Truth be told there are seasons where most of us who have walked with the Lord for any season of time have wrestled with anger towards Him. It most often comes through a very difficult, trying situation where the pain lasts not just a few month or years but for decades. Or for some even, a lifetime, such as in the loss of a child.
I was studying today Romans 9 for an upcoming video. One Scripture that seems at first troubling is Rom 9:14:
14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses,
“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
God has just said that in the womb he chose the older Esau that would serve the younger Jacob. Then he says the above.
At first blush it seems completely opposite of what he is saying. Is God unjust? Then it says something that seems like it means God is arbitrary.
It’s not that. When you go back to Ex 33:19, you see that this is a quotation said when Moses asked to see God directly. God said no because if he showed him his glory, Moses would surely die because the greatness of God was too much for a human. So God said he could see the hem of his garment. Moses did and even that was almost too much for him.
Why Paul is quoting this verse in Exodus is that he is saying God is not unjust. In fact, he is so holy, righteous, good and glorious that even Moses could not even hardly see a wisp of him without being harmed.
The implication is that God is so good and glorious and righteous, that he can do nothing that is not pure. Any decision he makes is righteous because it is impossible for God to be anything but righteous. Scary righteous.
When I meditated on that, it made me think. When I feel anger at God for being in a very, very, very prolonged place of suffering, my anger is because I am not trusting in God’s character. I feel somehow that he is cruel, unjust, unloving, uncaring, has set me aside, etc… Otherwise he would do something so that I wouldn’t suffer this long.
But if I think on this Scripture, it is impossible for God to be anything but good, righteous, glorious and holy. There’s nothing in him that is anything other than this. It is impossible.
So in my pain and suffering, I do not have reasons for it. I cannot say why these things are happening to me and why my prayers do not feel like they are getting anywhere.
Instead I’m being invited to trust His nature and character. Trust his holiness. Trust the glory He carries. Trust that He is good. To not accuse him because of my own lack of understanding.
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