The Pain Principle

To overcome our dependence on systematic sins for relief from emotional pain, we must avoid reoccurring emotional pain that opens separation from God. We prevent reoccurring emotional pain from happening by replacing emotional disabilities with emotional abilities. Emotional disabilities from adverse reactions to emotional injuries include hate, unresolved grief, unprovoked anger, impatience, meanness, evil intentions, unfaithfulness, harshness, and undisciplined behavior. The fruit of the Holy Spirit are the emotional abilities that we need to nurture God-pleasing priorities, values, and behavior. Emotional abilities prevent self-serving ego, anger, and greed from disrupting fellowship with God. The fruit of the Holy Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. When we have God-pleasing emotional abilities, our emotional and spiritual growth experiences overcome adverse reactions to emotional injuries. The emotional injuries continue to occur, but our response as followers of Jesus Christ avoids reoccurring emotional pain. We experience emotional renewal that defeats emotional pain when our love for God becomes the humility and compassion we show in our relationships with others.