Jonah 4:1: Angry at God

My friend’s granddaughter committed suicide a few months ago.  Part of her healing journey is dealing with her anger toward God. Where was God when Jordan was being bullied to the point of despairing of life? Why didn’t He do something to prevent this tragedy?

 Have you ever been angry at God?

God has limitless power to intervene in any situation and make all things right for us. But what if He chooses not to calm our storm or answer our prayer in the way we’d hoped? Do we find ourselves perplexed? Dismayed?  …even angry?  We might hesitate to admit it, but if we have ever experienced anger toward God, we are in ranks with Jonah (4:1), David (2 Samuel 6:8), Moses (Numbers 11:10-15), Job (chapter 10), Habakkuk (1:1-4), and countless other children of God through the ages who, like Jacob (Genesis 32), have confronted and wrestled with Yahweh in the midst of pain, anguish, confusion, devastation, grief, disillusionment, and injustice. Living in a sin-cursed world isn’t for the faint of heart. It can be brutal.  We need our God. But do we feel that He has failed us when He doesn’t deliver us from every dark valley, crushing crucible, or fiery trial?

God invites us to wrestle with Him. He wants us to come to Him with our distresses, our questions, our fears, our doubts, our needs, and even our anger. He already knows exactly what we’re thinking and feeling. None of it is a surprise to Him. Turning our backs and walking away does us no good.  When we draw close enough to beat on our Father’s chest and soak Him with our tears, it gives Him an opportunity to put His arms around us and speak truth to our hearts.  When Jonah became angry, his immediate response was to rush to God in prayer to sing His praises.  …um, no…that’s not quite what happened.  Jonah rushed to God in prayer and blasted out his hot anger without a filter, is what Jonah did (vs. 2-3).  Patiently, graciously, God met him there.

“But the Lord replied, ‘Is it right for you to be angry?’” (Jonah 4:4) Jonah, I want to help you understand something. Do you really think it’s right for you to be angry over this?

“‘It is,’ [Jonah] said. ‘And I’m so angry I wish I were dead!’” (vs. 9)

I picture a child throwing a tantrum in response to a parental decision. (We’ve all been in the shoes of that child, and many of us have experienced the other side of the equation, too.)  It’s not pleasant for anyone.  But I would surmise that parents who regularly demonstrate love toward their children through patience, grace, kindness, faithfulness, empathy, and constructive discipline are in a unique position to be able to pull their children close and help them process things they might not yet understand. God did that with Jonah.  At the very least, it may become easier for a child to simply trust his parents within the context of their love – even if he doesn’t understand their decisions – knowing that his parents have his best interests in mind. But there might be some rough terrain to traverse before a child’s faith in his parents’ wisdom is strong enough to stave off mutiny.  It is the same for us in our relationship with our heavenly Father.

We are human, so by default we have a human mindset. We want to be satisfied and comfortable. We want life to be fair and within the bounds of our personal expectations and desires.  We have happily-ever-after programmed into our DNA, so when things go sideways and we suffer, it can shake us to the core.  But we are only able to see life through a toilet paper tube at best. That’s why God has to reveal His perspective and truth to us through the Scriptures. His words teach us and anchor our souls. It is God who preordained our days before we were even born (Psalm 139:16; Job 14:5). As Creator of heaven and earth, He has authority over our life stories (Psalm 89:11; Psalm 115:3; Psalm 100; Proverbs 16:9). The Potter is sovereign over His clay (Isaiah 29:16; Romans 9:14-24).  But our flesh has a deep-seated desire to be the master of our own story. On top of that, we live within the confines of time and space, while God does not. We must function within a physical world that naturally draws our attention horizontally.  We might expect a certain lifespan with all the good things the world might have to offer within that span of time. Grandchildren shouldn’t die. But God doesn’t think the way we do (Isaiah 55:8-9).  Instead, He thinks in terms of purpose (Isaiah 46:10).  Each one of us was created to serve specific purposes in His plan for the ages, regardless of lifespan or personal comfort or any of those other things by which humans are constrained and conditioned. He has the masterful ability to use any and every circumstance to accomplish His will within us, through us, and around us (Romans 8:26-39; Ephesians 1:11; Proverbs 16:4; Hebrews 12:4-11; Genesis 50:20; James 1:2-4; Psalm 33:10-11). The hard part for mankind is being able to say, “not my will, but Yours be done” (Luke 22:42).

Aside from wanting to steer our own ship, another area of friction is our human tendency to believe that we own what we have, or that we are entitled to what we have. But that’s not accurate either (Psalm 24:1; Job 1:21; 1 Corinthians 4:7; John 3:27; Psalm 8; Luke 12:13-34; Psalm 104). God owns it – our money and possessions, family and friends, health, time, talents, employment, the food on the table, even the breath in our lungs. He generously and graciously gifts these things to us to steward and enjoy within whatever limits He has ordained. I have to admit that God has to regularly pry my hands off things that I’m trying to hold too tightly. It’s not easy to let go and trust God’s plan for that which is dearest to us – especially when it comes to loved ones hurting and dying.

But I also know that God can be trusted because He has proven that He does love us. When we get angry and wonder if God even cares about what we’re going through – or wonder if we’re simply a pawn in His unfeeling divine hand – we have to remind ourselves that His compassion is so much deeper than anything we as humans even have the ability to feel, much less act upon (Psalm 103). We wonder how a loving God could allow… Or where was God when… Where was God? He was dying in our place to pay the price our rebellion against Him requires. He did for us what we were totally helpless to do for ourselves so that we could be rescued from an eternity separated from Him.  It was His deep love and mind-blowing compassion that drove Him to take the horrific fate on Himself that should have been ours. He has every right to turn away from rebels like us and evaporate us with one word from His mouth. Instead, He emptied Himself and came into the world He created for the purpose of fixing what we messed up. All of creation groans under the sin-curse now, but because of what Jesus accomplished on the cross, all things will be made new for us in our forever home with Him (Romans 8:18-25; Revelation 21:1-5). Do we mean nothing to Him?  The cross proves beyond a doubt that we mean everything to Him. That’s what impels me to trust Him even when I don’t understand what He’s doing.  …even when life hurts.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (2 Corinthians 4:16-18). “Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:12-16; Psalm 147:3; Psalm 91:4).  When we stay close to our Good Shepherd, even in our anger, He can speak the words we need to hear, tend to our wounds, encourage us, and give us the strength and perspective we need to face each day.

“Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him” (Psalm 34:8).