FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT
This past year has been full of ups and downs and many of us may have run into situations where we feel disappointed with God; disappointed with Him for not helping us out with a problem; for not answering a particular prayer; for letting a loved one die from this virus; etc. Even our Lord Jesus Christ had His own moment: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt 27:16). It is okay to acknowledge these feelings. For one thing, we wouldn’t be disappointed with God if we didn’t trust Him to come through for us in our troubled situations.
When we think about it, though, disappointment with God is as a result of our needs and desires not being met by Him. I ask God to do something that I want and how I want it, and He fails to do it. So disappointment with God is a failure of my will not being done by Him. But Scripture says, “My ways are not your ways, and my thoughts are not your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:9). In Job 40:8 God asked Job, “Would you discredit my justice? Would you condemn me to justify yourself?
Is it likely that some of the assumptions we have about life play a big role in our feelings of disappointment toward God and therefore having the right perspective about life and our relationship with God could help in dealing with this matter? Here are some of the hard truths, I believe, we need to consider.
Life is worth more than the things we are disappointed with God about and what, today, we see as a disappointment by God, could easily be tomorrow’s blessings.
Things will not always work out the way we want them to, and we need to accept that this is okay, because no matter how I react to life events, life will go on, with or without me. Nothing is indispensable, everything is expendable, and there are things I cannot change nor do anything about. The will of God will always be done.
Whatever I am going through now is not unique to me and is not a question of “Why me”. As Scripture says, “Nothing has come to you that is not common to the human race” (1 Cor 10:13). Whatever I am going through now is part of what can happen to any human, and it comes with being alive. So, for all the things I cannot predict or control, I need to “Let go and Let God” or rather, I need to “Trust God and get going”.
So, what do I do when I feel disappointed with God? Scripture suggests that we seek after Him even more intensely—to trust that He knows better because He already knows what is in my tomorrow while on the other hand, I do not know what tomorrow will bring; to believe and to trust in His faithfulness to make the best out of my situation; to look back and see what He has done for me in the past and trust that He is able to do it again; to continue to take my situation, in petition and supplication, with thanksgiving, to Him in prayer; to hold unto the hope that, even though “My flesh and my heart may fail, God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Psalm 73:26); and to declare, with Habakkuk that “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior. The Sovereign Lord is my strength” (Habakkuk 3:17-19). May the good Lord strengthen us in moments of our weakness, Amen!
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