Angry at the world? Angry at God?

10/07/2013 13:16

If someone tell's you that its wrong to be angry ask them if they can switch off such emotions. And then pray for them because they are clearly a psychopath and incapable of understanding emotional concepts.

 

  Please read the whole book of Ruth. It's all of about 4 pages I'm sure it'll take you all day. lol.

 

  There is a myth, flying around all of Christendom that to be angry is to somehow be in sin. Like anger in itself is an emotion that will drag us, often biting, punching kicking and screaming into hell. I have one word for this attitude. BULL! 

 

  Did Jesus ever get angry. You'd better believe he did. He got so angry with the greedy money lenders and those selling sacrificial animals at the temple for upwards of five times their value, that Jesus overturned tables and made a whip out of rope to beat the people and animals out of his Father's house. Did he ever sin? No. So to be angry is not sinful. What we do with this emotion however, can be.

 

  We are later told that in our anger we are not to fall into sin. Ah, now that's interesting. We have nearly all lost someone, we have nearly all had something taken from us. We are all suffering every single day angry in our circumstances. I'm angry that we have to live in this way. I'm angry that it's been 2000 years now and Jesus has not yet come back. I'm angry that the snakes have taken the throne room in the UK and that my country is heading into a future of outrage, disgrace and disaster described in Deuternomy 28, because there are no wise people working for the government. I'm angry that the same government presumes to write laws and enact them that remove established civil, family and societal liberties upon which the UK was founded. If somehow I could, I'd be tempted to burn this whole world to ashes. But I can't, and I wouldn't. This way in my anger I am not in sin.

 

  We are also told not to let the sun set on our anger but to approach the transgressor and dialogue with them in order to put it to bed before you put yourself there.

 

  I'm angry at God. God bears all of these frustrations of mine. Through my pride, my reasoning and my bitternes. Thanks in full to the grace of the Holy Spirit I am still able to glorify the Father even through all of this. We are to bring glory to the Lord. That is the meaning of life in a nut shell. So how do you glorify God when your children are kidnapped from you, or your father has been diagnosed with terminal cancer or your sister was raped and is now begging you to sit and help her to pick up the peices, or your car gets stolen, or you husband beats you daily, or your children have gotten involved with organised crime, or your government allows your boss to sack you because you wear a cross to work, or you are being sued because you hold Christian values which now conflict with those of Brussels in the EU or your own government locally. How do you glorify the Father through any or perhaps even all of that and more? 

 

  "Jesus is enough." 

 

  It's a barely audible whisper at the beginning. We don't even know where the thought came from but it was there and it gets slightly louder.

 

  "Jesus is enough."

 

  "No he's not!" You cry in your suffering, through the tears of your rage and indignation. If he was here right now THEN Jesus would be enough. If I could physically touch him I would be able to discuss this further and explain how he has transgressed against me. (please hear the inference of pride in that last sentence. It is impossible for God to transgress or to do wrong) Then I wouldn't have to feel so alone in this sick little world of nearly 7 Billion people. Out of all those people I probably know about 130 well enough to call them by their name and only about 10 I'd share any idea of my feelings with and about 2 I'd tell my problems and even then I wouldn't tell them everything. "How can Jesus be enough!" You shout. "God is soverign over everything, why did he allow this sick world to cause me such harm? How can I suffer so much pain when God is so Good?" 

 Naomi, struggled with these very emotions. Ruth was incredibly loyal, and all the Pastors and Preachers focus on Ruth. They seem to avoid Naomi, unless it is to look down a self important and Hypocritical nose with a heart of fearful judgementalism. Naomi is incredibly, no, Brutally honest with us about our own lives and our own hearts. She can truly say that she knows what it means to suffer in this world of loss, grief and dispair. In that she shows us our own lack of humility, our pride, our self indulgent dispondency.

 

She lost her home, her husband, both of her son's and lived in times of famine and hardhip and then as a widow. She suffered so much that she changed her name. She no longer wanted to be called Naomi which means pleasentness. She chose the name Mara, which means Bitterness. Ruth comforted her as only a surrogate daughter could in a time when she had her whole family ripped from her life. Ruth stayed, foresaking potentially marrying a wealthy man of her own country of Moab in order to return with Mara back to Bethlehem. If you are suffering in your life in whatever kind of way I defy you to read the book of Ruth, possibly the best written book in the Bible, and not be moved by her story. Desperation is written into every word of the first 2 chapters. So was Jesus enough for them even then? BC!

