Is It OK for a Good Girl to Get Angry with God?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Is it OK for a good girl to get angry with God? Well, that’s where I’m at today, and I feel like God is giving me permission to share my story with you.

Prefer to listen? Here’s the podcast version on Heart in a Drawer, my podcast for adult children of divorce.

Season 3, Episode 7 (Number 68)

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Amazon Music and Audible

Spotify

Google Podcasts

Is It OK for a Good Girl to Get Angry with God?

If you had asked me this question at age 10, 20, 30, or even 40, I would have struggled to answer in the affirmative.

But in this hard, hard, hard year of so much hurt and injustice, I’m now able to say Yes, it is OK for a good girl to get angry with God – as long as she doesn’t stay angry forever.

What Being a Good Girl Cost Me

Ask anyone who has known me for a long time. I’m considered a good girl. My nickname in grade school – a private Christian school – was Miss Perfect. I won all of the Bible trivia challenges on Fridays, even beating my best friend, the pastor’s daughter. So I’ve been a Bible nerd and generally well-behaved girl for as long as I can remember, and I have a photographic memory.

Last night one of those photographic memories popped up, complete with all the feels. In fifth grade, I wore headgear to correct a bad overbite. But I have a very small mouth with very large teeth. The bar that arched upward cut into my tongue when I closed my mouth. I kept my mouth slightly open during the day so it wouldn’t hurt, but I couldn’t control my overnight jaw movements.

Night after night, the bar sliced a little deeper into my tongue. I was a 10-year-old good girl taught to keep quiet and not complain, a people-pleaser to the max. So I shut my eyes as the steel bar slid into the deepening grooves, while hot tears trickled out and down the sides of my face.

One morning, the pain was finally too much to bear. I quietly mentioned the situation to my mom. She looked angry when she had me open my mouth wide and inspected the deep gashes on my tongue. I thought I was in trouble for something, especially when a few hours later, she was standing in the orthodontist’s office alongside my dad. They were almost never in the same room together after their messy divorce.

Surely I did something wrong, I thought, but I didn’t understand why – because good girls often blame themselves for things that were never their fault.

I noticed even the orthodontist’s eyes held fear when he looked into my mouth. His eyes also held pity. With two quick clips from a large pair of pliers, the bar was gone. No more deep cuts without anesthetic. However, the deep grooves are still in my tongue decades later – a reminder of the cost of not speaking up.

Embracing Anger as a Good Girl

In this year of recovering from a painful divorce, betrayal trauma, and decades of emotional abuse, I have learned that anger is one of the good, healthy, and necessary stages of grief. I spent months working through my anger toward the people who hurt me – and believe me, there was an enormous load to process. While listening to angry songs, I screamed my grief, and a few carefully controlled fires in my fire pit really helped too.

From January onward, I poured out my anger toward evil, cruel, malicious people. But it wasn’t until June that I began expressing my anger toward God.

After a horrible triggering incident, I ran out onto the country road where I have prayed so many times. I screamed out at the gate I mention in the Sunbeams chapter of my new book. I wailed, “God, I don’t understand! You could have stopped this! You promised me and you haven’t answered! It’s not fair!” Then I sobbed and sobbed as the gravel pushed into my thighs, since I was sitting cross-legged on the ground.

As I walked back home with snot and tears covering my swollen face, I felt strangely better. Not because I had yelled at the God I had trusted since I was a little girl. No, because I was finally getting that anger out and directing it where it belonged – onto a God who can handle anything and everything we throw at him.

Why Anger with God Is OK

I want to state an important truth:

It is good theology to get angry at God for things he could change.

Why? Because God IS in charge of everything! If you believe in God’s sovereignty, that’s good theology.

The actual, real, unmutable truth is this: God COULD change it, take the pain away, switch the situation, reverse the curse, and destroy our enemies, because he’s in charge of everything. Simply read the first two chapters of Job for biblical proof of this.

But when he doesn’t exercise justice in the timing we prefer, it’s no wonder even good girls get angry.

As I write in the Angry Thoughts chapter of my book Transforming Your Thought Life, the four emotions tied to anger are hurt, fear, frustration, and injustice. For me in my struggles this year, the main problems are hurt and injustice.

Another case in point. The ONLY piece of mail addressed to my ex that still arrives in my mailbox is sent from the place where my ex feeds his addiction. It’s also where the wicked woman who helped destroy my marriage earns her living. These two have chosen to live just two mailboxes down the road, within sight from my driveway.

Guess what arrived in the mail yesterday? The monthly newsletter he claims he’s asked them to change three times. But it still keeps coming to my house.

WHY?!?

In my anger based on deep hurt and injustice, and with no anesthesia either, I complained to God. I said, “You could change this. It’s just a little thing. I don’t understand why you don’t. This doesn’t even feel like love.”

In that moment with hot tears streaming down my face, I did not feel God’s wrath, though of course I deserve that just like any other sinner does (more good theology). Instead, I felt his presence – I felt seen by him, and this gave me a small measure of comfort.

When a Good Girl Gets Angry with God

This weekend, I attended church per usual. It’s the final week of a sermon series based on movies, which I normally enjoy immensely as a creative person.

But the last two weeks at church have been massively triggering. On week 2 of the series, the movie was Encanto, which I haven’t watched since the weekend my ex moved out. Now, I see that weekend through my photographic memories, which is painful enough. However, I now know the betrayal that had been occurring for months behind my back before that weekend ever occurred. Looking back with this overlay was overwhelming and terrible. I was stricken with grief and anger for four days afterward.

