The godless in heart harbor resentment. Job 36:13
Dear heavenly Father, whether from an annoying fly interrupting a needed nap, betrayal by a trusted friend, the first ding in a new car, or an old hurt generating fresh pain, resentment never helps, nor is it ever necessary. Resentment only robs and rots our hearts. Like a parasite from hell, it sucks the life and joy right out of us.
To harbor resentment is nothing short of harboring a criminal, for resentment is bent on criminal activity: stealing peace, vandalizing sleep, robbing relationship, killing kindness, murdering hope, infecting the innocent with deadly toxins… to name a few of resentment’s crimes. There’s no greater waste of energy than resentment—much more than all the oil that was spilled last year into the Gulf of Mexico.
But worst of all, Father, resentment is a glaring contradiction of the gospel we love—a blatant misrepresentation of the God we worship. For if anyone has a right to hold a grudge, to keep a record of wrongs done, to rehearse and remember our sins against us, it is you.
Yet you do not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is your love for those who fear you; as far as the east is from the west, that’s how far you’ve removed our transgressions from us. You’re the Father who has compassion on us as your children (Ps. 103:10–13). You show us neither vexation of spirit nor exasperation of heart, so great is your love for us in Jesus.
So Father, by the love that sent Jesus to the cross and the power that raised him from the dead, heal and change us. Bitterness and bile are so unbecoming of your sons and daughters. Whether we have deeply rooted resentments or freshly planted ones, extract them all. We don’t want to be godless in heart, but grace-full in heart. We want to be free even from resenting other people’s resentment. So very Amen we pray, in Jesus’ merciful and forbearing name. Amen.
