I think a lot of us can say we've been mad at God. Maybe it was something shallow and stupid, in the long run. Maybe it was over something huge! Even if that huge something resulted in an equally huge blessing, when we feel we're being wronged, our first reaction is to be mad. Even after you've come to realize the blessing in it, you still might hold a grudge over the pain that came before it, over losses you've had, over heartbreak.
What do you do with that anger? Do you swallow it, a bitter pill that leaves you sour, and sugar coat your prayers? Or do you let Him have it?
God knows it's there. You don't have to tell Him you're angry with him. He already knows. When you sugar coat and hide your anger you serve no good purpose; God wants an authentic relationship with you. God wants your real, raw self. You can't have an authentic relationship when you're holding back your authentic feelings. We have to let them go. We do it because He wants us to, because He knows that in pouring our real feelings onto him, we pour OURSELVES onto Him, and in doing so we draw closer to him. We draw closer and we allow Him to heal our hurts and our anger. When we hold them back, there's no healing.
I was so angry with God when Karl's fight with cancer started going downhill. I was angry at the idea that my kids were going to have to watch their dad die slowly. I was angry that he had to be in so much pain. I was angry at the work I had to do; the job, the care-giving, the child-minding, the decision-making. It made me angry. Sometimes I held it back, sometimes I literally cursed God in my prayers. How could He do this to me? To my family?
Even as the many blessings that resulted from those two years of cancer poured onto me (I can't call someone's pain and death a blessing, especially not that of a good man and a good father, but many things have happened as a result of the struggle that ARE blessings), as my anger faded, I held onto some resentment. It took awhile before I could admit that. But when I did, when I finally let God have it all, the relief that came surprised me.
It works the same way in human relationships. We've all been angry at another person from time to time in our lives, but so often, we shrug when they ask and we say it's "fine," even when it's not. Even though we hurt and seethe inside. "I'm fine," is a lie I'm all too guilty of telling my husband when I just don't want to fight, or if I know that it'll hurt his feelings. Even when I'm mad, I don't want anyone else to get hurt. But you know, Greg knows me well enough, and I suck badly enough at hiding my emotions, that he knows I'm not "fine." And that hurts his feelings even more, because he, too, wants my real, authentic self. The people closest to us in our lives deserve authenticity from us. I want to be close to my husband, and he to me, and so we have to give of ourselves, the good and the bad.
Real human relationships are the biggest gift God's given us on this earth. Relationships with our parents and siblings, our spouses, our kids. I'm guilty of occasionally souring those relationships with that big lie, that "I'm fine." Probably most of us are. What I'm going to do, though, is work on being more authentic, more transparent, and more honest for the sake of my relationships with my loved ones. They deserve it and I deserve it and God wants that for us.
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