"I felt like God had let me down but the thought of admitting anger towards God seemed sinful."
One evening whilst waiting for an event to start, I got chatting with someone over a cup of tea. It was a man in his 50’s who was in emotional distress due to many negative things that happened in his life. His emotional wounds were leaking, and by that I mean he couldn’t help but speak about all the things he was going through and had been through even though I was a stranger to him.
Nonetheless, I put my ministerial hat on and I listened. After a lengthy but in-depth discussion, it was clear that he was very angry with God. He held God responsible for the things that happened in his life because he felt like God could have prevented it.
Here he was, a man in his 50’s with numerous health issues stemming from prolonged stress and he was still at a Christian event seeking help from a God he was angry with but couldn’t forgive.
I have been in that position many times so had compassion for him. I was able to spend some time praying with him and discussing the importance of speaking out about his pain towards God with God, and forgiving God. We didn’t have as much time together as I would have liked so I’m not sure what became of him.
I thought about him a lot after meeting him because I could see a lot of my old self in the things he said. I had also felt like God had let me down but the thought of admitting anger towards God seemed sinful. I just accepted the ‘negative’ experiences because maybe I deserved it in some way?
Over time this affected my self-esteem and made me fear God. I didn’t truly love him, I just respectfully feared him. Our walk with God is built through our relationship with him and relationships are built on trust. We can not have a healthy relationship without trust and when we feel let down by God, ‘trust’ leaves and ‘fear’ comes in.
Addressing the suppressed ‘un-forgiveness I had towards God was one of the hardest things I had to do. It was a very emotional experience. I didn’t realise how much of my misfortune I blamed God for. I felt a lot of peace after each opportunity to address my anger towards God and I wasn’t struck down by lightning. God was patient with me and over time, I learnt that he could be trusted.
I talk about this part of my journey and how to forgive God in two videos, ‘Don’t Ignore The Cracks’ and ‘How Un-forgiveness Can affect Your Life’.
These videos are fairly old now but the core message remains the same.
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