The Difficulties of Being Different
One of the complications of being a highly sensitive Christian is that most Christian teachers are not highly sensitive, and yet they’re the ones teaching and modeling for us the nitty-gritty of how to live our Christian lives.
Many highly sensitive Christians find themselves becoming increasingly neurotic as they sit under such training. It seems the harder we try to live up to these less sensitive ways of living the Christian life, the further out of reach slips the abundant life promised by Jesus (John 10:10).
Hard-wired entirely differently from less sensitive people, the highly sensitive experience the world in a way that few appreciate. In the church, highly sensitive people are rarely understood – even by themselves. Instead of sensitivity being celebrated and found valuable, as God intended, it is often disapproved as immaturity, defect, or character flaw.
Even among the teachers in the church who are highly sensitive persons, few have come to peace with their high sensitivity and many battle it as if it were an enemy.
Investing Our Sensitivities in the Heart of God
Highly sensitive people have richer senses and usually deeper emotions than their less sensitive counterparts. As highly sensitive believers, we have the potential to invest those deeper emotions and richer senses into our relationship with God, although people who don’t know about sensitivity are understandably unable to tell us that.
The highly sensitive person has an uncommon potential to develop a relational style with God that is strong with emotion – both our own and God’s – and able to sense the intangible Presence of God, emotions of God, and/or communications from God. What a joy to overtly experience the warmth of the love of God for oneself!
Enjoy Your God!
So, enjoy your high sensitivity. Enjoy your God (Psalm 9:2). Dance in His presence (Psalm 149:3). Rejoice (Phil. 4:4). Christ is your life (Col. 3:4). Rest (Heb. 4:9-10). Play (Mark 10:15). Come into His Presence with happy confidence because of Jesus (Heb. 4:16). Drink from the river of His pleasures (Psalm 36:8). Be safe in Him (Psalm 91:1). Respond (Rev. 3:20). Soak in His presence (Rev. 1:10). Thank Him (Psalm 107). Worship (Psalm 29:2). Believe (Matt. 9:28).
Be blessed.
Gail Ruth
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Good Morning Gail.
I am a Highly Sensitive Christian. Recently I got my feelings hurt during a Bible Study and have had a hard time letting go of it. Even to the point of not being able to sleep well. Others seem to enjoy a far about of disagreement and I just cringe and feel hurt. I came right home after that experience and looked online for information and found your website. Thank you so much for your postings that have helped me on my journey to accept and Love my very sensitive self. With his Love, Debbie
Hi Debbie. Thanks so much for your comment. I appreciate the way you write it without calling anyone bad, even though you were hurt.
I went to your website, http://www.PuppetsForMinistry.com and loved it. I’ve always been crazy about puppets. Used to do some puppeteering when I was younger. If anyone wants to make homemade puppets, Debbie has patterns for some nice ones on her site.
Blessings! Gail
I like design of your website What is the name of template ?
I use
Thesis Theme for WordPress. I like it so much that I’m an affiliate for the theme. It gives me a lot more design control than any other theme I’ve found.I really needed this. Recently sermons at church have been hitting me wrong. There have been plenty of ‘do this” or ‘don’t do this’ and a little bit goes a long way for me. About two minutes and then I just feel emotionally hammered. Sooo I’ve been reading poetry- Emily Dickinson is quite delightful.
Good old Emily. I too can only take so much behaviorally-focussed “edification” before I get the heeby-jeebies. Just let me be in a love relationship with God through Jesus and pour out my life as the Holy Spirit leads, and that’s about all I can handle. Blessings!
Gail, I’m a teacher myself. Actually, my class knows I’m not. The Holy Spirit is the teacher, I’m just the T.A. who coordinates. I was reading the posts above of those who have been hurt by a teacher. I’m not sure what those teachers did, but–strangely enough–I have never found that a class member was hurt by direct Scripture, in its true context, and with several related cross-references. We examine these together, and I find I never have to draw a conclusion of “do this” or “don’t do this”. The Holy Spirit does any such convicting or persuading in his own perfect way. Sometimes the Holy Spirit comes upon them and they teach ME. I will say that my pastor feels that one of my weaknesses is my lack of drawing a conclusion from Scripture. I was so glad I found your post about weaknesses earlier tonight. I just found you after praying and then searching the phrase “gifted Christians”. I know the Holy Spirit is opening up some new teaching to me through you.
I bless you, Kevin, in your teaching. Your method sounds wonderful. And I love the language you use of being the Teacher’s assistant. I know many highly sensitive Christians who would love to sit under such teaching as yours where you open scripture and let the Holy Spirit apply it in His perfect way. Non-controlling. No micro-managing. Just like our lovely Holy Spirit.
I do encourage you to not to let yourself be pressured into teaching in a way that is not in your heart. Each person who teaches is solely responsible for what and how he or she teaches. Scriptures tell us (James 3:1) that teachers will be judged more strictly than others. Frankly that makes my hair stand on end each time I think about it. And so I for one am very careful with what I say and how I say it as I teach. It sounds as if you do the same.
Blessings!
Gail
Your intuition is correct about James 3:1. It has made me too afraid to teach anything other than Scripture. If something is my thoughts on a Scripture and not Scripture itself, I make sure the class knows that before I speak it. If the Holy Spirit is using another person to teach me and the class and he brings to my mind the related Scripture, I will (when they finish) ask them to look up that Scripture and read it to the class so they can see that the Word validates the Spirit’s speaking through that person.
I started watching your “Jen” video but didn’t have time to finish it yet. Getting pictures in her head is one fulfillment of Joel 2:28, although she is a young woman, not a “young man”. I want to hear her out later. What has intrigued me at your site is your interest in recognizing and developing of spiritual gifts. I have noticed that not all gifts take on a miraculous or supernatural appearance (mine does not, for example), nor is everything with a supernatural appearance a spiritual gift. Yet we need to find and develop these to function as a church as Jesus intended for us to. So far I have found 39 gifts listed in the OT and NT, but I do not believe the list is closed.
When I talk about gifts in my series, I’m not just referring to spiritual gifts (both the supernatural-looking ones and the less-supernatural-looking ones). I’m also referring to the purely natural gifts that God wove into us as part of our created design. But who truly understands where the one end and the other begin? “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights…” (James 1:17). Blessings!