On week 3 of the series, the movie was about a family coming together and supporting each other despite challenges and differences of opinion. Yet it triggered my sense of injustice over two family members also betraying me this year, which eventually led to no-contact boundaries. Again, I had to process my grief for days afterward.

I hoped that this week at church would be easier. But no – the Holy Spirit is obviously using this series to uproot hidden anger in my heart. This week, we watched clips from the movie Father Stu. The movie is based on a man who was angry with life, then saved by God, then brought down low by a devastating diagnosis after he entered the priesthood. We witnessed a scene of him praying a raw, honest prayer.

His prayer:

“You love me, but you don’t want me.

You’re testing me, huh?

You want to test me to see how serious I am?

I want to know why, I want to know now.

Why?

Why?

WHY?!?

Why have you forsaken me here now?”

When Father Stu screamed that word, I came undone, right there in church, just as I have the past two weeks.

Feeling Your Anger as a Good Girl

In the span of only a few seconds, this was my interchange with God.

“I know I’ve just studied Elijah’s breakdown, and I should know better than to say this. But I have given my whole life to you. I’ve loved you since I was young. I’m a Christian writer and speaker for you. I haven’t turned to anything illicit to numb my pain. I want to give you glory. But WHY must I suffer so much? WHY?!?”

Right then another movie scene popped up in my mind. The one from the movie Forrest Gump, where Lieutenant Dan climbed up on the mast of the ship in a wicked storm. He screamed at God about the hurt and injustice he had experienced.

This is what God whispered to me in church last night:

“I see you up on that mast, screaming at me. I see you right there, right now.”

The scenes that come next in that movie then played in my mind. Lt. Dan swimming the backstroke in the ocean, when Forrest says he knew Lt. Dan had made peace with God.

The scene when Lt. Dan is happy and peaceful and healed at Forrest’s wedding. How I wish I could fast-forward to scenes like these in the future of my own life.

But right now, I feel stuck in the relentless storm. For some unknown reason, I don’t think God wants me to come down, not just yet. So I’m still out in the darkness with the whipping wind and ferocious waves, learning it’s ok for a good girl to get angry with God.

Valuing Suffering as a Good Girl

As my pastor said in this weekend’s sermon, “Honestly expressing what’s on your heart and in your heart to God is a beautiful thing that brings you relief. You can say to God whatever you want to say. And you can tell him that you’re as angry as can be, just like David and some of the other psalm writers…The point is, better express your anger to God and let it out there than to let it bleed onto everybody else.”

Later in the movie, Father Stu says, “All our outer nature’s wasting away. But our inner nature is being renewed every day. This life, no matter how long it lasts, is a momentary affliction preparing us for future glory. We shouldn’t pray for an easy life, but the strength to endure a difficult one because the experience of suffering is the fullest expression of God’s love. It is a chance to be closer to Christ.”

That’s good theology too, based on 2 Cor. 4:16-17, 2 Thess. 1:5 and 1 Peter 2:20.

I admit I flinched when I heard Father Stu say this:

“Now I know my suffering’s a gift from God.”

My suffering – my unanesthetized, unfair pain – a gift? No way!

But he continued:

“Even Christ had his moment of despair: ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ He asked from the cross. Christ felt betrayed.”

So in our sufferings, we have the privilege of identifying with Christ. We can even display him to the world through our sufferings – as long as we don’t get stuck in our anger, which will eventually turn us into hard, bitter people.

It’s also very comforting to me to know that Jesus really does understand my pain. He felt betrayed by his own Father, the one he knew beyond any doubt to be in control of all things. He said this straight out in his prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. So when I feel betrayed and forsaken, I can turn to Jesus for affirmation of my feelings.

How to Express Anger as a Good Girl

What I’ve learned over the past two weeks is that it’s absolutely necessary to express anger as a good girl. If I hold it in, my anger will turn into bitterness and destroy me. But if I let it out, God is big enough to handle anything and everything I say – all the hurt, fear, frustration, and injustice he wants to remove.

My go-to meditation verse as long as I’m on the mast in the storm is this one:

Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face.

Job 13:15 ESV

I won’t let go of my faith, but I will continue to argue my case before God in my suffering. For my healing, I need to present evidence of the unfairness, just like that awful newsletter that arrived in my mailbox. God won’t mind if I shake it in his face through prayer, as long as I don’t give up hope that better days are ahead, since his love for me never changes. Since Job could do that in his unmatched suffering, I can do it in mine.

If you are a good girl (or guy) and are struggling with anger toward God, I hope you’ll reach out for help like I am doing. I’m returning to regular visits with my Christian counselor this week. You can have a free, one-time counseling call HERE that will help you connect with a Christian counselor in your local area.

You can also reach out to me with your feedback or prayer requests – it would be my honor to lift you up before the Lord. Send me a message HERE.

Special insider opportunity!

Did you know? I spend over $200.00 per month on all the expenses relating to my ministry. If you are willing to donate to help offset these expenses, I’ll reward you with an exclusive monthly video teaching and printable. Please donate HERE if you received value from my content today. I’ll add you to the monthly list to receive the exclusive rewards for your donation of any amount. Thank you!

If you make a purchase through the provided links, I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you in advance for supporting my writing ministry!

I send my weekly newsletter Tea on Tuesdays at 3:00 p.m. Central time every Tuesday.  I write an exclusive devotion for you each week that I share with you first.

To receive the newsletter, please subscribe below. I can’t wait to share personally with you each week!