“Should I Be Worried About God Being Mad At Me?”

Preached 11/1/2020

“SHOULD I BE WORRIED ABOUT
GOD BEING MAD AT ME?”

Fear and worry come from all directions in the world today.  Sadly, some of it may come from within.  Thoughts creep into our little minds and start whirling around.  And before long we have ourselves convinced of something that is so far from the truth; yet seems so real.  Satan is good at this.  He just plants a seed and before you know it you are worried or afraid.

Could you believe that some people are afraid of God being mad at them?  That our Lord, Who came and died on the Cross for us, would be mad and stay mad at us?  That’s not the way it works.  That’s not who He is.  He came to save us and deliver us from all of our fears.  For our part, it’s a matter of believing and accepting.  But that is not always that easy, is it?  Should we worry about God being mad at us?  No, no, a thousand times no!

He tells us definitively that He did not create us to be afraid.  The source of all fear comes from Satan.  It’s a lie from hell and it smells like smoke.  In a letter to his dear friend Timothy, Paul said this – I thank God, whom I serve, as my forefathers did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.  Recalling your tears, I long to see you, so that I may be filled with joy.  I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also.  For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.  For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.  (2 Timothy 1:3-7 (NIV) (842)[1197]

When you might be having trouble with things swirling around in your mind, remind yourself of the basics.  Sometimes we have to remember the basics.  Football players always start out every year doing the basic drills.  It all goes back to basics, running, tackling, blocking.  If you forget the basics you can’t capture the nuances.  When you forget the basics, you can be led in too many wrong directions, and one of those is fear.

God may be complicated, but His plan for us isn’t.  A Manger, a Cross, an Empty Tomb, His Love, these are the basics.  If God doesn’t love you and plan for you to be with Him, why would He have gone to so much trouble?  He is waiting on each and every one of you.  Just look back at some of the Word as Jesus talked to us and prayed for us.

(Jesus said) “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father — and I lay down my life for the sheep.”  (John 10:14-15) (759)[1075]

As one of His sheep He knows you, one to one.  His relationship with you is like His relationship with His Father, one to one.  Imagine that, you have the same relationship with Jesus Christ one to one, that He has with God the Father.  We have that relationship with all three, God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit.  We can stop and talk to each and all, anytime, anywhere.

And look at the plans He has for us:
“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.”  (John 14:1-3) (763)[1081]

Christ tells us that He has gone on before us to prepare a place for us.  Would he go through all this trouble for, arrest, beatings, lashings, physical, mental, emotional cruelty, you if He was going to stay mad at you and not let you in?  NO, it is not so.  He loves you and is waiting for the right time to take us all home.

And what a home it will be:
One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.”  And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.  It shone with the glory of God, and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.  It had a great, high wall with twelve gates, and with twelve angels at the gates. On the gates were written the names of the twelve tribes of Israel.  There were three gates on the east, three on the north, three on the south and three on the west.  The wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
The angel who talked with me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city, its gates and its walls.  The city was laid out like a square, as long as it was wide. He measured the city with the rod and found it to be 12,000 stadia in length, and as wide and high as it is long.  He measured its wall and it was 144 cubits thick, by man’s measurement, which the angel was using.  The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass.  The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third chalcedony, the fourth emerald, the fifth sardonyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst.  The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl. The great street of the city was of pure gold, like transparent glass.
I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.  The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.  The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it.  On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there.  The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it.  Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.  (Revelation 21:9-27)

Look at the description of the city.  Each gate is one shining, gleaming, perfect pearl.  Think of the planning that has been going on all throughout eternity.  God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit have been anxiously awaiting OUR arrival!  When we get there will be a Wedding Feast.  Would they go through all that, waste all their important time, if we would never get there because God was mad at us?  Never believe it for a second.

God loves you.  He saved you.  He will keep you.  He will never leave you, nor forsake you, nor forget you.  Look at one more place.

Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. 37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”  (John 6:35-40)

Jesus has said He will not drive us away.  He will not get mad and turn His back on you.  God the Father turned His back on Jesus while on the Cross so that that would not happen to you.  He has saved you.  He will keep you.  He will never leave you nor forsake you.

Never fear that God will stay mad at you.  Remember where those thoughts come from and send them back there.

God loves you… always has… always will!

Bostwick UMC 11/1/20