Can I Be Angry with God and Be Holy?

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - Good Monday morning.

00:00:05.480 | Hope you had a great weekend

00:00:06.600 | and I hope you have a wonderful week ahead.

00:00:09.480 | Well, we've talked briefly about lament on the podcast,

00:00:12.560 | particularly about whether or not we can get angry with God.

00:00:17.240 | We address that back in APJ 931,

00:00:20.400 | 930 was a long time ago, episode 931.

00:00:23.180 | Since that episode aired,

00:00:25.960 | which is an episode that compares godly lament

00:00:28.400 | with ungodly lament,

00:00:30.520 | several more questions and follow up questions

00:00:32.240 | have come in on this topic.

00:00:33.680 | Here's one example, Pastor John,

00:00:35.280 | a most recent version from a listener named Brian.

00:00:39.240 | Dear Pastor John, thank you for the podcast.

00:00:41.880 | I'm wondering if we can be honestly angry at God

00:00:44.960 | for things that happen to our lives

00:00:47.680 | or is such a response out of the question?

00:00:51.560 | Pastor John, what would you say to Brian?

00:00:54.240 | - Let me try to interpret Brian's question

00:00:56.400 | so that I can try to answer what I think he's really asking.

00:01:01.400 | He says, can we be honestly angry at God?

00:01:06.480 | Now I'm not sure what he means by honestly,

00:01:10.080 | because I don't know what a dishonest anger at God would be.

00:01:15.080 | I think he means by honestly angry, really angry,

00:01:20.280 | truly angry.

00:01:22.260 | The other word that I wonder about

00:01:24.880 | is the word can.

00:01:26.760 | Can we be truly angry with God?

00:01:29.320 | I think he means, should we be?

00:01:31.580 | Or is it morally permissible or right to be?

00:01:36.580 | And when he asks, is it out of the question?

00:01:39.960 | I think he means, is it so wrong

00:01:43.120 | that we should avoid it at all costs?

00:01:45.040 | So the question I'll try to answer is this,

00:01:48.200 | is it ever virtuous or righteous or godly

00:01:53.800 | or innocent or even morally neutral

00:01:58.360 | to experience, to feel,

00:02:01.080 | not talking about what you say,

00:02:02.160 | I'm talking about what you feel,

00:02:03.680 | to feel heartfelt anger at God,

00:02:08.280 | whatever the reason, whatever the reason.

00:02:10.620 | That's my question.

00:02:11.840 | And the short answer is no, never.

00:02:16.720 | It is never right, never good, never virtuous,

00:02:21.240 | never merely neutral to feel anger at God, never.

00:02:26.240 | Now, Paul imagines a situation

00:02:32.680 | where a man sees God as something he doesn't like,

00:02:36.840 | isn't approved of the way God's acting,

00:02:38.960 | and he expresses this, this man,

00:02:41.240 | this person that Paul's thinking about,

00:02:43.400 | expresses this in very forceful terms

00:02:46.640 | of resistance to God's ways.

00:02:50.040 | It's described in Romans 9, 18 to 20 like this,

00:02:54.480 | God has mercy on whomever he wills, Paul says,

00:02:58.680 | and he hardens whomever he wills.

00:03:02.440 | You will say to me then, why does he still find fault?

00:03:08.080 | My tone of voice there is an interpretation,

00:03:10.400 | and you'll see, I think it's a legitimate interpretation

00:03:13.280 | as we keep moving.

00:03:15.120 | Why does he still find fault?

00:03:18.000 | For who can resist his will?

00:03:19.700 | Who are you, oh man, Paul says,

00:03:23.800 | who are you, oh man, to answer back to God?

00:03:28.800 | Will what is molded say to its molder,

00:03:33.680 | why have you made me like this?

00:03:35.280 | So here's a situation where a human being

00:03:40.720 | watches God's action and does not like what he sees.

00:03:46.720 | And Paul doesn't say it makes him angry,

00:03:49.720 | he says that it makes him question God,

00:03:54.880 | who can resist your will?

00:03:58.320 | Why do you still find fault?

00:03:59.760 | Why have you made me like this?

00:04:02.480 | And Paul responds to this kind of questioning of God

00:04:08.320 | with who do you think you are, oh man,

00:04:14.320 | oh man, to get in God's face about the way he acts,

00:04:19.320 | that's a pretty strong rebuke.

