Emotions

It occurred to me yesterday that I am a person who is greatly effected by emotion. My responses to others come out of my emotions, my outlook comes out of emotions, my faith(or lack of) is a result of my emotions-it all comes from what I allow to control my emotions. I have noticed that those around me influence me easily in this area. If someone has great faith for something, I catch on very easily and quickly and believe God for something amazing to occur, but if I am around someone who has little faith or is quite negative, I quickly might find myself becoming the same.

I know that we can guard our hearts against this great influence, and I'm determined to seek the face of God for strategy and help in doing this. I will become the influencer, not the influenced.

Today, I was reading in Matthew 14: 13-14 where Jesus goes away to a quiet place after the death(beheading) of John the Baptist. I can only assume he has gone away to mourn and contemplate the death of this great man of God. So, Jesus goes away to a "quiet" place only to find that the multitude had followed him out there. Now, I know my response to this would be a fleshly response similar to: "can't I just get a minute of quiet time to myself??!!!", but Jesus' response was the complete opposite. He was moved with compassion on the crowd and He healed their sick.

I want to be more like Jesus today-so selfless that regardless of life's circumstances, He was moved by those who needed the Love of God and healing in their lives. Not ruled by emotion, but instead ruled by the unconditional love of Christ.