Are you Angry at God? Here are 3 Simple Steps to Calm the Rage.
My anger made me a walking, talking, ticking, time bomb.
If God had shown up on my doorstep there was a distinct possibility I’d have punched His lights out.
My anger wasn’t red hot and raging. More of a smoldering slow burn, built up over time, corroding my heart and soul, straining our relationship. Tick tock, tick tock. I was about to explode.
I’d lost both my mum and sister to cancer way before they were scheduled to earn their heavenly wings, and then, I diagnosed.
Are you kidding me?
The injustice. The grief. The unknown future. My kids, what about my children? Would they be motherless by the end of the year?
Was God deaf and blind to my pain and grief? Didn’t He see the heat-seeking missile of death locked in on me?
I was mad. Deep, dark, smoldering mad. Wouldn’t you be?
But I had no idea what to do with the anger, how to deal with it and move on, and as long as I was angry I had no peace. At all. There wasn’t room for peace with all that anger raging around.
When our world shatters and we’re left merely surviving a life we never sign up for, it’s easy to get angry with the Man Upstairs. He’s the chap who put black holes in the cosmos (why, I have no idea) and those little luminous creatures at the bottom of the oceans (again, why?). He’s the guy who parted the Red Sea and healed the blind and crippled.
Why doesn’t He make it better?
Why didn’t He heal my mum and Jo? Why wasn’t He healing me -parting the waters drowning me?
Getting angry with God may not be something we can avoid but we can do something with our rage before it takes up residence. Our circumstances may not change, but it does take us off DEFCON 1 anger alert, and changes how we feel about them. We’re more able to cope with what life’s hurled our way, and feel His peace and love.
Anger limits our ability to feel loved by God and prevents us from sitting in His comfort and peace.
Here’s what I do to ditch the anger and grab hold of peace.
1. Lament (have a good old moan)
I’ve given up hiding my ugly feelings from Him. I reckon He knows them anyway and is big enough to handle it. When we let it all hang out, lamenting like a psalmist, unloading our frustrations, laying out our deepest fears, screaming questions like How long? Why? Where are you? it’s not only cathartic to get it out, but surprisingly, our venting draws Him closer, rather than pushing Him away
He loves honesty.
When we’re truly vulnerable, laying our emotions naked before Him, it’s an invitation He’ll never refuse.
