Trusting Your Emotions vs. Your Thoughts

In this special excerpt, Ray Leight unpacks some core lies that are hindering the Church right now.

Below are some notes from our Partners-only Monthly Mentoring Session. These sessions have been recorded and you can access them by becoming a Partner today! Find out more at DougAddison.com/TimeOff. 

Ray started off the session by saying that one of the areas where he sees the enemy trying to destroy us (and keep us from knowing who we are) is in these phrases: You can’t trust your heart or You can’t trust your emotions. He hears these phrases all the time.

He has even heard this said: If one of your friends lied to you as much as your emotions do, you would no longer be their friend.

Ray made the point that your emotions are never lying to you. Your emotions are always telling you what you feel. You can—100%—trust your emotions 100% of the time to tell you what you are feeling. They’re not telling you anything else. They’re NOT telling you what’s going on around you (that would be discernment).

But if you’re in the place where you’re triggered by fear, shame or guilt, the information you’re getting doesn’t necessarily mean that’s an accurate report of what’s going on. It means that your emotions are just informing you about what you’re feeling.

What we can’t trust are our thoughts, because our thoughts (most of the time) are manifesting our emotions. That’s why we have to capture every thought and bring it into the light so we can make them obedient to Christ.

One of the most common things Ray has seen by people believing that they can’t trust their hearts (and making their emotions something that are untrustworthy) is that the Church has dissociated from their hearts, and they live from their heads. By doing this, the Church is actually still eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil instead of the tree of life.

When we eat from the tree of knowledge, we try to do what’s right and stay away from wrong, and we become “right-and-wrong robots” instead of followers of Jesus. This is the most common thing Ray sees that’s destroying people.

As a new creation, one of the most destructive lies that you can believe is that you are STILL just a sinner with a wicked heart. That will destroy your walk because then you will really believe that you are JUST a sinner.

Faith always manifests itself, so if you truly believe you’re just a sinner, you will manifest sin. Then what you do is … you start trying to manage your behavior because that’s all you can do. If you’re just a sinner with a wicked heart, then that’s what you’ve got to do—you can’t stop sinning. 

So, what people think they have to do is manage behavior, and managing your behavior is a lifestyle of sin.

Ray made the point that he was not saying to go out and live whatever life you want to live, because righteous grace does not manifest sin. If we can believe who we are, we can live who we are.

So, remember: One of the core lies that’s keeping us stuck and destroying our walk with the Lord is behavioral management. Trying to manage your righteousness with your behavior is a lifestyle of sin.

InLight Connection thanks Ray Leight for sharing his heart with us.

P.S. Thank you to all of those who partner with InLight Connection and give on a regular basis. You are holding their arms up in the spirit right now, and they are truly grateful. For those who have not yet given or it’s been a while, please consider giving now (or partnering monthly) … to help, just click HERE. Becoming a Partner will give you access to the upcoming guest speaker events. These meetings are going to be POWERFUL!

Doug Addison is the founder and president of InLight Connection. Doug is a prophetic speaker, author and coach. He is known for his Daily Prophetic Words, Spirit Connection podcast and blog. He and his wife Linda live in Los Angeles, California where they are impacting the arts, entertainment and media industries.