By Mako A. Nagasawa, June 3, 2026
This post is part of the Obsculta Preaching Series, sponsored by the Obsculta Preaching Initiative at Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary.
It is imperative that we teach on the emotions of Jesus – not just the actions of Jesus or the words of Jesus, but the emotions of Jesus. Why? Positively, because we can share in Jesus’ emotions, as the apostle Paul felt “the tender affections of Christ Jesus” towards the Philippians (Phil.1:8). Negatively, because we can easily get caught up in doing, saying, and thinking “the right things” without being emotionally connected to Jesus. And doing that leaves us emotionally isolated and vulnerable.
In ordinary times, we often feel fear and jealousy towards people. I think we live in extraordinary times. Political and media voices encourage us to not just fear certain people, but to feel disgust towards them, savor the delicious taste of seeing opponents fail or publicly mocked, enjoy the snobbery of being right, and long for a past that may or may not have even existed. In addition, social media algorithms feed our outrage and anxieties.
Jesus felt none of those emotions, and it is important to explain, up front, why we can know that and say that. Jesus’ emotional resources to love appear to be unlimited. He shared in our human nature and understands our weaknesses, but did not sin (Heb.2:10; 4:14–16). For Jesus constantly entrusted himself to the Father who sent him and led him by the Spirit; his openness to the Father’s infinite love made him “the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being” in human form (Heb.1:3). Rather than fall into self-protection or self-aggrandizing, Jesus stamped his faithfulness upon his own human nature to purify and perfect it, and to be “the source of salvation” for us (Heb.5:7–10; 12:1–2). For instance, Jesus’ own mortality did not stop him from “the joy set before him” in resurrection (Heb.12:2). Thus, Jesus seeks to share and nurture in us his own emotions, as we share in his Spirit.
In his parables of the lost things – the shepherd seeking the lost sheep, the woman seeking the lost coin, and the father seeking his lost sons (Luke 15:1–32) – Jesus clearly wanted to persuade the “Pharisees and scribes” of his perspective and heart. They criticized Jesus for “eating with tax collectors and sinners.” Jesus shared the parables so that they – and we – could know our own emotional lives, understand why we feel what we feel, experience Jesus’ emotional connection with us, grasp his own emotions, and allow him to reshape and heal our emotions via his own emotions.
I preached from these passages often during my time as a campus minister, in my church, and in other settings. They remind me and others what “lost” means to Jesus, how Jesus sought them out, and how he leads us by his Spirit today.
On the one hand, the lesson was simple. Jesus feels about lost people how we feel about things and relationships that we lose. And Jesus celebrates finding those people. To “get into” the stories Jesus told, I ask people to recall a time they lost something important. I told a story about a time my house was broken into, and how the thief stole my wife’s engagement ring which she had left on the bedside stand: the ring that had been my grandmother’s engagement ring, which she had given to me so I could propose to my wife. I was heartbroken and furious. Over time, I accepted our loss and let go.
On the other hand, the lesson was not simple. Jesus never gave up on people. He kept searching for people. There were emotional differences between Jesus and me. What do I do with those differences as I preach Luke 15?
To the best of my ability to discern, this emotional difference is appropriate. I could not and should not pine away forever over a material object, even a family heirloom with sentimental value. We should not pine away after an old boyfriend or girlfriend. Even when a loved one passes away or deserts us, we may never fully escape the grief, but we do have to invest in the people who remain. And the grief does become less sharp because we make more internal space for love and joy.
But the emotional difference between Jesus and us is striking, and the reasons for it even more so. Why does Jesus keep searching for people? Why does he keep feeling the loss “until he finds” them (v.3, 8)?
First, because Jesus cannot and does not replace a person with another person or thing. Jesus’ three parables of Luke 15 point to that. Even one lost sheep out of a hundred was valuable for its wool, milk, and potential progeny and meat. One lost coin out of ten diminishes the value of all ten, because the ten came as a set, in a necklace or headpiece as a dowry gift. One lost son, to a loving father who has a vision for his family, cannot be replaced. To Jesus, every single person is unique and irreplaceable. In fact, his relationship with that person extends beyond their death. Perhaps even their experience of eternity – as either increasing joy or resentment – will be rooted in Jesus’ love and pursuit of themselves and others, as C.S. Lewis suggested in his book, The Great Divorce. Whatever the case, Jesus moved with great unhurried intentionality to develop people who felt his feelings towards others.
Second, because Jesus’ emotional resources to love are infinite. And, as the Marvel character Vision said in WandaVision, “What is grief, if not love persevering?” Jesus does not protect himself from feeling the loss. He does not distract himself, or self-medicate. He wept over Jerusalem (Lk.19:41–44). He wept angrily that death and sin took Lazarus and distressed his sisters (Jn.11:20–44). Our emotional resources, however, are finite. And we need to learn to lament in the true sense – as a spiritual discipline. Lament helps us truly love. Lament helps us sustain evangelistic love. Lament helps us sense God rejoicing.
We begin to glimpse in Jesus’ emotional life why he chose to not indulge certain other emotions. Jesus did not fear people. He did not feel disgust towards them, either. The father certainly imagined, then saw, then smelled, the residue of mud, pig, and human matter on his younger son who had not bathed in a long time; but the father hugged him tightly anyway. Jesus’ love made disgust for persons impossible. Jesus did not relish his opponents’ defeats or feel self-satisfied. Those feelings are incompatible with his love, because his feelings were – and are – for us, and for our highest good in him.
In these days, when we are so easily manipulated emotionally towards low goals, with little to no value in virtue, we need to hold up our own emotions to Jesus’ and meet him in them. We must call others to do the same. We need his emotions to reshape and heal ours. In our preaching, perhaps we might linger in those places we find Jesus showing emotions, sharing emotions, or commenting on our emotions. We need to not shame ourselves or other people for having emotions. Rather, we need to honor emotions as part of the imago dei and as one of the connections between divinity and humanity that Jesus himself inhabited, healed, and dignified.
Mako Nagasawa is the Executive Director of The Anástasis Center for Christian Education and Ministry, where he and his team teach and train about Christian restorative justice and Jesus’ healing atonement. He has lived in Christian intentional community with his wife and kids for 26 years. He serves on the leadership team of Neighborhood Church of Dorchester. He earned an MTS from Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Seminary in 2019.
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