I Don't Care If Church Makes You Feel Better

I have been in countless church services that ended with a minister asking something like "don't you feel better?" I understand the idea behind the statement. There is a peace and joy that comes from laying your burdens down, but when was it decided that feeling better was the goal of coming into God's house? You may ask why should I even care that such a statement be made, but my reasoning is simple. The world today (and my generation in particular) rely too much on feelings. Ask a young person how they know they are in love and they'll generally respond "I just feel like I am". Ask why they act depressed and it's "I just feel sad". Ask why they engage in certain behaviors and they reply "It feels good".

And what's wrong with relying on feelings? Feelings fade. Having a "good church service" in which you leave feeling better about what ever you are facing is useless when you go home and face the situation again. Being raised Pentecostal (a fact I am incredibly grateful for), I have seen my share of services in which the music is great and people cry and feel relief and we leave saying "The power of God showed up so strong that the preacher didn't even get to preach." And then we leave the church and go to lunch and go about our day and act exactly the way we did the day before. We may have left the church feeling better, but we didn't leave changed. The truth is that the times in which I have truly been in God's presence I didn't feel better, I felt challenged. I have found strength, and peace, and refuge, and a place of rest in Him, but He doesn't reveal Himself so that we can let go of a few tears and feel like we've had a breakthrough. It is impossible to be in His presence and leave unchanged, so when I hear someone say "I felt the presence of God" and yet no change takes place I have to question if they had an encounter or just a feeling.

The second problem with relying on our feelings is that they can easily be induced. I believe that churches often encourage the idea that feeling better meant that something great happened because if we are going by feelings, then we can replicate the situation in which the feelings came about and please the congregation. You often hear worship leaders sing a song because "God moved last time we sang this" and pastors often recycle old sermons because they saw people react in one way or another to it in the past. How dare we make such a mockery of God's presence? We try to "stir up" something in the congregation and pass it off as a move of God, but people leave exactly the way they came.

I say boldly, I don't care if church makes you feel better, I care if you leave God's house changed. I don't care if the sermon hit you where you live and now you feel badly about your lifestyle, I care that you are somewhere in which someone loves you enough to tell you the truth. There is joy and peace that you will find when you live in His presence, but it has nothing to do with how you feel, it has everything to do with what you know. I know that I'm saved not because I feel better but because I am better because He changed my life. If you have been living your life based on your emotions, I invite you today to lay it aside. Emotions fade, truth remains.