00:04:23.640 | So if Paul says that the mere words

00:04:29.600 | of questioning God are so out of place,

00:04:34.480 | what would he say if those questioning words

00:04:38.840 | were enforced with strong emotion

00:04:44.280 | and anger?

00:04:45.760 | He would say they're doubly out of place.

00:04:49.520 | It's not right for a creature to call into question

00:04:54.120 | his maker and doubly wrong for a creature

00:04:57.520 | to back that up with the force of an emotional no to God.

00:05:02.520 | Now, don't confuse this with humbly trying

00:05:09.600 | to understand the perplexing ways of the one you trust.

00:05:14.320 | Oh my goodness, that's worth a lifetime, right?

00:05:16.840 | That's all I do.

00:05:18.040 | It's like, at least I try to be humble and say,

00:05:20.480 | God, I want to understand.

00:05:23.240 | I want to understand as much as you reveal in your word,

00:05:26.600 | grant me eyes to see.

00:05:27.880 | It's not wrong to ask God questions like Mary.

00:05:32.880 | When the Lord said to her, you're gonna have a baby, Mary,

00:05:36.900 | while you're a virgin, and Mary bows and said,

00:05:40.300 | I'm your handmaid, but how can this be?

00:05:44.020 | God did not get upset with that question.

00:05:46.300 | That was a good question, a how question.

00:05:49.100 | A humble longing to understand is not a bad thing,

00:05:52.680 | but it's always wrong to question God

00:05:57.300 | as though he were in the wrong.

00:05:59.580 | As I've thought now about why Christians

00:06:05.380 | who believe the Bible might think otherwise,

00:06:08.660 | and evidently they do, I've tried to get inside their heads

00:06:13.620 | and see some possible ways that they're thinking.

00:06:18.500 | So let me respond to a few of those.

00:06:22.860 | One, maybe some people think that since anger

00:06:27.860 | is not a decision of the will,

00:06:32.100 | but rather an emotion that rises spontaneously

00:06:35.300 | out of the heart, maybe it doesn't have the same rightness

00:06:40.300 | or wrongness that a decision of the will would have, maybe.

00:06:45.540 | But that's not what the Bible teaches about emotions.

00:06:50.700 | Emotions are not morally neutral.

00:06:53.520 | Many emotions are forbidden by God,

00:06:57.100 | and other emotions are commanded by God.

00:07:00.100 | We're told not to fear, not to be anxious.

00:07:04.340 | We're told to put away bitterness.

00:07:07.500 | We're told to abstain from desires of the flesh.

00:07:11.780 | We're told to love God and delight in God

00:07:15.540 | and find pleasure in God's presence and praise God

00:07:19.060 | and be thankful to God and rejoice in all his works.

00:07:22.880 | So it's simply not true

00:07:24.380 | that even though emotions rise spontaneously,

00:07:29.700 | that they are morally neutral.

00:07:31.620 | They're not morally neutral.

00:07:33.380 | They are morally significant.

00:07:36.100 | A good tree bears good fruit, a bad tree bears bad fruit.

00:07:39.740 | Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks,

00:07:42.120 | and out of the abundance of the heart, the emotions flow.

00:07:44.980 | So whether anger at God is right or wrong

00:07:48.460 | cannot be settled simply by saying it's an emotion.

00:07:52.740 | Second, I wonder if people who think that anger with God

00:07:59.140 | is morally good or neutral

00:08:04.060 | are confusing the approval of anger

00:08:08.460 | with the approval of honesty and authenticity.

00:08:11.480 | In other words, I wonder if in refusing to disapprove

00:08:18.020 | of anger at God, what they are really disapproving of

00:08:24.260 | is hypocrisy, of feeling anger and not expressing it.

00:08:29.260 | I wonder if they really do assume

00:08:33.780 | lots of people are angry at God,

00:08:35.900 | and people like Piper are cultivating class A hypocrites

00:08:40.900 | by telling people it's wrong to express it.

00:08:45.460 | So maybe some of the people who say it's okay

00:08:51.980 | to be angry at God are really on a crusade

00:08:55.100 | to help people who are angry at God be honest

00:09:00.020 | and say they are.

00:09:02.300 | Now, my take on this is that if you are angry with God,

00:09:08.940 | there is absolutely no point in hiding it from him.

00:09:14.980 | You can't.

00:09:17.980 | You may as well tell him that you're angry.

00:09:22.460 | The telling is not the problem.

00:09:25.940 | I'm not on a crusade to shut people's mouths.

