God Is Not Angry at You
“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
(Romans 5:1)
God is not angry at you. Through Jesus Christ, you have been brought into permanent peace with God. Unfortunately, because His character is so misrepresented by institutional Christianity, a person can believe their sins are forgiven and still think God is angry at them. In fact, many Christians believe God is furious with them, even after salvation. Our Creator is made out to be a parole officer who doesn’t offer much consolation after our release, but instead, His job is to make sure we toe the line. And if we don’t? Right back to jail we go!
Even worse, in my opinion, is that He’s portrayed as someone who’s extremely two-faced—saying, “Let me comfort you,” and then suddenly switching to, “You’ve gone too far this time!”
Tragically, many believers give up on enjoying their relationship with God because He’s depicted as having the same mentality as legalistic men. The good news is, He doesn’t.
Unlike those who claim to represent Him, but clearly do not, God has no desire to control you. Nor does He want to squeeze you for 10% of your income. Your loving Heavenly Father also does not compare your failures and achievements to others, despite what’s been said by those who’ve smeared His name.
Perhaps you’ve heard just enough about Jesus to know you’re going to heaven, but you’ve been convinced that the Father is frustrated with you until you finally arrive. He loves you, you think, but He’s also constantly irritated by your actions and attitudes. You might flinch when you’re not doing what He says, and relax only when you are. When you pray at night, your prayers feel good after a good day, but after a bad day, you hesitate to even whisper something.
You might even imagine Him nodding His head in reassurance because of the good deeds you do. Or you picture Him with His arms crossed while you explain away why you didn’t.
What’s saddest is that this man-made characterization of God has caused countless saints to resist basking in the very grace they’ve received through Jesus—a grace that superabounds beyond anything our finite human minds can fathom. They’ve been taught to dismiss grace as a license to sin rather than recognize it as what empowers them to not sin (see Titus 2:11-12).
So, they still think the Father is angry. Very, very angry.
If He’s angry, then why would Paul write this?
“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 5:1)
If we have peace with God, then how could He be angry? And do you see who caused us to have such peace?
Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Yet because Christ is of no real importance to many who teach about Him, Jesus is treated as an afterthought to whatever they want to talk about instead. Consequently, peace with God is an afterthought.
Paul didn’t say we have occasional peace, temporary peace, or peace until our next failure. What Jesus did on the Cross was more than sufficient to establish permanent peace with no fine print.
YOU’RE STANDING, NOT BALANCING
In Romans chapter 5, Paul didn’t stop at peace alone. In the very next verse, he said something that gives us our foundation:
“Through Him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand.” (Romans 5:2)
You stand in grace.
You’re not tiptoeing on the edge of God’s patience like a tightrope walker in a windstorm, hoping your next mistake doesn’t send you plunging deep into a chasm. Standing is what you do on solid ground.
Religion hands you a much different picture. It gives you a checklist for keeping God happy: pray enough, read enough, give enough, volunteer enough, feel bad enough. The longer you’re involved with that system, the longer the list grows and the more your peace shrinks, because nobody will ever tell you how much “enough” actually is.
You’ll spend your whole life chasing a number nobody will give you, just “to be safe.”
Paul gave you something better than a number. He gave you a Name.
Notice, too, that having peace with God and feeling peaceful are two different things. You can have a terribly anxious Tuesday because of circumstances you’re dealing with, all while your standing with the Father hasn’t budged an inch. You can feel embarrassed about something you said that you wish you hadn’t, while He remains completely at peace with you.
Your emotions are real, but they don’t get a vote on what Jesus accomplished.
So the question is never, Did I have a good enough day for God to be at peace with me? The question is, Did Jesus establish permanent peace that causes me to stand in His grace?
He did.
GOD PUT IT UNDER OATH
Most Christians know Isaiah 53 well. It describes the Messiah being pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities. But very few people keep reading into the next chapter, which is a shame, because what God says after describing the Cross is stunning:
“‘For this is like the waters of Noah to Me; for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah would no longer cover the earth, so have I sworn that I would not be angry with you, nor rebuke you. For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but My kindness shall not depart from you, nor shall My covenant of peace be removed,’ says the Lord, who has mercy on you.” (Isaiah 54:9-10)
Think about that. God compared His promise to not be angry with you to the rainbow He gave Noah. Then He doubled down by calling it a covenant of peace, a prophecy of the New Covenant that came through Jesus on the Cross. The next time a storm rolls through, you won’t worry about a flood wiping out the planet. Why? Because God made a promise thousands of years ago, and He’s kept it every single time it’s rained since.
