Navigating our Inner World: Proverbs has a lot to say about our relationship with the external world. As we have seen in our study, the wise person is a champion of making peace in relationships, communication, conflict, and other realms of the external world. But where does all this come from? A key and vital part of getting this wisdom and becoming a champion of peace is understanding our emotions in the inner world. Our emotional life has more attention than ever today, but there is still so much struggle and confusion. Proverbs – though written thousands of years ago – has powerful wisdom for understanding our emotional life.

1. The Validity of Our Emotions

No proverb tells us to avoid difficult emotions, that the righteous are never anxious, or that depression is a sign of disobedience to God. What we read is quite the opposite. Proverbs validates our emotions as a core part of humanity alongside our rationality and our will. We see colorful expressions like crushed, rotten, heartsick, strengthening bones, and the tree of life to describe a variety of emotional categories experienced by people walking in wisdom.

Prov 4:23 - “Guard your heart above all else, for it is the source of life.”
Prov 18:14 - “A person’s spirit can endure sickness, but who can survive a broken spirit?”

In Proverbs, we see the heart as the primary place where emotions are experienced. In Hebrew, the heart is the core of a person – where our emotions, reason, and will all interact together. This means that our emotions are not a lesser part of us or on a lower plane as if our thinking and actions were more trustworthy and pure. To ignore our emotions is to ignore our humanity. Wisdom requires that we validate our own emotions and the emotions of others as an essential part of reality.

2. The Complexity of Our Emotions

Even though it was written thousands of years ago, Proverbs doesn’t take a simplistic or reductionistic approach to emotions. Instead, it offers us a nuanced, complex, and true-to-life portrayal of our emotions:

Prov 14:10 - “The heart knows its own bitterness, and no outsider shares in its joy.”
Prov 20:5 - “Counsel in a person’s heart is deep water; but a person of understanding draws it out.”

These proverbs point to the complex and inward nature of our emotions that is not perceptible to others. This means that we need to learn how to identify and express our emotions that are beneath the surface. The picture of a wise person here is able to navigate their emotions and help draw wisdom out of the “deep water” in others. To draw out emotions involves dealing with extremes like bitterness and joy and understanding when something may be lingering beneath the surface that is not always as clear.

Prov 14:13 - “Even in laughter a heart may be sad, and joy may end in grief.”
Prov 25:20 - “Like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured on a wound, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.”
Prov 15:1 - “A gentle tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit.”

One application here is that we may not be able to discern what is going on beneath the surface in others, so we must approach this complexity with gentleness and care. Biblical wisdom calls us not to seek a simple solution for difficult emotions. There are two ways we can err in this regard. One is to give a wrong diagnosis. Another is to apply the wrong cure. In these ways, it is possible to pour vinegar on someone’s wounds, which only causes more pain. Imagine if you had a heavy heart, and someone just told you to pray more fervently. By contrast, a wise tongue is a gentle tongue because wisdom recognizes a whole-person approach to the complexity of emotions.

3. The Intensity of Our Emotions

Prov 25:28 - “A person without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.”
Prov 18:14 - “A person’s spirit can endure sickness, but who can survive a broken spirit?”

The Proverbs remind us that emotions are part of the heart, but they are not meant to rule the heart without bounds. The wise person is called to feel emotions and validate them, but not be ruled by them. This can be difficult because emotions vary in intensity. Our inner life can carry us through physical pain, but we can’t will ourselves out of a broken spirit because we often depend on the resources from within to influence what is outside of us. Self-help strategies might scratch the surface, but they are not ultimately enough to revive a broken spirit.

Prov 14:30 - “A tranquil heart is life to the body, but jealousy is rottenness to the bones.”
Prov 17:22 - “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.”

