What do you do with grief, sadness, anger?

Excerpt from “Is God Religious; If not why are we?

A Contemporary Example

I want to tell you a true story. I was running a camp for high school kids. One of the counselors came and told me there was a girl (we will call her Marsha) who was having a very bad time at camp. Marsha was a truly committed Christian teenager, a real quality person, but she was really in despair because her father had a chronic illness that wouldn’t go away. He was suffering every day – constant 24/7 pain. She really loved her father and watching him suffer was tearing her up. Coming to camp was her break from watching his unending pain.

Once she got away from the pain though, it was even worse. She saw normal life without pain and she realized how really bad their family’s life was. Her counselor asked me to talk to her. So, we sat on the dock together and I asked her what was wrong. She poured out the story of her father’s pain and as I listened to her I sensed a deep, deep anger toward what was going on.

I said Marsha you are very angry, and she said, “No I am not. Being angry is wrong.” I asked her again and she said, “No, being angry is wrong and God would not like it if I was angry.” I said, “Marsha, I think it is worse than that. I think you are angry at God.” She said, “No, I mustn’t be angry at God, you can’t be angry at God.” Finally, she said, “Well, I know I am really angry.” I said, “You are angry at God because your father is really suffering and in pain.” She said, “What am I going to do?”

I opened up my Bible and found one of the most depressing Psalms, one of the worst ones I could find; “I wish I was dead, I am drowning, I am your servant, why don’t You love me?!” You know, one of the one’s you never see on a fridge. I said, “Marsha, I want you to go back to your cabin where you can be all alone, and I want you to pray this Psalm. And after you pray it, I want you to throw a fit. I want you to yell and scream and throw a fit and do whatever you have to do to be honest with God. If you have to break things, then break them as long as they belong to you. I want you to tell God exactly how you feel. Then when you are done I want you to sit still and wait. Don’t leave the cabin – just wait.”

So, she tucked her Bible up under her arm and set her face like flint and she marched off to her cabin. I began praying as hard as I could. And I didn’t see her for a few hours. When she came back her face glowed. It was a Moses thing. There was a total transformation and I knew she had encountered God and I said, “Marsha what happened?!”

She said, “I went into the cabin, and the moment I sat down I read the psalm and I got really angry and told God how angry I was. I let Him have it with everything I had, all of my anger and pain. And then it was over, and I sat down, and I didn’t know what to do so I turned a couple of pages in the Psalms and I found this one and I started to read it. I don’t know what happened, but God came into the room. God visited me and touched me with His love; I have never felt anything like it in my life. All my pain and anger was gone! I was so happy I couldn’t believe it and I still feel it right now. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before.”

I said, “Marsha, that was God.”

I got a letter from her months later and she was still filled with joy! Her friends told me what she was like when she went home and that her life had truly changed. The touch of God’s love transformed her because God’s love is real. It is not an idea. It is real!

And we need to be real. I hazard to guess that if she had not been honest with God that encounter would not have happened. I am committed to that truth. I believe with all my heart that if she had not been honest with Him she would still be trapped in pain and anger.

God is the Truth and in Him there is nothing but Truth. He can only relate to you on the basis of honesty. It is not in His nature to relate to you on the basis of anything but honesty. It is not that He doesn’t want to. He can’t. He is pure Truth. And as you become real and transparent with Him in your anger, disappointment, frustration, pain, disillusionment and even your sin, you will come to know Him at a deeper and deeper level.