Has God Ever Disappointed You?
To love is to risk. I set up expectations of people I love whether I mean to or not. The more I love, the more expectations I have. I sense it when those expectations are not met and I feel like I’ve been let down. It’s something that annoys me about myself. I want to love without expectation. I want to love freely and not let people down or feel like they let me down.
I love God, I pray, I come to him with the things that weigh on my heart. When he doesn’t answer the way I think he should that can make me feel like he let me down. I don’t understand why God chooses to not do things that seem obviously right to me. But I know that he can see more than I can and that he can give me the strength I need to go through those tough times. I know that my risk is higher if I don’t love because then I am truly all alone. Has God ever let you down?
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18 Responses to “Has God Ever Disappointed You?”
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Hi Gerald, thank you for sharing your story with us. I have also been through separation (and unfortunately) divorce. I did not pursue it and, like you, I prayed for healing in the relationship, but nothing improved. It takes two willing hearts, not just one.
I don’t think you should stop praying or hoping for healing. I really admire your courage to keep on praying for that. There may be a time when for the sake of moving on you have to ‘let her go mentally’ in prayer, but that’s for the Holy Spirit to confirm, not me or anyone else. However terrible the circumstance is and how badly it sucks (and especially then), I do believe that God wants to offer you peace and joy and to bless you with people in your life who will support you and pray for you.
When I was a single dad, it felt uncomfortable going to church (I was the only singe dad there), but I swallowed my pride and still stayed involved. That was really good for my kids and it kept me from being stupid amidst the pain, like seeking a relationship with a woman when I was still too broken.
I’ll keep you in my prayers! If you want to talk to one of our confidential online mentors, just click on “Talk to a Mentor” on the top right of the screen.
Thanks again for sharing
Hi Daley, your comment stuck out to me because I’m also a musician and I have also been praying for God to lead me on a journey of seeing my music touch more lives. Of course we’ve never met and I’ve never heard your music. So, I would just say a few things:
First, when you say you have a gift for music, I’m assuming that this has been confirmed by people outside of your family who can give honest feedback, and I’m assuming your skills are such that you are ready for public performances.
Second, I would encourage you to keep on praying, practicing and to not give up. Also, it’s good to search your heart for what motivates you. If you’re like me, it feels pretty good to perform in front of people and that can boost our ego, but if we want our music to be a powerful instrument of the Holy Spirit, then our main motivation must be to ‘make God look good’ and to ‘make Him known.’ Have you given God a blank check with your music or are you holding on to a vision of what you think it should be? I don’t know you personally, so I’m just asking you this because it’s something I had to examine in my own heart.
Third, if you haven’t already, I would encourage you to take risks by putting yourself out there in the local music scene, whether that means church, open mics, or such. As you step out into the community, trusting God to direct you, I believe he will show you where your music is supposed to go.
Last year I did very little musically and was quite discouraged and wondered what God was up to. At first I thought I was supposed to use my music at church, but we had just started attending a church that was blessed to have a lot of musicians and didn’t really need my help. It took a while, but I finally realized that God was challenging me to take my music out of the Christian bubble and to use it as way to connect with not-yet-Christians. So I started going to the open mics in town. What I’ve discovered is that God has been leading me very clearly every step of the way, making it easy to build relationships. I even have an amazing guitarist friend (twice my age, but that doesn’t seem to matter) who is working out accompaniment to some of the songs I hope to record into an EP. I’ve seen my songs bring joy to people who don’t yet know God, and that is very exciting.
All that is to say that God loves taking his children (like you and me) on adventures of faith, but sometimes it takes a while for us to be ready to be released, to truly give him a blank check and to trust Him to fulfill the desires of our hearts in a better way than we could ever imagine.
Take care, I’ll be praying for you.
Yes I have and am now.ive been praying for musicians to come in my life for along!!! Time and I’ve seen no fruit of friendship or musicians in my life.i am 20 years old and adventurous.i feel left out and I feel like God is just leaving me out.i have a gift but want to share it but know one wants apart of it
.it sucks being single and it sucks having a passion in which you care about.And I agree with Gerald about gods promises the desire of my heart is to see life’s changed by the music I play and relationships to come in but I’ve been praying standing and believing but,……..nothing…..
I feel extremely let down and disappointed by God. For the last 9 months I have been praying, believing, hoping and wishing that the mother of my children would come back to me and have a heart that wants to be married and officially solidify our family. I’ve been believing God for this for all this time to minister to her spirit to show her how important it is for her to be saved and how much she means to me and how much this is all affecting our kids. All to no avail, as not much has changed except the date on the calendar. So much time I feel like I’ve wasted. All the promises of the Bible feel like some kind of joke. I’m hurt and devastated and frustrated. Nothing has any sweetness anymore. Sometimes I even find myself looking at the kids like an annoyance because when I see them I think of their mother and the boot she always gives me to kiss. I feel mad at the world in general and love songs and wedding commercials make me want to throw a brick at the TV. The world took a serious poop on my dreams, and crying out to God, seeking his kingdom first, praising his name and letting him mold me did nothing but fill me with false hope. The “desires of my heart” clearly have not been given unto me. I just feel suckered.
