This has been a year of introspection…and anger. The anger piece was a surprise. If someone had asked if I was angry with God, I would have given an adamant, “No. Things are great with us.”

That apparently wasn’t completely true. There was a story in me that I was unaware of. That hid behind a closed door.

An event happened that caused that door to get shoved open and spew anger all over my surprised emotions. Initially, my anger was directed toward the person center stage in this event. And then the anger traveled back, through my personal history, highlighting a few authority figures over the years whose inability to love well had wounded me. And finally the anger landed on the greatest authority figure in my life who had let me down in some of the worst ways.

God.

God had failed me. He hadn’t been there for me when I needed Him most, when I needed rescuing. He let me flounder and sink and drown in some difficult situations.

And I let him have it. All of my anger. And I didn’t gracefully carry my anger to the cross and lay it at his feet. I yelled horrible, angry words at him. I let him have it for all the times He’d left me alone and hurting. What good was all that power when you don’t use it to rescue your kids?

I was raw and honest and horrified. One part of my brain was yelling terrible things at Him, while a small rational piece was apologizing for my outburst. The explosion was immense.

And necessary.

You see, the anger and the lack of trust had always been there, buried beneath my busyness. There was a part of me that felt alone and abandoned when I wasn’t “doing” something with or for God.

And I just ignored that piece of myself. Stayed busy. Scrolled Instagram or read a book.

But once that door was opened I couldn’t close it. All that anger came pouring out. My resentment for believing I had to meet other people’s expectations to gain their love. I was done with that and done trying to please God so He would love me too.

And in the midst of dumping my anger, God said, “It’s about time.”

I was on a path He’d never asked me to walk. The path of doing, pleasing, trying to gain approval.

The issue was I viewed God through the same lens I viewed significant people who had hurt me or let me down. I was trying for His love the same way I’d tried for theirs. And because God allowed pain in my life and didn’t rescue me, I assumed He wasn’t in those situations with me.

But I learned that He was. He’d never left me. In those dark times, He used His power to hold me, though I hadn’t felt it. He used His love to comfort me, but I hadn’t experienced it.

My lack of experiencing Him or seeing Him during my difficulties didn’t make His presence any less real.

He was there. He did hold me. His comfort surrounded me because He can’t help but comfort His kids. Sometimes He intervenes and rescues us, but often He chooses to go through the junk with us.

I needed a lens change. As long as I saw Him through a lens that painted him as conditional, I couldn’t connect at the deepest heart level with Him.

When we can’t look at the ugliness behind our closed doors we just distract ourselves from our true emotions. Those emotions may be ugly, but until they come out we’ll hide a piece of ourselves from God.

Prayer

Father, if there is any place in me that needs a touch from You, please expose it. Flood me with Your gentleness and Your kindness. Break through the dark places in my life, the places that are closed off and shine Your healing light on them. Release me to walk in all You have for me. In Jesus’ name, amen.