Why Does God Hate Me?
After
2 years of marriage, Mary and her husband wanted to start a family. The next two years brought four more
miscarriages and an almost unbearable sadness to Mary. She and her husband never spoke of the
loss. Her husband became too busy to
talk.
Mary’s sadness threw her
to the floor when she realized she had no one could help her or understand her
sadness. Doctors offered pills, friends
offered sympathy and family ignored the obvious. There was no joy in life when
one bears a desire so strong it burns a hole in the spirit. When she turned to God it seemed He was
silent or non-existent. Then one day in a flash of anger Mary prayed, “God if
this is your abundant life, I don’t want it anymore.” Then Mary packed her bags and left her
husband amidst rumors of her being mentally ill. The truth about Mary was that she had lost her
dream of being a wife and mother. At age
twenty-six her life was over and she had accomplished nothing.
As a child and a teen
Mary had felt great love for the Lord, He had brought her through many of life’s
trials and she knew in her heart He was real.
But now she began to question.
Alone, broke, no marketable skills, overwhelmed by mental and physical
exhaustion plus the silence of the Lord she had always trusted; hopelessness entered her heart. Mary just wanted to go away, not die, just go
away where there was no hurt. She asked
the question, “God, why do you hate me so much?
All I ever wanted to do was be obedient to you and you have taken away
the ability for me to “be fruitful and multiply.” That was the last prayer Mary said before
she faded into the darkness of anonymity in a large city.
The question asked by most of us at one time or
another in life is the same, either ‘why is God mad at me or why does He hate
me?’ But this question alone gives its
own answer. The question is about
ourselves. Even the Psalmist said it in
Psalms 102:9. For I have eaten ashes like bread And
mingled my drink with weeping Because of Your indignation and Your wrath,
For You have lifted me up and cast me away. My days are like a lengthened shadow, And I wither away like grass.
For You have lifted me up and cast me away. My days are like a lengthened shadow, And I wither away like grass.
The poetic beauty reveals the distraught heart that
feels as though God has abandoned him.
Why do these feeling occur?
1. Life’s
trials – Life is
filled with trials for every person, but James says to count it joy to fall
into these trials because they will lead us to completeness so that we are
lacking in nothing. In other words to
have everything we must first have the trials.
We cannot gain understanding without the trial
2. Focus
on Self – By
becoming absorbed in our pain we miss the blessing that is to come, Our focus is
on our own sufferings and our needs becomes the sympathy of others in order to
justify our suffering. In this case we
become double-minded, we want God to fix our problem while at the same time we
bask in the sympathy of others. It is a
troubling place to be.
3. Expectations
– In 1 John 5:19 it says that the
whole world lies in the power of the evil one.
If the world belongs to the devil, he will set our expectations on the
things of the world to keep our hearts away from God. The world promises us a good life filled with
all the desires of our heart which are mostly relational or monetary. We expect to be rich and loved or at least
some form of it.
4. Life
is hard- While we
suffer in our trials we compare ourselves to others who seem to have an easy
life and we want that life. But we do
not know their trials. When we gaze upon
the Christian wholly dedicated to Christ true peace and contentment is seen.
The question becomes how to obtain that contentment with our own circumstances.
5. Christ
is the answer –
He said, “If I be lifted up I will draw all men to me. (John 12:32) the verse
previous to that says, “Judgment is upon this world. . .the ruler of this world
will be cast out.” He was referring to His
death on the cross which would conquer the power of the devil that is death.
(Hebrew 2:14). Death occurs when we lose
hope or we focus on self, because we lose sight of the person of Jesus
Christ. When we lose that focus we judge
God by the actions of the evil one.
6. God’s
call can be heard the best in the midst of pain – C.S. Lewis said that pain was
God’s megaphone to get our attention. It
is in the middle of insurmountable suffering and hopelessness that God is
calling to us the loudest. God has an
answer for each of us in our own set of circumstances. It is a supernatural answer and cannot be
found in a natural world that is controlled by the evil one.
Change – is not always what we think it will
be. We may be wishing for healing or
restoration of wealth or a relationship while God sees our healing as enduring
through the pain and drawing closer to him in that pain. The trial is given to us for our perfection
in Christ in whom we will be complete.
Without the pain of the trial we miss the greatest blessing on
earth. The solution is to turn our eyes
upon Jesus.
The answer
if found in the wounds of Jesus. For you
have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving
you an example for you to follow in His steps, and while being reviled,
He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously; and He Himself
bore our sins in His body on the cross , so that we might die to sin and live
to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed. 1 Peter 2:21-24 (NASB)
Even
Christ had to keep His eyes on the Father in order to endure His trial.
As Mary sat down at the table to
discuss matters of work, she was introduced to the people at the table, one of
them a godly man. Two years later he became her husband and she was granted four
children. She never took her eyes off Jesus
throughout her trials.
Thanks to Judith Vass photography for the beautiful artwork
