Faithbase

Hey, Elias here. I wanted to talk today about emotional strongholds and being healthy emotionally is very important. Healthy emotions are to the soul what the senses are to the body. They reveal the way we feel about life circumstances but some people are in prison by negative emotions. These people don't just have a bad day once in a while which happens to all of us, rather they feel as if they're trapped and as if they can't escape and as if their very life is being choked out of them. When they wake up in the morning they don't say good morning Lord, no instead they say good Lord it's morning. It's they struggle to survive you know they may feel helpless and hopeless and worthless and I use the word stronghold because anger, depression, worries, stress and low self-esteem or they're all spiritual issues and they must be overcome spiritually. When we get the spiritual component right we won't be enslaved by emotions and some emotions not tied to stronghold can be linked to physiological causes such as a chemical imbalance. However, most emotional strongholds don't spring from psychological causes or physiological causes rather they stem from sin either your own or someone else's. For example you might struggle with the emotions of guilt, shame or regret because of the wrong choices you made or because you may have suffered abuse, betrayal or rejection. In these cases the stronghold of fear, insecurity or worry didn't come from your own sin but from others and emotional strongholds can even result in what we can call atmospheric sin. This happens when sin clouds our atmosphere around us and affects us regardless of whether we actively participate in it or not. This is often the case with greed, social irresponsibility, injustice, racism and so on and these can lead to emotional strongholds just as secondhand smoke can lead to lung cancer. In an environment that is rife with sin people are often likely to suffer emotional strongholds believe it or not. People who find themselves enslaved to their emotions may deny the problem exists or they may use pills, entertainment, sex or even money to distract themselves from the real issues causing their emotional discomfort. But I want to help you discover the root behind what these people are experiencing what you who are listening may be experiencing this. So I want you to look beyond your feelings so you can discover and address the causes of emotional strongholds and overcome them. God did not create you to be imprisoned by emotional strongholds rather he promised you a lot of full life. As Jesus said, I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. John 10 10. He has not called you to live each day in defeat. He wants you to know and trust that he is in control of all things and that he is watching over your entire life. He is sovereign. If you're not experiencing the abundant life Christ freely gives now is the time to overcome your emotional stronghold any stronghold. Turn to him and ask him to reveal the areas where emotional stronghold may have set in. He wants to show you how to see past your sorrow and how to view your life from his vantage point. From where you stand right now life may look small yet from where God is seated all is well. And when we overcome emotional strongholds we let go our need to understand everything right now and we trust God to make a miracle out of our messes out of other people's messes. And remember emotions don't think they merely respond. It's a reaction thing reactionary type of response that we're doing and emotions have to borrow thoughts in order to stimulate any feelings that we feel from them. Therefore look this is what here's what I'm trying to say. Whatever controls your thoughts also controls how you feel. For example if you were weighed down with the worry of bills and stressed up that payments are coming up that have been piled up you have been laid off work or you saw no way out of your financial circumstance or chaos your emotions would be to respond on how you were thinking to the situation. But if I handed you a check for $500,000 well let's just say your emotions would completely change. That's because our emotions follow our thoughts. You can overcome emotional strongholds by mastering and controlling and taking captive of your thoughts. When you align your thoughts with God's truth you will be for certain be free because those who trust and believe in Jesus Christ are free indeed.