Dear Floyd, thank you for opening up and sharing your heart with us. May you know that God loves you unconditionally no matter how you feel about yourself or what others may have spoken against you. I would like to give you a link to the “Father’s Love Letter” that will help you to realize how much God cares about you personally.
http://www.fathersloveletter.com/text.html
Also, it sounds like you are really down and could greatly benefit by connecting with one of our Mentors that can encourage you through this season of sadness. Here is a link for you to be able to connect with one of them via email: http://powertochange.com/experience/talk-to-a-mentor/
Floyd, God does not want you to be feeling down, sad, and depressed. He has wonderful plans for your future. I hope and pray that you will feel moved to reach out for additional help and encouragement. Are you a believer in the Lord? Do you attend church?
i feel god doesn’t love me. I wish I’d never been born. I’m obese, depressed, stupid, and wish I’d never been born
Carol, I am so sorry for your pain, as you clearly have the desire to reach out to others with a very giving heart. Truly, I understand the hurt you feel with your parents, and the sense that they have chosen your sister over you. For years I actually felt the same way with my mother until I learned that she felt that I was available to her any time, but she had to be open to my siblings whenever they were available to her. That gave me a different understanding and it took the feelings of rejection away that I would experience whenever she would choose their invitations and offers given to her by me and my husband.
Something else I have come to understand after much suffering is that I would often plan things in my life, desiring to bless others, but it was not what God wanted me to be doing. What I was failing to do was to turn to Him in prayer BEFORE I made decisions to ask for God’s plans for my days and future, so that I could walk in His will for my life, rather me choosing what I wanted Him to bless. He knows much better than I what is best for, not only today, but for the longterm.
Carol, I pray that you can find peace in seeking God’s will for your life day-by-day and in serving the beautiful children He has given you, as well as in loving your husband and being the best help-meet to him you possibly can be as you look forward to his return home to you. May the Lord Jesus richly bless your marriage and your family in every way, and may He draw you ever closer to Himself as you seek His will for you daily. In Jesus’ holy and mighty Name, I pray. Amen.
I seem to be constantly disappointed by people in my life.With friends, I would be the first to help in a crisis…to do what I could.I tried to call them to do get togethers, and they would give me huge gratitude and sing my praises, and tell me what a great time we would have together. Then I would find out they have been doing things with mutual friends and not included me. When I could have used comfort and help, they all said they felt bad and I should call on them if I needed it, but it was fake. They never called to see how I was or really offered to do anything. Others, I have been best friend phone confidents…but then they would ask others over to their house…never me to be social with. I am always feeling excluded and that they can’t come through for me. These are long time friends that have lots of friends & family around. I have no family around. I tried to please my in-laws for 27 years only to have them never to speak to me or my 3 kids again because I am good friends with my sister-in-law who asked my mother-in-law to treat her nicer and not make such nasty comments to her. It started “WWIII” and I was hated by pure association.They tried to break up our marriages bad mouthing us to our husbands and blaming us for all the family problems. It almost cause 2 divorces and our kids have gone through hell listening to many fights about the in-laws. I tried for 10 years to move home close to my sister(14 years younger than i am) and my parents. I finally did with my 3 children(2,3 and 7 at the time) and my parents moved to Florida permanently. My sister and new husband followed moving within 2 hour distance of my parents. My parents picked up and moved closer to her. My sister then moved 8 hours away because of her husband’s job.I have put my 3 kids in the car and drove 2-3 times a year to Florida to visit my parents & sister.My sister only visited me 2 times, both for less than 1/2 day and mainly to see other people in town. I have a very close relationship with my mother and speak with her on the phone every single day.We have both said for 14 years we wished my dad would agree to sell the house and at least have a condo near me for part of the year, and near my sister for part of the year.My parents health has been declining. My sister knew I wanted my parents near me so I could help with their needs…my kids are all almost out of high school so it’s easier for me. She has 4 little kids now.I went back to school to be a nurse planning to help my parents as my mother has cancer for a 4th time and my father has Parkinson’s. Apparently my sister wrote my father a letter asking him to move near her so they could help them and she could help them too. My parents visited them and my brother in law convinced them to move right near them.Even picked out a house. My mother,told me in a text message. My father FINALLY agreed to sell the house but instead of getting a condo near both of us so we could share in responsibility of our parents and both have them in our lives, I was completely left out of the discussions and decisions. All I wanted was to spend real daily time with my parents before they die. I don’t want to be the “visitor” on Christmas for a week.I want to be part of their daily lives and now my sister will get that and so will her kids. I am not so jealous, but so hurt that my parents have once again chosen her over me and act like I’m ruining everything