 

  Yes. For Naomi and Ruth, Naomi losing her husband and two sons, Ruth losing her husband, they found a sweetness in each others company by the grace of God. They were able to share their anger and upset at the Lord and at there circumstances together. Their bond was as unbreakable as a loving mother and Daughter by blood. Without Ruth, Naomi (Mara) would have suffered in her singleness also. She makes the point that she was too old now to get married. It was more or less unheard of for women to work back then and would have certainly been frowned upon. If a woman was a widow or if a child was an orphan they wouldn't work so much as forage. This goes back even further to the Law of Tything. You were supposed to give 10% of all you grew (The first fruits of your harvest) To the Lord. You were to take that part which was yours, you were also to leave some for the widows and orphans to pick for themselves so that they could eat even if they had no money. The Lords early benefit system, before the Nanny state took over.

 

  I imagine Naomi locked in the depths of despair. We would diagnose it now as depression. I imagine her suffering so much pain that she became numb to life and could do nothing but sleep and weap or just coldly stare into space. Praise the Lord for Ruth and all people like her, who stood by her through her suffering. Not only did she loyally stay by her Mother in law, but she went out and gathered enough food for them both to survive. 

 

  Can you see Jesus in this? Naomi-Mara, lost everything. Yet by just a handful of grace was she able to survive. By gifting Naomi with Ruth God was able to provide for her needs as she suffered in her grief. Did she sin? Is it wrong to feel the emotions that God gives to us? Don't forget that God feels pain, and anger and wrath and love and sadness and insult and woe. God despared at having made us once. This is why Noah was called upon to build the Ark.

  We are image bearers of God. We are made fully in his likeness. When Satan told Eve that by eating the fruit from the tree she would become like God, he lied. Human beings (Apart from Jesus) Have never been so alike God as we were in the garden until she bit into that fruit. Is it wrong to feel anger and angst, torment and pain and to express those emotions? No, in fact it's healthy, if you can channel those feelings to avoid sinning in your anger.

 

  So can we be angry with God? The answer is yes, we all CAN. Should we be? 

 

  I'm going to say, no. However, if we feel hurt or upset with the state of our lives and as loving Christian children we have come to the father cup in hand and asked him to nourish us. If he says not yet or no and leaves us hurt, wondering why there is so much wrong in the world and suffering, we are very likely to become angry with God. In this state we need to be extremely careful. There is one who is adverse to Gods commands. He comes and he intercedes, not on our behalf, but on his own. He points to that rage and shows it to God. He accuses us of pride, of lust, of envy, of greed. He accuses us of hatred and enmity. He is called Satan (The accuser) If we feel angry with God there is little we can do. I'm yet to meet a person yet who can fully control their emotions. 

  Yet we are not to allow the sun to set on our Anger. In our life times we can all (If Christian) state the Jesus has always welcomed us with open loving arms. The Holy spirit Guides us and speaks to us, through the Bible, through dreams occassionally audibley and always to the Glory of the Father. It is at times of bleak hardship that we are often most inclined towards the Lord. How sad is that? That some of us only come to the father by the desperate needs we have in our hardships.

  You need to see the video I've posted on this page. It's just below. So You have had terrible times, and in your outrage are you enraged with God. You need to know something about creation. When God created the heavens and the earth he spoke them into being. When he seperated the water in the air from the the water in the sea he spoke that seperation. When land came forth and then plants and animals were created he spoke and they all formed. 

  This is why life continues on the Earth even throughout our sins. This is why we have never yet been truly, hopelessly abandoned by god, and we never will. Here is the reason that God always saves a remnant and why Jesus was sacrificed for each one of our sins so that we can live and breath and enjoy and endure to the grace of the Glory of God.

  In those six days that That he made the entire universe for the first five of them God did no manual labour. He ordered things into being and there they were. Then on Day 6 God created Adam and how did he do it? This is how much the father loves us. Out of all creation the only ones he made by hand were you and me. Fashioned of clay by the fathers Gentle touch, life lovingly breathed into our nostrils. 

  Then what did God do? He rested a day. Now God cannot grow tired and weary, he doesn't age he doesn't sleep. He has no physical form and yet ther eis some form there because we were made in HIS IMAGE! He rested not to regain enough energy to last the rest of creation. He rested in the same way that we rest when we take our children out for picnics and we set out that blanket and pull the hamper over. He enjoyed his creation and he enjoyed us, he enjoyed Adam and he enjoyed you and me. And the only ones in creation the Lord has ever done manual labour for are you and me. The only ones he suffered and died for are you and me. And he died so that you can claim the offer of salvation from your sins in the name of Jesus Christ.

  Now I'd like you to watch the video below and then ask yourself.

 

 Are you still angry? And are you still angry at God or are you starting to look into your own heart and see your own bitterness? Maybe you need to stop being Mara and become Naiomi once more. Naiomi was re-united with God thanks to Ruth and Boaz having a little baby boy. It was the continuation of life and the providence of the Lord and prayer which changed Naiomi back to the woman she was before yet better because she had a greater understanding of Gods love. 

 

  Are you still angry with God? It's time to discuss it with him. Don't let the sun go down on your anger.