Loving What You Do
"And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil" (Jn. 3:19).
Your actions have a psychological impact on your mind. You are going to have affection for what you do. It's human nature. When Jesus came into the world, people rejected him because "their deeds were evil." Their affections just fell in rank with their deeds.
I realize that Jesus taught that the heart is a person's control center. He said, "For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person" (Mk. 7:21-22). But your heart can be distinguished from your affections. Who hasn't done something he did not feel like doing? The point I am making is not that of the Pharisees--that a person can be defiled by something outside of him (cf. Mk. 7:14-15). I am saying that if you do something long enough, you will start to love it.
This principle doesn't have to apply always to sin. Take good deeds, for example. We do not always feel like doing them. But if we ignore the feelings at first, and do what we know we should, eventually the feelings will come around. Thus, C.S. Lewis wrote,
Do not waste time bothering whether you "love" your neighbour; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him. If you injure someone you dislike, you will find yourself disliking him more. If you do him a good turn, you will find yourself disliking him less (Mere Christianity, 1960, p. 116).
When it comes to sin, there is an urgent need to repent, not just because we may run out of time. It is true that we are never guaranteed tomorrow. But unimpeded sin is also dangerous because it changes the way we feel about morality. If we're not careful, we can become hardened past the point of no return (Eph. 4:19; 1 Tim. 4:1-2).
God has recorded his will so that we can rely on revelation, not feelings, for direction. We had better follow the Book, even if it means ignoring our feelings for awhile. Obedience comes first. The affections will warm later.
