Feeling God's Love

[Integrating Editor]

Having this classified under self-improvement frustrates me a bit. I have only once in my life had a fleeting feeling of God's love, and my emotions at that time were seriously unreliable, so I don't know if that was actually coming from God. I've been doing everything the answer suggested for years, except talking to a counselor about God's not giving me certain emotions, and I've come to the conclusion that my relationship with God is intended to be intellectual, not emotional. Fighting him on that one will make me less happy and will be counterproductive. Their advice doesn't work for everyone, and treating the failure to feel God's love as a character flaw is just plain wrong. Perhaps someone might feel that way after sinning, but that is not even close to the only reason. Accepting the intellectual knowledge as sufficient and trusting the Lord that he knows what he is doing may be a far more effective way to obtain peace than fighting for a different relationship with God. My relationship with him is different that most people's, but that doesn't mean it's worse. Or that it's something I should change to improve myself. Also, talking about feeling the Spirit always rubs me the wrong way. I have talked with God through the Spirit, but I have never "felt" anything. Making the default terminology about emotion reinforces the idea that if your relationship with God is not emotional, there is something wrong with you.

[Tally M.]

I think self-improvement usually ends up being our catch-all for advice questions.

[Dragon Lady]

Also, just because it's self-improvement doesn't mean it's the same for another. Not being able to progress in one way doesn't mean that you're bad or sinning. It just means you put your effort in progressing in another way. And it's possible that the people progressing in feeling God's love emotionally can't progress in an intellectual relationship with God.

Or, in other words, I don't think everything classified as self-improvement has to apply to everyone.

But, out of curiosity, how would you have categorized it? (I remember categorizing questions and it was awfully hard. The day Katya retired made me want to weep, because that meant I couldn't just wait for her to categorize all my answers.)

[Haleakalā]

Having this classified under self-improvement frustrates me a bit. I have only once in my life had a fleeting feeling of God's love, and my emotions at that time were seriously unreliable, so I don't know if that was actually coming from God. I've been doing everything the answer suggested for years, except talking to a counselor about God's not giving me certain emotions, and I've come to the conclusion that my relationship with God is intended to be intellectual, not emotional. Fighting him on that one will make me less happy and will be counterproductive. Their advice doesn't work for everyone, and treating the failure to feel God's love as a character flaw is just plain wrong. Perhaps someone might feel that way after sinning, but that is not even close to the only reason. Accepting the intellectual knowledge as sufficient and trusting the Lord that he knows what he is doing may be a far more effective way to obtain peace than fighting for a different relationship with God. My relationship with him is different that most people's, but that doesn't mean it's worse. Or that it's something I should change to improve myself. Also, talking about feeling the Spirit always rubs me the wrong way. I have talked with God through the Spirit, but I have never "felt" anything. Making the default terminology about emotion reinforces the idea that if your relationship with God is not emotional, there is something wrong with you.

If I remember correctly (and I could be wrong) I think I was the one who classified this question, and it was definitely what Tally M said - I just kind of used it because the question was an advice question. I didn't meant to imply anything about the person who asked that question by classifying the question as "self improvement."

[Integrating Editor]

Since the definition of damnation in LDS theology is non-progression, not progressing in a way that people think of as spiritually significant can readily lead to guilt and a sense that it can (and must) be changed. I have actually had people, including a bishop, assume that I must be doing something terribly wrong to be where I am in my relationship with God. Listening to them made me miserable and angry that doing all the things I'm told to in the church didn't give me the relationship I was apparently supposed to have. I saw signs of my earlier frustration in the question asker, so it bothered me that no one from the question asker on questioned that trying to change it was essential. While the reader may benefit from trying, he/she may well be best suited by accepting what hands he/she has been dealt. In my case, I very much feel that God knows what he's doing, and my less typical experiences with God have helped people beyond myself. It does make me feel better that the category was more of a default than anything else. And Dragon Lady, I'd probably put it in religion and nothing more specific.

[vorpal blade]

I think I can relate to the questions of whether it is important to feel God's love and how do we feel it. I've had very similar questions for a long time. But then, I also wonder how important it is to feel anyone else's love, and whether or not I've ever felt loved by anyone in the world. So I wonder, Integrating Editor, have you ever felt that anyone else ever loved you? How did you feel, and how did you know they loved you?

I was recently wondering about this as I read chapter 2 in the Priesthood/Relief Society manual for this year, on the prophet Joseph Fielding Smith. I thought about asking the question in class, so how do we go about feeling more of this love? I didn't ask. Perhaps the chapter will help you clarify your thoughts. I think it helped me a little. http://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of- ... t?lang=eng

The paragraph that got me thinking about it was this

“I sit and reflect at times, and in my reading of the scriptures, I think of the mission of our Lord, what he did for me, and when these feelings come upon me I say to myself, I cannot be untrue to him. He loved me with a perfect love, as he has done for all men, especially those who serve him, and I must love him with all the love I can, even if it is imperfect, which it should not be. It is wonderful. I did not live in the days of our Savior; he has not come to me in person. I have not beheld him. His Father and he have not felt it necessary to grant me such a great blessing as this. But it is not necessary. I have felt his presence. I know that the Holy Spirit has enlightened my mind and revealed him unto me, so that I do love my Redeemer, I hope, and feel it is true, better than everything else in this life. I would not have it otherwise. I want to be true to him. I know he died for me, for you and all mankind that we might live again through the resurrection. I know that he died that I might be forgiven my follies, my sins, and be cleansed from them. How wonderful is this love. How can I, knowing this, do anything else but love him, my Redeemer. I want my boys in the mission fields to feel this same way. I want my children and my grandchildren to feel that way, and never stray from the path of truth and righteousness.”2