My Struggle with Emotionalism
One of the hallmarks of Church life growing up, was that as Christians we were supposed to experience the "Joy of the Lord". I grew up in a Charismatic-Baptist-Pentacostal-Wannabe church and regularly witnessed people being "Slain in the spirit", speaking in "tongues", and exhibiting the vast array of emotional behaviours, from laughing uncontrollable, to lying face-down while sobbing profusely.
With so many emotions going on all over the place, it was easy to make the connection in my brain: emotionalism equaled spirituality. If one were not overcome with emotion during a Sunday morning service, then that meant that he was not "tuning in" to the Spririt of God, who was obviously present due to the wide range of emotionalism exhibited in others at that very same service. A non-emotional response meant that you were detached from God - and needed to somehow cause yourself to cry or laugh in order to join in the "move of the Spirit". That was how I grew up.
There were some obvious consequences of such understanding, naturally. Women tended to be regarded as more "Spiritual" than men. Women enjoyed the service more than men, were more easily moved to tears than men, and thus were "closer to God" than men. There were exceptions of course, but generally all the spiritual people were women. We knew this to be an issue, of course, and I remember congregants discussing the reasons why the men of the church were not as spiritual as the women and things we might do to change that.
During all this time, I was a teenage-male whose only emotional outbursts were ones of frustration and anger... clearly not spiritual in the least.
But, unlike other men who had no other option, I discovered that I could be slain in the spirit. And when I was slain in the spirit, I could exhibit emotions even without feeling them. I could easily cry and laugh, but it wasn't under my own control. I was under the control of someone who I thought was God, and since the physical reaction was one of emotional display, I figured this was God working in me - demonstrating to the world that I was indeed spiritual. The more I cried and laughed uncontrollably, the more I thought that God was "touching me".
All this led me to an uncomfortable reality, though, because deep inside, I knew that it was all phony. Not that the power affecting me was only a product of my own imagination, it really was a real power. But I somehow knew that if it was God who was actually touching me, then I should feel something more. But instead, it was all physical manifestations without any of the inner work that I knew should be present as well.
That was over twenty years ago. Now I've left that life completely behind and have been received into the Holy Orthodox church. Even though that emotionalism is in my past, I still struggle with it. It has been on my mind lately as to why it was so easy for me to be deceived into a false spirituality. And I think I have an answer.
One of the hallmarks of Protestant Evangelicalism is that when you became "Born again", you accepted Christ's forgiveness, and now your legal status before God is one of being righteous. You are not actually righteous, but the great thing is that God looks at you through the righteousness of Christ and views you as righteous. Because you are now viewed as righteous by God, you will go to heaven when you die. The upshot of all this is that there is nothing that you can do that will cause God to view you as unrighteous - Christ has forever changed God's opinion of you. This is an odd mixture of classic Calvinism and Free Will - you are free to choose God, but once you do you are locked in forever. That is why it is so important for evangelicals to get people to say the sinners prayer. Even if they go back to their old life and forget God, as long as they were sincere at the time, they've got their ticket in heaven.
This all sounds great, except that it's not the teaching of any Church earlier than 200 years ago, yet somehow this has become the predominant understanding of salvation throughout North America, at the very least. Regardless, the first generation of those who held to this view were very thrilled to be "saved" out of other dead "high church" denominations. Knowing there's no need for legalism, knowing that we are saved for sure, knowing that it is Christ's righteousness that will get us into heaven, not ours.
But...
There's the next generation. My generation. Try growing up in a culture which tells you it doesn't matter what you do, you are saved and you are going to heaven. Why? Because you said the sinner's prayer at some point in history and you are locked in. What kind of behaviours does that logic lead a young teenager to have? Clearly if there is nothing we can do to earn our salvation, then we can do whatever we want and still have salvation.
At this point there are two paths one can follow: become completely worldly and throw one's self into a life of sin, or continue going to Church but struggle with what the point is all about - what does going to Church accomplish? I chose the latter because I knew in my heart that it was wrong to sin. And ultimately, the congregation was filled with people who chose the latter. What do you do at a service when it ultimately doesn't matter? Answer: get something out of it.
But what can you possibly get out of it? Good teaching? Sure, that's possible. But there must be something else. What is it people want? They want to be emotionally stirred. Our entire entertainment industry is focused on stirring people's emotions. A movie is great if it stirs your emotions. A song is great if it stirs your emotions. That means that a worship service is great if it stirs your emotions and , ultimately, an experience at church is good if it stirs your emotions. Emotionalism is entertaining. It's an experience that is enjoyable - even if the emotion itself is not considered a positive one. And that is what people wanted to get out of church. That is why experience became the number one sought after result by going to Church. Sure, you can be a Christian by yourself at home, but if you don't come to Church you'll be missing the experience.
And that is how I grew up. And that is what I am struggling to un-learn. Sure, if you were already an adult when you entered into that environment you can probably easily stop thinking that way. But if you grew up in that environment it is very hard to separate yourself from it.
