Angry at God for Our Foolishness?

Enthusiasm without knowledge is no good;
haste makes mistakes.
People ruin their lives by their own foolishness
and then are angry at the Lord.
- Proverbs 19:2-3 (NLT)

(Ow! Ow! Ow! Surely I haven't been guilty of this, have I?)

I put this passage into the same category as this verse: "And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them." (Romans 8:28, NLT)

How's that, you ask? Think about it. Don't we have a tendency to assign to every event the idea that God has ordained it to be so? Don't get me wrong; while God does specifically ordain and orchestrate many things that happen and often executes these things through His people who are following Him closely (and sometimes through those who don't know Him), He also allows us -- beings to whom He's given free will -- to make choices, both good and bad. How He uses the outcome of the latter (our choices) is where we see His power to make a jeweled purse out of a proverbial sow's ear. This is exemplified throughout the Scriptures. Don't take what I opine as being the absolute truth. Search the Word for yourself to see if what I'm saying is correct.

As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been blind from birth. "Rabbi," his disciples asked him, "why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?" "It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins," Jesus answered. "This happened so the power of God could be seen in him."
- John 9:1-3, NLT

As Jesus said, this man was born blind so that the power of God could be seen in him.

But later...

One of the men lying there [at the Sheep Gate] had been sick for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, “Would you like to get well?” . . .
Jesus told him, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!”
Instantly, the man was healed! He rolled up his sleeping mat and began walking! But this miracle happened on the Sabbath. . .
But afterward Jesus found him in the Temple and told him, “Now you are well; so stop sinning, or something even worse may happen to you.”
- John 5:5-6, 8-9. 14, NLT (emphasis mine)

Not only did Jesus not directly tell the man in the second passage that his affliction had been given to him so that God would be glorified, but He tells the man afterward that actions have consequences.

We don't even necessarily need to go too "deep" with what Jesus said. He may have meant something much more mundane than we typically read into this. For instance, "If you continue to be verbally abusive to your neighbor, he may hit you in the face and crush your nose, giving you breathing problems for the rest of your life." Simple advice, but very practical. And possibly worse than being crippled.

Posted in: Christianity, Life, The Bible, Trials