Suppose you have been outside in extremely cold temperatures, only then to enter the home of a friend who offers you a glass of brandy. A few minutes after drinking it, you become conscious of a feeling of warmth and attribute it to the alcohol. The fact is, the alcohol will actually make you colder. It has for the moment caused your blood vessels to dilate giving you the impression that your body is producing heat. In point of fact, it is losing heat. You may feel you are warming up, but in reality you are cooling down. Your feelings have led you astray. An observer knowledgeable about the effects of alcohol could tell you what was really happening. But if you are relying on your feelings you would reject his conclusions. So, too, in the spiritual realm, feelings can often deceive us as to the true state of affairs. We must have an external reference point or standard of objective truth by which feelings may be evaluated and judged… All subjective states of mind and emotion must be brought under the searchlight of the objective principles of God's written Word.