I recently chatted with a godly young woman in her 20s about what the Lord was teaching us. She pondered a question aloud: “What if I don’t feel like changing, or being obedient, or acting kind? Should I do something when my heart’s not in it? Isn’t that being fake?”
I appreciated her honesty. It’s a question worth grappling with, and it’s become a common one as our culture kneels at the altar of authenticity. Even those of us who know the answer can admit we struggle to apply it.
The simple answer according to the Bible is that being kind when we don’t feel kind isn’t being inauthentic—it’s an act of love. No lack of integrity is in play. Instead, the fruit of the Spirit is bursting forth from our lives when we act in accordance with the nature of Christ rather than with our sin nature.
What About Our Feelings?
A generation that rightly values emotional health may scoff at the suggestion that our feelings aren’t a factor. Didn’t Jesus condemn the Pharisees for hypocrisy when they obeyed the law but not from the heart? So how should Christians understand the relationship between authenticity and obedience?
When we don’t feel like obeying, the answer isn’t to disobey, nor is it to dismiss our feelings. Emotional honesty and godly obedience aren’t opponents in a tug-of-war—they’re on the same team. The psalms make it clear that God calls us to come to him not with pasted-on smiles but with appropriate sighs and questions. He gathered the tears of the psalmist (Ps. 56:8), and he welcomed my younger friend’s vulnerable question.
Emotional honesty and godly obedience aren’t opponents in a tug-of-war—they’re on the same team.
The Pharisees, on the other hand, weren’t emotionally honest. Most were fakers, trying to hide their sins and appear righteous before men. Their hidden motives warranted censure from Jesus. But when one of them came by night to ask honest questions, the Teacher welcomed him, and that’s what he does for us (John 3:1–15).
God wants the “real you” so he can transform it into the “real you” he created you to be. When a funk of irritation, selfishness, lust, or sloth settles in and it’s hard to obey, we should pray honest prayers: “Here’s my heart, Lord, with all its entanglements and temptations. Help!” Our Father answers that cry, forgiving us and empowering us to do what he’s called us to do. Then in faith, we move our hands or feet or words or thoughts down the path of obedience. That’s honest Christianity.
True to the New Self
But even if we’re being emotionally honest, is obeying God when we don’t feel like it inauthentic? The trendy but tricky word “authentic” is about being genuine and true to yourself. As Christians, we should ask which self we mean—the old or the new?
In Ephesians 4:22–24, Paul instructs the church, “Put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and . . . be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and . . . put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.”
Being true to the new self often means rejecting selfish urges and inclinations that feel like comfy old blankets. It means helping someone when we feel like curling up in a ball of self-pity, expressing gratitude when we feel like complaining, and serving when we’d rather be served. These choices are beautifully unnatural to the old self but completely authentic to the new self as we grow in Christlikeness.
Although we’re being “transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory” (2 Cor. 3:18, NIV), we won’t be fully perfected until heaven, and our first inclinations in this life will often be to “not feel like it.” Parents don’t wait for toddlers to feel like obeying before they train them to do what’s right. Feelings don’t have to precede actions.
Scripture teaches that denying our own will in favor of God’s is proof of faith and maturity (Luke 9:23). That means the grinding of gears we often experience as we follow God’s commands isn’t cause for questioning our authenticity—it’s a reason to celebrate. We’re moving in the right direction.
God Will Help Us Feel like It
Obedience to God doesn’t produce lifeless religion, dry as tree bark. Jesus promises the opposite: rivers of living water will flow from our hearts (John 7:38). As we make difficult, unnatural choices to honor Christ by the power of his Spirit, we begin to love what he loves.
In one of the most encouraging passages for struggling sinners, Philippians 2:13 assures us that God works in us “to will and to work for his good pleasure.” God helps us not only to obey him but to want to obey him. From his storehouse of riches in glory, he generously provides the new inclinations we can’t drum up on our own (4:19).
God helps us not only to obey him but to want to obey him.
In his grace, God called us to come to him even when we didn’t feel like it. The One who intercepted our sprint toward hell welcomes us into his presence through Jesus. Now, every time we struggle with our crooked hearts and warped inclinations, we can run to him for love, help, power, and comfort. As we confess our sins and failures, he gathers us up, reminds us of who we are, and shows us the right way to go. Heeding that voice is authenticity at its best.
The Gospel Coalition