Angry With God

Angry With God

The people will declare, “The LORD is the source of all my righteousness and strength.” And all who were angry with him will come to him and be ashamed. –Isaiah 45:24

In the radio interviews I did when my book Holding on to Hope came out, I could always count on one question coming up: Didn’t you get angry with God? Some interviewers seemed very frustrated with me when I told them that I really didn’t get angry. I think they thought I was either being dishonest or trying to be too good to be true.

When we face a devastating loss, fellow believers sometimes encourage us to express our anger freely toward God, assuring us that God understands and accepts our honest emotions. It is a natural response to be angry when you don’t get your way, when something or someone you love is taken away. And God is the easy target for that anger. Because our understanding of his sovereignty is shallow, we reason that if God is in charge of everything, then our suffering must be his fault, and therefore we see our anger as justified.

But wait a minute, where is our fear of God? Why do we think we have a right to be angry with our Creator? Who do we think we are to suggest that God owes us an explanation? What arrogance for us as finite, sinful creatures to disapprove of what God does and what he permits. The fear of God holds our tongue when we want to accuse God of wrongdoing; it halts our defiant finger-wagging; it humbles us in the midst of our self-righteous anger.

Am I saying that being honest with God about how you feel is sinful? No. When we feel it, we might as well admit it since he knows anyway, and hypocrisy only adds to our sin. Am I saying you should never feel angry? No. What I’m saying is that as you work through your feelings about what has happened, and as you inform your feelings by what you know to be true about God, you can reject the temptation to turn your back on God. You can refuse to point a finger in the face of God saying, “You are not good.” Instead of pointing a finger toward God, won’t you open your hands, asking him to meet your desperate need? Won’t you lift your hands to praise him?

Source of all my righteousness and strength, I’m ashamed at how quickly and easily I grow angry and stay angry with you. What arrogance on my part! I humble myself before you and open myself to you.

DIGGING DEEPER