and being selfish because I am so upset. My husband lost his job and the only position the company could offer him was in China. So he is there for at least 1/2 year and I am on my own with friends that don’t think to even ask how I’m doing, much less ask me to do social things with them. And No family around. I am just always feeling left out and that I always give more than I ever give back with people I really care about & love. All I wanted to do was spend time with my parents…be able to run to their house to help them with something or invite my mom over for coffee or go shopping with her. And even help with nursing care when they need it. My whole life I grew up without family around. My father moved from Canada so I only saw one gradparent at Christmas once a year. I never had any extended family and I didn’t want that for my kids.I don’t understand why things like this happen to me.I would do anything for anyone, but it is never reciprocated and I always feel so hurt. Why can’t I have the best friend and why can’t my family ever make me a priority and why do my in-laws hate me and why did I have to endure such fighting/unrest from my husband and why do 2 of my kids have difficult disabilities and why do we always struggle for money and why can’t i be a part of my life with my parents before they die and why doesn’t my sister want a close relationship with me and choose my parents over me?? I know others have it worse, but I am not asking to be a millionaire and have diamonds & furs. I just want to be able to love my parents and be there for them and it hurts me that they choose my sister.Why do others have their families around them…they don’t need close friendships with me because they have their siblings & parents close by. I try so hard to follow God’s path for me but I can’t see any. I question every decision I make. Nothing seems to work out.I feel like my life has no purpose, not even in my own family.I just can’t be happy. NOTHING is how I want it to be. Not even one thing.I feel powerless.I try trusting God, Jesus and praying to him. But nothing happens that makes me happy.I try making decisions and going back to school, finding another job, but nothing feels right or works out.I put my whole life into my kids and my family and I feel I disappointed my kids and I feel disappointed by my family.
I can understand that you would be disappointed with God right now Rolex. That kind of financial crisis is so hard to live through and when there doesn’t seem to be any help from God even when you pray has got to shake your confidence in Him and His ability or willingness to help you.
When you say your family is in danger is that just because of the lack of money or is there something else threatening you and your family?
So tell me, what was your relationship with God like before your dad lost his job? Did you feel that you and God could talk and He would listen and help you out? Were there things that God said to you?
I also felt disappointment with God for almost a year now. My life is going downhill, my father lost his job and we are almost reduced to poverty by now. And every night before I go to sleep I would ask, why God was so unfair, so cruel. I go to church every week, I go ro confession, and all the things like that. But nothing seemed to inprove, and now my family’s unstable life is in danger.
Dear Anonymous,
So sorry to hear that you feel that God has disappointed you and that you do not trust or believe that God is good, loving, caring, etc.. Sounds like you have been let down and disappointed in many areas of your life…does this include people close to you as well such as parents, siblings, close friends, etc? Sometimes people develop a poor image and view of God based upon how other people has treated them.
One of the first steps in having a wonderful relationship with God is to acknowledge and accept Jesus, God’s Son, into your heart and life making Him your personal Lord and Savior. Have you taken this critical step in asking Jesus into your heart and life?
Yes I do feel that God has disappointed me in pretty much every area of my life. I do not trust or believe that God is good, loving, caring, kind, trustworthy and all the other things that people say he is supposedly is based on my experiences with God in my life.
The enemy is strong…and sometimes our heart can be decetful. He says He will never leave you nor forsake you..I have trouble with Trusting in the Lord also. My heart aches for this world and those that are close to me that are not save.Greater is He that is in you than He that is in the world…sounds like you need rest from the battle for awhile????
@ Anonymous
I understand the pain of being rejected by others as I myself was rejected and always had difficulty making friends. My parents, and siblings accepted me however as our culture was different years ago my parents were powerless to protect me from my outside family and from my peers in school. I like you accepted Christ when I was very young and I knew that he did love me but was unable to understand why God would not protect me. We finally moved from the situation that I was in to thousand miles away and the little devil that was tormenting me lost his power. However part of the problem was that I never fully surrendered to Christ and as I felt accepted being rejected. I married someone who was abusive and my marriage ended seven years later. She informed me I was too nice to her and was unable to handle this so she walked out of my life and I have not seen her since.
I thought God would send me someone else but to date he has not done so as God wanted me to surrender fully him. During my divorce I lost everything I had and ended alone, and seriously debated if I should leave my family and walk the streets like the homeless do as I came pretty close to walking this road. God LOVED me too much for this to happen. I moved into an apartment downtown that were full of drug dealers, strippers, and not exactly the cream of society lived at this place.
