Is it really SIN to be angry with God ?

Please do not take up trying to comfort others in times of distress. You will only do more harm than good I am afraid. I had people like you say all the wrong things which only made understanding God hand in my life worse.

In fact it was unsaved friends who were there for me NOT Christians. They had better councel and caring understanding than the judgmental Christians did.

 

I leave you with this mans testimony ( not mine of course but it could have been )

Angry?...Without Sin?

Have you ever been angry with God? I have. I grew angry with God when our first baby died.
I married my high school sweetheart. After a couple of years we started visiting doctors to help figure out why we were not having babies. They did all they could, but still no baby. We went through the roller coaster of emotions peaking at Hope and bottoming out at Despair while mostly walking the pathway of Why?

Every one of our married friends, it seemed were having babies. We would discuss the abortion issue within our society and wonder why anyone would reject such a precious gift. We watched as some would have children who didn't want them while others who desperately wanted them could not have any. We questioned practically everything.

After three years, we discovered that we were expecting our first baby. Less than one month later, the love of my life, my high school sweetheart miscarried. Many family members and friends wanted to help, but their words brought only a greater feeling of emptiness.

I knew all the philosophies and the ways to look at it, right? After all, I was a seminary student training to become a pastor. All we knew was that our baby was dead. All our hopes, all our dreams, all our grand plans, dead. We never got to look into his/her eyes. We never got to place his/her foot into our hand. We never heard the laughter or the crying. Our baby was dead. And the anger toward God began to mushroom within my soul.

The next morning, our phone rang at 4:30. "Ted, this is Tommy. I saw your light and thought you might be up. Are you okay?" I assured our neighbor that everything was just fine. I had risen to pray. To this he replied, "I know you usually get up this early to pray. I just didn't think you would today." "Was that because of the miscarriage?" I asked. "Well, uh, yes. I mean, after all, you're so sad," Tommy slowly spoke. Then I shared with Tommy what I was really doing at that time.

I told him, "Tommy, can you imagine with me for a moment? I'm imagining that I am walking up to the throne of God and punching him right in the nose. Then I'm imagining that I'm crawling up into his lap and crying." In shock he replied, "Can you really do that? I mean can you really punch God?" I explained to him that God and God alone holds life and death in his hands and He's the only one I can go to about this. I further explained that I also have no where else to go with all of my pain. God and God alone is the great Comforter. So I go to Him for comfort in my agony.

Tommy understood all this. We discussed it more over the following few weeks while Tommy worked through his own anger and then trusted Jesus for salvation. Interestingly enough, he had always been taught by his parents and his church that anger toward God was a sin. I helped him see otherwise and he then became a faithful follower of Christ.

I had already learned that we are commanded in Ephesians 4:26 to "be angry" but not to sin. It takes time and some help to learn how to be angry without sinning. I had learned this from two events earlier in my life. These lessons I used in order to help Tommy.

I have already shared with you about the first lesson. But let me remind you that I had grown angry with God over years of feeling rejected. Then in the driving rain one night, God spoke to me and cleansed me from my bitterness and rage.

The second lesson I learned was from one of my heroes, Dr. David Seamands. Dr. Seamands had grown up in India with missionary parents. He later returned to India after college and seminary to serve as a missionary himself. After sixteen years, he and his family moved to Wilmore, Kentucky for him to serve as pastor at the Methodist Church.

He had served as pastor in Wilmore for six years when the legendary Asbury revival occurred. God descended on the campus of Asbury College in February of 1970 during a routine chapel service. The service continued around the clock for the next eight days. It began on a Tuesday.

On Friday night during dinner, Dr. Seamands' wife, Helen asked if he planned to attend the revival any that evening. He responded that he probably should, "After all, I am the pastor of the Methodist Church and I should make an appearance."

I learned of this conversation in 1988 as a student of Dr. Seamands. He told us that his wife looked at him for a brief moment and then responded with the single most effective sermon he had ever heard in his life. When he told her that he should make an appearance, she replied, "David, I think it's time we started being honest instead of respected."

This is what I shared with my neighbor. He couldn't imagine someone wanting to pray after the death of his dreams. He couldn't fathom the idea of openly and honestly expressing my anger to God. But as I honestly and openly shared with him, God was able to reach deeply into his soul and do a work that later resulted in his salvation.

King David tells us in Psalm 51:6 that God desires truth in the innermost areas of our hearts and souls. However, many times we Christians are more concerned with appearances than with truth. The Apostle Paul commands us to "be angry" but to avoid sin in his letter to the Ephesians (4:26). On the other hand, we Christians many times would rather pretend everything is fine than to be angry. Often we would rather pretend we have no anger instead of openly and honestly facing God with our anger.

