Fear & Anxiety
I keep feeling like God is angry with me and something bad is coming as punishment. I cannot shake the sense that he is disappointed. Is that true?
“The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever. He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.”
This psalm was written for use in public worship, which means Israel sang these lines together as a corporate statement of who God is. The claim is precise: he has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor repaid us according to our failures. That is not a general sentiment about niceness. It is a considered verdict about how God has actually behaved toward people who had every reason to expect otherwise.
“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.”
John writes to believers unsettled by teachers who had left the church, and he draws a hard line between fear and love. The fear he has in view carries torment with it, the constant expectation of punishment. His diagnosis is not that such fear means you are unloved, but that love has not yet finished its work in you. It is described as something being driven out, not something you should already be past.
A path forward
Write down the specific thing you believe God is angry about. Name it, confess it if it needs confessing, and then read a passage about God's mercy over it out loud. Undefined guilt cannot be resolved.
Ask a pastor to help you distinguish real guilt from inherited fear, especially if you grew up under a harsh picture of God. This is common and it is treatable.
Read the whole of Psalm 103 once a day for two weeks. Repetition is how a picture of God actually changes, and single insights rarely stick.
Closing verse
“But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
- Romans 5:8
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