00:09:29.580 | I'm on a crusade to change people's hearts.

00:09:32.780 | The feeling of the anger is the problem, not the mouth.

00:09:37.780 | So don't add sin to sin.

00:09:40.860 | Don't add the sin of hypocrisy to the sin of anger.

00:09:44.440 | The battle is not with your mouth.

00:09:48.420 | It's with your heart.

00:09:49.780 | Third, I wonder if since it's possible to be angry

00:09:56.660 | at someone that we love, love very much, spouse, child,

00:10:02.860 | God, it's possible to be angry with someone that we love,

00:10:09.580 | it seems to some people that therefore

00:10:12.700 | we can be angry with God while still loving him,

00:10:15.180 | and it must not then be bad.

00:10:18.060 | But that doesn't follow, does it?

00:10:20.260 | It may still be a sin to be angry with God

00:10:25.020 | even though we love him,

00:10:26.780 | because anger towards God is not what flows

00:10:30.980 | from loving God.

00:10:33.800 | Four, I wonder if some pastorally sensitive people,

00:10:40.500 | I think this one probably is very prominent.

00:10:43.820 | I wonder if some pastorally sensitive people are

00:10:47.500 | very reluctant to disapprove of anger at God

00:10:52.500 | because they know that if they do,

00:10:56.940 | they may be heaping guilt on people

00:11:00.860 | who are already experiencing the pain of a huge loss,

00:11:05.860 | which has made them angry at God in the first place.

00:11:12.940 | Now, in my experience of dealing with hundreds of people

00:11:17.940 | in times of great loss over the last 50 years,

00:11:21.540 | God in his wisdom has always provided a way

00:11:28.100 | to minister to people's true need and true pain

00:11:34.540 | without compromising the truth.

00:11:40.820 | It is a pastoral failure of nerve or failure of wisdom

00:11:45.820 | if we think that we have to condone sin

00:11:53.780 | in order to bring comfort.

00:11:55.900 | There's always a better way.

00:11:59.340 | And finally, number five, I wonder if people who approve

00:12:05.640 | of anger at God have really thought through

00:12:10.620 | what anger at a person is.

00:12:14.000 | It is a strong, emotionally laden disapproval.

00:12:20.340 | That's what anger is, a strong, emotional disapproval.

00:12:28.020 | God does something, we assess it, we disapprove of it,

00:12:38.420 | we oppose it emotionally, we resist.

00:12:41.880 | Anger is the counterpart in the heart

00:12:44.620 | to the indictment of God in the head.

00:12:48.820 | Our minds judge God to be in the wrong

00:12:53.900 | and our emotions say this with anger.

00:12:57.000 | And my response is that God always acts justly.

00:13:05.620 | He always acts wisely.

00:13:08.820 | He always acts with love toward his people.

00:13:12.780 | He never wrongs anyone.

00:13:16.140 | He is never blameworthy.

00:13:18.580 | He is always pure and holy and righteous and good.

00:13:23.580 | He is infinitely worthy of our trust and our love

00:13:29.180 | and our admiration and our delight.

00:13:32.240 | And when we don't understand his ways,

00:13:37.240 | we put our hands on our mouths and kiss the rod

00:13:42.400 | and say with Paul, "Oh, the depth of the riches

00:13:48.240 | "and the wisdom and the knowledge of God."

00:13:52.320 | - Amen, thank you, Pastor John.

00:13:53.840 | And Brian, thank you for the question.

00:13:55.600 | If you wanna find that other episode

00:13:57.360 | on Godly Lament, see APJ 931,

00:14:00.080 | an episode actually on prayer,

00:14:01.720 | I think was the topic.

00:14:02.680 | It was titled, "How Do You Pray in Public Without Performing?"

00:14:06.000 | And there's a little riff on lament in there

00:14:08.300 | that's worth listening to as well.

00:14:10.000 | Thank you for joining us today.

00:14:12.200 | You can ask a question of your own,

00:14:13.600 | search our growing archive for APJ 931,

00:14:16.920 | or subscribe to the podcast.

00:14:18.240 | You can do all that at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:14:22.460 | I am your host, Tony Reinke.

00:14:25.360 | We will see you back here on Wednesday.

00:14:27.260 | Thanks for listening.

00:14:28.240 | We'll see you again soon.

00:14:29.480 | (upbeat music)

00:14:32.060 | (upbeat music)

00:14:34.640 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Can I Be Angry with God and Be Holy?

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