There is a powerful image in Proverbs related to our emotions, and it centers on the concept of the bones – it’s like we have an inner emotional skeleton. Observe in these proverbs the impact that emotions can have on the “bones” for better or for worse. Our bones are what hold us together, keep us moving through life, and uplift us when we lack strength. This metaphor illustrates the intensity and power of our emotions – when our inner world is strong, we can move out in strength; we feel like we can do anything! But when our inner world is rotten or dried up, we move out into the world fragile and brittle; we feel like we can’t do anything! What can help us navigate such powerful realities?

4. The Healing of Our Emotions

Proverbs gives us two powerful insights for the healing of our emotions:

1) Look to your hope

Prov 13:12 - “Hope delayed makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

Our hope is what we look to when we want to be happy or fulfilled. What you place your hope in ultimately sets the tone for your emotions. Some relevant examples might be your success, wealth, influence, or you’re your children. Consider how you feel when your hope gets delayed and how your emotions fluctuate. If you want to get to the “control center” of your emotions – look to your hope. When you have the thing you hope for, you feel whole and alive. When you don’t get it, you feel heartsick. In a broken world, all hopes will eventually be delayed or disappointed. This is where the tree of life comes in.

The tree of life is only described in the Bible in the books of Genesis, Revelation, and Proverbs. Underneath every difficult or hard emotion is a good desire or hope that points back to the tree of life in Genesis and forward to the new creation in Revelation. The tree of life in Genesis stands for the emotional wholeness we were made to have but lost. The tree of life in Revelation means emotional healing, desires fulfilled and tears wiped away. How do we get back to the tree of life? The Bible says it took another tree. Jesus makes a way back to the tree of life by experiencing the tree of death in our place (see Galatians 3:13 and 1 Peter 2:24). In other words, Jesus experienced the complete emotional breaking of his spirit, the drying up of his bones, and the sickness of his heart to make a way back to the tree of life.

2) Let the good news in

Prov 15:30 - “Bright eyes cheer the heart; good news strengthens the bones.”

This proverb speaks to the power of something outside of us, someone else’s bright eyes or good news they bring, to get inside and strengthen us at the core. We cannot heal our own broken spirits or push out our bad emotions from within ourselves. But good news can get into our bones to give us an emotional skeleton. We won’t disintegrate or fall completely apart even when we are broken. Please hear this: it is not that believing the gospel shields us against emotional struggle or even intense despair. If Jesus experienced grief, pain, suffering, and sadness, how much more will we all? Nevertheless, we are connected us to a larger story, one where death ends in resurrection, darkness in light, and despair in hope. This is our hope. This is the good news.

REFLECT OR DISCUSS

1. What are some ways in which your inner world of emotions are hard to manage or understand?

2. Consider this quote from Allender and Longman (Cry of the Soul) : “Ignoring our emotions is turning our back on reality; listening to our emotions ushers us into reality, and reality is where we meet God.” In what ways have you been tempted to ignore your emotions? What are some ways that this can impact you and others?

3. Do you think it’s more difficult to validate your own emotions or the emotions of another? Why do you think this might be?

4. How are we sometimes tempted to offer simple answers or “solutions” to complex emotional realities? How can this do more harm than good?

5. Can you think of a time where someone wrongly diagnosed your emotions or attempted to provide the wrong solution to your problem? What does it mean to take a whole-person approach to someone else’s problems?

6. The Proverbs use the image of our “bones” to describe how our emotions can hold us up and help us move out into the world or weigh us down and immobilize us. How

7. What happens when we give into the intensity of our emotions? Should we avoid intense emotions altogether? How can we exhibit self-control without being dishonest about our feelings?

8. How does Proverbs tell us we can find healing for damaged or wounded spirit? How does Prov. 13:12 help us get to the source/root of our emotional wounds and hurts? If the Bible doesn’t offer us a way to avoid emotional wounds and pain in this life, what does it offer us?

9. How does Prov. 15:30 tell us we can find strength even in the disappointments/pain of life? How does knowing there is good news outside of my inner world (ie a larger story my story is a part of) help strengthen our inner world?

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