God Is Not Mad at You: You Can Experience Real Love, Acceptance & Guilt-free Living (3 page)

Perhaps you need an entirely new view of God. A biblical view, not a worldview as many have today. I can assure you that no matter what you have done or what you may be doing right now that is wrong and sinful, God does love you, and although He may be angry at your ways, He has never stopped and never will stop loving you!

If you receive His love right in the midst of your imperfection, it will empower you to change your ways with His help. Fear does not help us truly change. It may provoke us to control our
behavior for a time, but unless we are changed inwardly, we will never change permanently. We will always revert to our sin in times of stress and weakness. But if we receive God’s love even while we are still sinners, our gratitude for His great mercy will make us want to please Him rather than be afraid of Him.

Our fear that God is angry with us is rooted in the fear that we have not performed as expected. We did not get an A on our spiritual test, we fell short of our goal, we lost our temper, and now we are disappointed with ourselves, and we are sure that God is disappointed, too.

The truth is that God already knew that we wouldn’t perform as expected when He chose to love us. God is never surprised by our failures! As long as we are on what I call the “performance/acceptance” treadmill, we will inevitably suffer with disappointment in ourselves and an unhealthy fear that God is more than likely angry. But God has not asked us to perform; He asks us to believe.

Our first goal is to develop a relationship with God based on His love for us and ours for Him. When our relationship with God is a solid foundation in our lives, we can go on attempting good works that are spirit led, but they will be done out of desire, not fear. We will be free to do the best we can, and not get stressed-out about our imperfections. We are not to get out of bed each day and try to perform for God and people in order to
get their approval, applause and acceptance. We should have the goal of loving God and people, and of doing the best we can for no reason except that we love God and sincerely want to do the right things.

It is time to break free from the trap of doing right to be rewarded and learn to do right because it is right. God does reward us, but our motive for serving Him must be love and love alone. And we cannot respond to God in love until we are fully convinced that He loves us unconditionally.

God is not like the baseball coach who is disappointed in us when we strike out in the last inning and cause the team to lose the game. God knew that we would strike out before He let us play the game. The Bible shows us that God knows our faults and loves us anyway. The beauty of grace is that “
while we were still sinners, Christ died for us
” (Romans 5:8).

God has already accepted us; therefore, we don’t have to try to perform in order to earn His acceptance. We are made acceptable in the Beloved (Jesus) (Ephesians 2:4–6; Romans 5:19). God views us as acceptable through Jesus Christ. When God looks at anyone who has accepted Jesus as Savior and Lord, He sees the perfection of Jesus, not the imperfection of the individual. Once we have received Jesus as our Savior, the only thing that matters is who we are in Christ—not our performance record. In and of ourselves, we are nothing and can do nothing perfectly right. But by virtue of being in Christ, by faith we can do anything God wants us to do, and do it to His satisfaction. God doesn’t require our perfection… He requires our faith.

Is your mentality, “I owe, I owe, so off to work I go”? It was mine for many long years. Each day when I woke up, I felt I had to pay for all my sins and mistakes of the day before, so I formulated a plan for how good I would be, hoping to work my way back into God’s pleasure and favor. During that time, I regularly attended a church that clearly taught that salvation is by grace and not by works. I said I believed it, but I didn’t apply it to my life.

Even though I did some things right each day, I also did many things wrong that overshadowed the little bit I did that was right, so I never got ahead. The next day I still owed for the day before and had to get back on the treadmill once again. By the end of each day, I was spiritually, mentally, physically and emotionally worn-out from trying to please God. And it made me grouchy and not very enjoyable to be around.

I did not yet have revelation of what Jesus said in the book of Matthew:

My translation of this verse of Scripture would go something like this: “Get off the treadmill of performance/acceptance and just come to Me. Trust My love for you and be assured that you are not accepted because of what you can do, but because of what I have done for you. Breathe a sigh of relief and don’t be stressed-out by your faults.”

If you made a list of everything that is wrong with you, how long would it be? I can assure you that even if you wrote down everything you could think of, and even if you asked family and friends for their additions, you would still miss a lot of things. God knows them all, and His desire is that we stop counting. If we reached up with a cutting tool and cut the power line coming into our house one time, we would be without power. If we cut it ten times, we would be without power. Whether we sin often or rarely, we have still cut the power line from us to God, and we all need Jesus to restore it. Even if you think you are better than someone else you know, it doesn’t matter because God is not counting. According to God’s Word, if we are depending on the law to justify us and we are guilty of one thing, then we are guilty of all. Fortunately, He offers us an opportunity to live under grace and not the law.