I have served as a pastor for eighteen years now. I find it common among Christians to face hardships and difficulties with a mask over our feelings. Later, because we refuse to honestly face God with our anger, we turn away. We stop praying. We stop reading our Bible. We stop attending church services. In other words, we walk away from God. All because we prefer to be respectable instead of honest. We have been taught this, however, anything that has us acting in a dishonest way is from Satan. Of course he would have us more concerned with appearance than with truth.

I mentioned my wife and my struggle with having babies. Now years later, we have one daughter. When she was five years old, we took her to the funeral of Austin Yanders, a one month old from our church. The three of us walked up to the casket. She looked into the face of little Austin, "Daddy, is he dead?" she asked me. "Yes, he is." She studied his face a little longer, then stated, "I'm really angry with Jesus right now." I quietly responded, "Most of us in the room are angry with Jesus right now." She continued, "Could Jesus have healed him?" I assured her, "Yes, he could have." She then repeated herself, "I'm really angry with Jesus right now."

She said nothing else. Over the seven years since that moment at the casket, she has grown in her faith. She has not turned away from God. From time to time she wants to walk over to Austin's grave.

She was angry with Jesus. I did not try to convince her otherwise. I want her to grow up knowing how to "be angry" but without sin. I want her to have an honest and open relationship with Jesus that grows deeper every day of her life.

Rev. Ted Beam

 

Thanks but I do not need my eyes open, clearly you are the one in DENIAL remember that is one of the steps one must take for a healthy outcome. You clearly lack a full range of understanding not only in how to apply Gods word but how to deal with human relationships effectively.

I understand your point but it just isn't as simple as that.

Everyone is at different walks in their Christian life. A once strong Christian can all of a sudden become weak through certain circumstances in their life. WHO AM I to say they are in sin to be questioning God or be angry with him. MY JOB as a Christian is to be there for them along each step of the WAY. it may take just a short time before they are ready for Gods word on his sovereignty and his Lordship in their life or it may be years.

All I am asking is that we need to be sensative to the leading of the Holy Spirit and not be so JUDGEMENTAL. I am NEVER against Gods word and I never twist it or misuse it. There is a time to use Gods word and a time not to.

Just like witnessing, we need to be sensitive that we listen to who we are talking to and try to understand where they are comming from in order to present Gods truth to them EFFECTIVELY. Some may need the message of grace full well knowing they are sinners, some will need the law thinking they are good. Some we may just need to be SILENT and just pray for them. Since we would just be throwing pearls among swine.

Hope that helps not only you but others.

 

Joseph_Botwinick
You must be great at teaching doctrine to young children they must have great understanding when you are done with them

 

Joseph_Botwinick

Yep you WIN hope you feel good now. Goodnight

 

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Joseph_Botwinick

Yep you WIN hope you feel good now. Goodnight

 

Artimaeus

I think we agree with each other. But again whether you realize it or not that questioning even the way you explained it ( which is exactly what I would do ) is DOUBTING God, and without FAITH it is impossible to PLEASE God. So according to you, you are sinning.

Being MAd, ANGRY or UPSET mean all the same thing just different words. You tried to say they are different but they are not.

 

Don't get me wrong I am ALL for scripture. ( I probably more than most ) I agree that questioning God which we all do and whether we admit it or not are angry when we do that, may not be the " RIGHT " thing to do. Again " without FAITH it is impossible to please God " But is a SIN in the same way that Lying, cheating, stealing, fornicating, selfish anger, jealousy, coveting ect. ect. IS ? I would have to say NO !

I am sure I am like most that when I question God and am upset with him for not revealing why injustice is done in my life I do not feel GUILTY like I would if I commited the other sins I just mentioned. I am hurt and want answers like I would from any other close person in my life. I wouldn't be angry at a stranger that much if he did something to me, I would just shrug it off. Now if a close personal family member or friend hurt me I would would want to get my feelings out with them. WHY so we can have a better relationship.

Consider this statement by a Pastor....

Misunderstanding, disagreement, and conflict are inevitable in any relationship, especially one in which a sinful human being tries to relate to an invisible God in a fallen world. thus, if we want to have an honest and intimate relationship with God we need to be willing to " wrestle with God."...Among the Christians I work with in counseling, it has been my experience that those who are willing to honestly wrestle with God by confronting, questioning, or even complaining to him about the pain and injustice they experience are the ones who develop the most intimate relationship with him.

There were more people in the Bible who wrestled and questioned God who were never rebuked. Job was an exception. Probably because he was one of the STRONGEST believers EVER.

I wonder if you guys would honestly tell a young child who has experenced much loss, abuse and abandoment that they were wrong to question God.