That’s the same kind of promise He attached to His anger toward you.
He didn’t say, “I’ll try not to be angry with you.” He didn’t say, “I won’t be angry unless you mess up again.” He swore it. And notice the order: first the suffering Servant who carries our sins in chapter 53, then the sworn peace in chapter 54. The oath stands on His sacrifice.
Mountains can move and hills can crumble, but His kindness toward you will never depart.
“BUT MATT, GOD NEVER CHANGES!”
I hear this one all the time. Somebody opens to a passage where God was furious with ancient Israel because they were rebelling against the covenant they promised to keep, and says, “See? Same God! He doesn’t change!”
Truthfully, they’re right. God never changes. What changed was the covenant, through Jesus. Same God. New Covenant.
An unchanging God can make one promise in one era and a different promise in another, once justice has been satisfied. And it was—through Jesus (see Romans 3:25-26, 1 Peter 3:18). His faithfulness is exactly why He followed through. The same God who dealt with Israel under the Old Covenant is the same God who swore that oath in Isaiah 54 and then fulfilled it through His Son.
That’s not a personality change. That’s the Promise Keeper keeping promises.
And if you want to know what an unchanging God looks like, look at Jesus. Hebrews 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”
How did Jesus treat people who trusted Him or were at least interested?
In Luke 19, He walked under a sycamore tree, looked up at Zacchaeus—a tax collector the whole town despised—and basically said, “Get down here. I’m coming to your house for dinner” (see Luke 19:5). He didn’t make Zacchaeus clean up his books first. He invited Himself over.
Was Jesus ever angry? Absolutely. Mark tells us He looked around “with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts” (Mark 3:5). But who was He looking at? The religious leaders who cared more about their rules than about a man with a withered hand. Jesus saved His anger for those who were burdening people with self-righteousness, not for the people being burdened.
That should tell you something about whose side He’s on.
So when someone pulls an Old Testament passage about God’s anger and aims it at you, ask some simple questions. Who was being addressed? What covenant were they under? And how should I see this in light of what Jesus accomplished?
If you don’t, you’ll keep seeing an angry face on a loving God.
THE FATHER RAN
Jesus told a story about a son who took his inheritance early, blew all of it, and ended up so broke he was eyeing the pig slop with envy (see Luke 15:11-16). Finally, he decided to head home. And like a lot of us would have done, he rehearsed a speech on the way: I’m not worthy to be called your son. Just make me a hired hand.
Here’s what happened when he got close:
“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.” (Luke 15:20)
The father ran.
In that culture, a respected older man didn’t run anywhere. To do that, he’d have to hike up his robe and show his legs in front of the whole village, which was undignified and embarrassing. But the father didn’t care. His son was coming home.
And notice when the kiss happened: before the speech. The son got a few words into his rehearsed apology, and the father cut right past it, calling for the best robe, a ring, and a party (see Luke 15:21-23). He didn’t wait to hear whether the repentance was sincere enough. He didn’t make his son grovel on the porch and work his way back into the family.
That boy never stopped being a son. Not in the far country, not in the pigpen, not on the walk home. He only thought he had. Even when the father said, “This son of mine was dead and has come to life again,” notice what he still called him: his son (see Luke 15:24).
Maybe you’ve been rehearsing your own speech, the one you think you’ll need to deliver before the Father will look at you kindly again.
You can put that speech away. He’s already run toward you, embraced you, and kissed your face off.
YOU’RE IN THE ONE HE’S PLEASED WITH
When Jesus came up out of the water at His baptism, the Father spoke from heaven: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17).
Here’s what I love about that. Jesus hadn’t preached anything to anyone. He hadn’t performed a single recorded miracle. He hadn’t gone to the Cross. The Father was pleased with Him simply because of who He was.
Now look at where Paul says you are. God “made us accepted in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1:6). The Beloved. That’s the same Person the Father spoke about at the Jordan River. You aren’t standing outside of Christ, hoping some of the Father’s approval splashes onto you. You’re literally in Him. The way the Father feels about His Son is the way He feels about everyone who is in His Son.
That’s you, dear Christian.
This is why you don’t have to address God as “Your Honor.” You can call Him “Abba, Father!” (see Galatians 4:6). Abba is a family word. It’s what a child calls a dad he isn’t afraid of but looks to for protection and comfort.
Jesus didn’t present Himself as the only kind and caring Person in heaven. He told His disciples plainly that the Father Himself loved them (see John 16:27). Not tolerated them. Not put up with them until Jesus could talk Him down. Loved them. Loved means loved.
