SUCCESSFUL SUFFERER SERIES
Have you ever been angry with God? I sat down this morning to study my Bible when I came across some notes that I wrote about the Prophet Jonah. Jonah was not on my agenda for the day. I wanted to move on and continue to the Book of Revelation but the Holy Spirit would not allow the words that I read to leave my heart and mind. They hovered over me and the sadness that I felt only grew.
I am saddened because the Body of Christ is perpetuating the lie that it is okay to be angry with God. “Life did not turn out the way that you thought it should, you can be angry with God.” Your business failed, you can be angry with God.” “You prayed for healing and your loved one died, you can be angry with God.” Being angry with God has become an unrighteous part of the Christian community. In our attempts to show empathy towards the pain that others are suffering, we forsake God in the process.
In the Book of Jonah, we read that God gave the prophet an assignment to go to Nineveh and declare that He would punish them for their wickedness. Instead of the Prophet Jonah obeying God, he boarded a ship that was going in the opposite direction of Nineveh. Jonah did not want to prophesy to Israel’s enemies, he did not want them to repent, and he did not want God’s mercy to be extended to them. After spending three nights in the belly of a fish, God planted Jonah on dry land and told him once again to go preach to the people of Nineveh.
So the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest to the least of them…Then God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he became angry. So he prayed to the Lord, and said, “Ah, Lord, was not this what I said when I was still in my country? Therefore I fled previously to Tarshish; for I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm. Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live!” Then the Lord said, “Is it right for you to be angry?” (Jonah 3:5; 3:10-4:4).
Is it right for you to be angry? Jonah was angry because the character of God did not fit into his will. Maybe you cannot understand Jonah’s anger because you agree with God’s mercy being extended to Nineveh. God’s character remains the same. His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9). We do not get the “privilege” to judge God’s doings. When we become angry with God because of His sovereignty, we are exalting our thoughts and ways above His. Let God be true and every man a liar!
There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death (Proverbs 14:12, 16:25). It may seem right to you that you can be angry with God, but that is a path that leads to spiritual death. Being angry with God is coming from a carnal mind which is hostile towards God (Romans 8:7). It is an exhibit of pride in our hearts to believe that we know better and that God should bend to our will.
Therefore I was angry with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways.’ So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ” Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; But exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin…” (Hebrews 3:10-13).
Do not allow your anger (and pride) to harden your heart. Jonah told God to take his life because he would rather die than agree with the sovereignty and character of God (Jonah 4:3). Do not allow your intimacy with God to die because you have been deceived to think that your anger is justified. Being in the fish’s belly did not change Jonah’s heart. He completed the mission but was angry.
Is it right for you to be angry?
For more on being a Successful Sufferer, read the series.
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Copyright 2021 T.L. Lockley. All rights reserved.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