I knew a woman who made a list of everything she wanted to accomplish each day. She delighted in checking things off her list because it gave her a feeling of succeeding. However, when she had things left on her list, it made her feel like a failure and she usually became angry with herself. She was always counting things. Pieces of clothing to be ironed, chores left to be done, length of time it took her to do things, et cetera. I remember
counting how long I prayed and keeping precise records of how much of the Bible I read each day as if my right standing with God increased or decreased because of it. I have been delivered from counting, the woman I am speaking of has been delivered from counting, and I pray that you, too, will be delivered from counting what you have done right or wrong. God’s grace sets us free from counting! Love takes no account of the evil done to it, and it keeps no records of wrong (1 Corinthians 13:5). God keeps short accounts! When we post a debit (a sin) to our account, He posts a credit (forgiveness and mercy). In Christ our account balance that we owe God is always zero! It always says, “Paid in full.”

The law requires us to count and keep precise records of our sins, and to pay for them with sacrifices. Those who live under the law never stop feeling guilty. Their sin may be covered by their sacrifice of good works, loss of joy, or guilt, but it is never completely removed. It is always lurking in the shadows accusing them. If, however, we live under grace (God’s undeserved favor), we have the assurance that even though we are guilty of many things, we are freely and completely forgiven, and we are in right standing with God. God is not angry with us!

Peter said that Jesus died—the innocent for the guilty—that He might bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18). Are you ready to stop counting and just go to God? When you make mistakes don’t run from God and hide in fear thinking He is mad, but instead run to Him to fix what is wrong. When a baby is learning to walk and falls down, he runs to Mom and Dad for comfort and is comforted and encouraged to try again. I have recently spent a lot of time with my two youngest grandsons. As I watch them throughout the day, when they get into trouble or get hurt, they immediately run to Mom and Dad. I’ve noticed that they don’t ever run away from their parents; they run to them, or they sit on the floor with
uplifted arms, asking to be picked up. Jesus died so that you and I could run to God every single time we fall. Surely such a costly gift should not go to waste.

On rare occasions when my dog has an accident and poos on the floor (which is usually during a storm), she hangs her head and cowers until she hears me say in a loving voice, “Come here.” I can assure you that once she hears those words, she has not one ounce of guilt left. She returns to her play just as if she had done nothing wrong. She plays and I clean up the mess! Is it possible that God is offering us the same grace? Yes it is! To keep her from going back and doing it again, I spray PetZyme™ on it. We have something much more powerful than PetZyme™ to remove our poo stains—we have the blood of Jesus Christ in which we are washed and made completely clean (Hebrews 10:14, 17–19).

Jesus has completely cleansed us. He has forgiven and canceled our sins and there is no longer any offering that can be made. We don’t have to work to pay because we don’t owe. Our debt has been paid in full by the blood, suffering and sacrifice of Jesus!

If you have been on the performance/acceptance treadmill, what are you offering God as payback for your sins? Are you sacrificing your enjoyment of life? Do you feel undeserving and guilty when you relax and try to have fun? Do you carry a burden of guilt, condemnation and shame with you everywhere that you go? Do you work excessively, feeling you are more acceptable when you do? These were my preferred methods of self-punishment and I thought you might recognize some of them. Large percentages of the crowds that I minister to, when asked, admit that they feel
guilty when they try to relax. If you feel that, too, it is
not God
making you feel that way! He has commanded us to rest as part of His divine rhythm of life. Work, rest, worship and play are all vital for wholeness. If we leave any facet out, we will not be whole individuals, and we will always feel that we are deprived and missing something.

We cannot do enough right to make up for our wrong. We cannot pay God back; He doesn’t want us to try to.

In some places, the Grand Canyon is nine miles wide. I could jump maybe three feet, Dave could jump eight to twelve feet and a broad jumper could jump twenty-four to twenty-six feet—but we are all very short of nine miles, and very dead without someone to save us.

Thank God we have been saved and no longer have to struggle to make a jump that is impossible to make.

Judah Smith tells a wonderful story about his young son that makes a crucial point.

In this instance, Zion performed well, and his dad was immensely proud. But I know Judah Smith’s character, and I know that he will love and accept his son equally if he totally fails at the next practice or game. As good parents, we are not up and down in our commitment to love our children.

Some of us are way too emotional—too up and down. I did something good today and God is pleased. I sinned, and God’s mad at me. Have you ever heard of the foreknowledge of God? He knows—and has always known—about our future failures. If He loves us now, knowing what we’ll do wrong tomorrow, why are we doubting? Embrace grace and move on!

It is very good news that we don’t have to wear ourselves out daily trying to manifest a perfect performance so God can love us. He is going to love us either way, so let’s just do the best we can out of a heart of love for God, and trust His mercy for our failures.

When Charlie was a child, each autumn, his dad gave him the chore of raking up the leaves. It was a difficult job for a young boy, taking hours to complete, but one he did without argument. At the completion of his task, he would say, “Daddy, you’re going to love it; the yard looks amazing!”

Every fall, his dad had the same response at the conclusion of his yard inspection. “It looks good, son, but you missed some leaves over there… and a few over there… and there are a few more by the gate.” Charlie’s dad was a perfectionist and Charlie never felt that he measured up to his dad’s expectations.