I am learning every day that spiritual does not equal emotional. That church is not something that exists to suit our purpose. And that ultimately what I do in this physical life does matter. That last one is my deepest struggle. Oh, how I struggle with it.
With so many emotions going on all over the place, it was easy to make the connection in my brain: emotionalism equaled spirituality. If one were not overcome with emotion during a Sunday morning service, then that meant that he was not "tuning in" to the Spririt of God, who was obviously present due to the wide range of emotionalism exhibited in others at that very same service. A non-emotional response meant that you were detached from God - and needed to somehow cause yourself to cry or laugh in order to join in the "move of the Spirit". That was how I grew up.
There were some obvious consequences of such understanding, naturally. Women tended to be regarded as more "Spiritual" than men. Women enjoyed the service more than men, were more easily moved to tears than men, and thus were "closer to God" than men. There were exceptions of course, but generally all the spiritual people were women. We knew this to be an issue, of course, and I remember congregants discussing the reasons why the men of the church were not as spiritual as the women and things we might do to change that.
During all this time, I was a teenage-male whose only emotional outbursts were ones of frustration and anger... clearly not spiritual in the least.
But, unlike other men who had no other option, I discovered that I could be slain in the spirit. And when I was slain in the spirit, I could exhibit emotions even without feeling them. I could easily cry and laugh, but it wasn't under my own control. I was under the control of someone who I thought was God, and since the physical reaction was one of emotional display, I figured this was God working in me - demonstrating to the world that I was indeed spiritual. The more I cried and laughed uncontrollably, the more I thought that God was "touching me".
All this led me to an uncomfortable reality, though, because deep inside, I knew that it was all phony. Not that the power affecting me was only a product of my own imagination, it really was a real power. But I somehow knew that if it was God who was actually touching me, then I should feel something more. But instead, it was all physical manifestations without any of the inner work that I knew should be present as well.
That was over twenty years ago. Now I've left that life completely behind and have been received into the Holy Orthodox church. Even though that emotionalism is in my past, I still struggle with it. It has been on my mind lately as to why it was so easy for me to be deceived into a false spirituality. And I think I have an answer.
One of the hallmarks of Protestant Evangelicalism is that when you became "Born again", you accepted Christ's forgiveness, and now your legal status before God is one of being righteous. You are not actually righteous, but the great thing is that God looks at you through the righteousness of Christ and views you as righteous. Because you are now viewed as righteous by God, you will go to heaven when you die. The upshot of all this is that there is nothing that you can do that will cause God to view you as unrighteous - Christ has forever changed God's opinion of you. This is an odd mixture of classic Calvinism and Free Will - you are free to choose God, but once you do you are locked in forever. That is why it is so important for evangelicals to get people to say the sinners prayer. Even if they go back to their old life and forget God, as long as they were sincere at the time, they've got their ticket in heaven.
This all sounds great, except that it's not the teaching of any Church earlier than 200 years ago, yet somehow this has become the predominant understanding of salvation throughout North America, at the very least. Regardless, the first generation of those who held to this view were very thrilled to be "saved" out of other dead "high church" denominations. Knowing there's no need for legalism, knowing that we are saved for sure, knowing that it is Christ's righteousness that will get us into heaven, not ours.
But...
There's the next generation. My generation. Try growing up in a culture which tells you it doesn't matter what you do, you are saved and you are going to heaven. Why? Because you said the sinner's prayer at some point in history and you are locked in. What kind of behaviours does that logic lead a young teenager to have? Clearly if there is nothing we can do to earn our salvation, then we can do whatever we want and still have salvation.
At this point there are two paths one can follow: become completely worldly and throw one's self into a life of sin, or continue going to Church but struggle with what the point is all about - what does going to Church accomplish? I chose the latter because I knew in my heart that it was wrong to sin. And ultimately, the congregation was filled with people who chose the latter. What do you do at a service when it ultimately doesn't matter? Answer: get something out of it.
But what can you possibly get out of it? Good teaching? Sure, that's possible. But there must be something else. What is it people want? They want to be emotionally stirred. Our entire entertainment industry is focused on stirring people's emotions. A movie is great if it stirs your emotions. A song is great if it stirs your emotions. That means that a worship service is great if it stirs your emotions and , ultimately, an experience at church is good if it stirs your emotions. Emotionalism is entertaining. It's an experience that is enjoyable - even if the emotion itself is not considered a positive one. And that is what people wanted to get out of church. That is why experience became the number one sought after result by going to Church. Sure, you can be a Christian by yourself at home, but if you don't come to Church you'll be missing the experience.
And that is how I grew up. And that is what I am struggling to un-learn. Sure, if you were already an adult when you entered into that environment you can probably easily stop thinking that way. But if you grew up in that environment it is very hard to separate yourself from it.
I am learning every day that spiritual does not equal emotional. That church is not something that exists to suit our purpose. And that ultimately what I do in this physical life does matter. That last one is my deepest struggle. Oh, how I struggle with it.