then the man went to the second son and told him the same thing. ‘I will, sir,’ said the son, but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted?" "The first," the chief priests and elders answered. And Jesus said to them, "Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you.”

(Posted on Facebook 2/12/2021 Talitha Koum)