GRIEF IS NOT ANGER
“But we can still grieve the Holy Spirit!”
Yes, we can. Paul wrote, “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” (Ephesians 4:30). But look at what sits right next to the word grieve: sealed. In the same breath that Paul mentions grieving the Spirit, he reminds you that the Spirit has sealed you. That’s comforting, not threatening, and it proves grieve does not mean anger.
Let me ask you a question: When you go to a funeral, are you angry? No, not unless there’s some kind of injustice surrounding the death. Instead, when you go to a funeral, you are grieving. You are full of sorrow.
When my daughter, Grace, first learned to ride her bike without training wheels, I told her not to go too fast down the hills. If she’d ignored me and wiped out, I wouldn’t have stood over her while she was crying with a bleeding knee and said, “You just got what you deserved!”
Absolutely not. I’d be sorrowful, grieved, because she got hurt. I’d want to help her up, clean her off, hug her, and help her understand why I warned her in the first place. Her choice would never erase my love. I wouldn’t be angry. I’d be concerned.
Now apply that to God, who’s a much better Father than I am.
The same goes for “quenching” the Spirit (see 1 Thessalonians 5:19). Imagine Grace and I are sitting by a campfire, and she dumps a bucket of water on it. She’s quenched the fire. We’ve lost the warmth and the light, and that’s a shame. But the bucket of water didn’t change who she is to me.
When you ignore who you are—or lie about who you are while displaying false humility and self-abasement—the Spirit cares, because it smothers the warmth and light He shines through you. People around you need that. It also pushes Him down, because He wants to express Himself through you, with you (see Galatians 5:22-23). But His concern for your well-being isn’t hostility toward you. You can agree with Him about your behavior without ever doubting that you belong or that He loves you.
A GOOD FATHER TEACHES
Just because God isn’t angry at you doesn’t mean your choices don’t matter. Sinful decisions can wreck your marriage, your body, your finances, and your peace of mind. Your Father cares about all of that, and He’ll teach you, correct your thinking, and help you grow—but He always does this graciously and without condemnation.
Hebrews describes this training as something that happens because you’re His child, not so you can become His child (see Hebrews 12:5-8). Belonging comes first. The gentle instruction flows from it. The writer even admits that it isn’t always pleasant in the moment, but afterward it bears “the peaceable fruit of righteousness” (Hebrews 12:11). There’s that word again: peace.
And God delivers that training peacefully too. The unpleasant part doesn’t come from Him. It comes from our old mindsets and coping mechanisms having to let go of what they’re used to.
But know this: God never punishes you for your sins through pain. Jesus already took that punishment on the Cross.
And please don’t assume every hard thing in your life is God disciplining you. A flat tire doesn’t mean God is mad. It might just mean you ran over a nail. Always remember that we live in a broken world where people make bad choices, bodies get sick because of flawed DNA, and water heaters burst at the worst possible time. Your Father will help you through hard things without having sent them to punish you.
STOP CHECKING GOD’S MOOD
Some Christians treat God like a weather app. Every morning, they check the forecast: Sunny with a chance of blessing? Or partly cloudy with a seventy percent chance of smiting? Then they plan their whole day around what they think His mood will be.
Our Bernese Mountain Dog, Maggie, does something like this. When she’s chewed up something she shouldn’t have, she slinks into the room with her ears flat and her eyes up, braced for trouble. Meanwhile, I’ve already thrown the shoe away and I just think she’s cute. She’s reading a mood that isn’t there. I’m not mad. Now Jennifer might be, but not me. Just kidding, honey.
Unfortunately, that’s how a lot of saints think about their Father.
Maybe you’re worried His patience has a limit. It doesn’t. Time doesn’t matter to Him because He’s not bound by it. Paul—a man who had once hunted down Christians—said Jesus showed him “all longsuffering, as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life” (1 Timothy 1:16). If Jesus’ patience was enough for the number-one persecutor of Christians, His patience can handle your repeated, lifelong struggles.
People may run out of patience with you. You may even run out of patience with yourself. But God never will. His patience is limitless.
So the next time you have a bad day or a bad moment, don’t wait until you’ve strung together a week of good behavior before you talk to Him. Hebrews says, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16). And guess what? You’ve already done that, my friend. You’re not approaching that throne over and over every time you make a mistake. You’re already sitting on your Daddy’s lap.
He’s happy you’re there, and He is not angry at you.
This devotional is from an upcoming book! Check out Matt’s other bestselling books here!