During my time alone from the world when I shut everyone out I was so alone that I would often talk to woman who were strangers thinking they would not wish to talk with me but for some reason woman were attracted to me. I would walk the streets and begin conversations with woman in the park as I enjoy talking to strangers. I was very surprised that they wanted me to take them to my place for sex even though it would have been very easy to walk down that road I knew that it would only make the hurt of rejection deeper. Even though I felt let down by God for some very strange reason I sensed God was protecting me from becoming involved with the strangers. I guess deep down I knew I would feel extremely guilty if I took I walked down that road so God protected me from becoming involved with the wrong kind of love.
I decided to allow God to heal me and accepted the love of my family and Christians around me. I prayed that the Holy Spirit would help me forgive others who hurt me and heal my severely wounded troubled soul. He did but it took me a journey that took a long time. Your mistake is to believe that Christians SHOULD accept you however often they don’t and what I have learned to do is show my love to the unloved. The biggest issue that you face is the rejection that you feel and it is a mistake to blame God for this and blaming God for letting you down. It was not God that let you down it was the human being who let you down. The most important aspect that I have learned in all of my life’s bitter disappointment is that it does not matter if I have a million dollars or if I don’t have friends or if friends leave me or if I am totally rejected. When I understood that my blueprint for my life is different than God’s blueprint and I accepted God’s blueprint then I understood that even though I thought I was walking down a pathway that led to the top of a mountain. I was walking down a path that led to a cliff and if I fell into the abyss I would never be able to escape.
In Romans 15: 13 I pray that God the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.
I had extreme bitterness and if I didn’t forgive then no one will want to be around me. It is very easy to think WOE is me no one loves me and give up and feel bitterness however if I LOVE others then an amazing occurrence happens I begin to accept myself. If others don’t love me I have learned to not care if they don’t because it is their loss I will show love to others who need love. Christians are not perfect and many don’t live the spirit filled life however when I pray that Jesus Christ will give me joy through the Holy Spirit then I am joyful and how do I become joyful? I am most joyful when I use the gifts that the Holy Spirit has given me to serve and love others then I feel completed.
YOU may have thought that God let you down but he never has let you down as the bitterness inside of you is preventing you from receiving his blessings. When you forgive and get rid of bitterness you will be able to share the joy of Christ. I have learned to never look for love from others as they will not love me but I know that God loves me and that he will give me joy, peace and others will look at me and see Christs love. It does not matter what others do to you it only matters what you do for others which is show Christ love.
You were born into a Buddhist family and Christ revealed himself to you in a dream and you accepted him. YOU have no idea how fortunate you are as God does not show himself through Christ in a dream to anyone. Christ does not reveal himself in a dream to anyone as he must have a very special purpose for your life. Christ wants you to show his love to the Buddhists which is why he revealed himself to you. To show Buddhists his love as imagine a church that is planted with fellow Buddhists what this effect would have? When you crawl in a hole and feel rejected because Christians don’t accept you then show the love of Christ to reach the Buddhists. You will be amazed as to what the Christians response will be when you follow Christs purpose for your life to reach the Buddhists. The same Christians whom you believe reject you now will will see that your bitterness is gone and that you show love towards others.
My dear dear friend DON’T allow the devil to poison your mind with bitterness as when we submit totally to the Holy Spirit then God will do supernatural things that will be beyond your comprehension. I am a Christian and I ACCEPT you so will many others. Love to hear your response and on behalf of all the Christians who reject you I am sorry on their behalf please forgive them and allow the Holy Spirit to do amazing works in your life. I am sorry for the very long reply as I try to keep my response short. God LOVES you and so do I. God Bless!
Yes he did.
I was born buddhist and in the age of 5 i enrolled to christian elementary student. At the same age i went to chapel for the first time and i felt like “i miss you” in my heart. That night i had a dream and Jesus came, asking me if i want to follow Him or not, i replied yes.
Sixteen years had passed and my life is like hell. I’ve never been really good at making friends ever since kindergarden, i don’t know why but senior high is hell to me. I live in social oblivion in senior high, people always look down and despise me. I am what you guys call ‘nerds’. At eighteen, when i’m in third grade of senior high i converted into christianism and gave myself to babtism. I always attended prayer meetings whenever possible, eventhough it can last to four hours and held three times a week. But in the end, the others in that prayer group was just all the same. They look down on me, despise me, humiliated me, and in the end i got expelled from that same group.
I am what you call pantheist, or believe in God. Yes He exists. He truly exists and there’s so much between me and God that i can not put it all. But thing is, why is my life is so full of bitterness?
And if you are a Christian and you say that i let myself full of bitterness than im going to ask you in return, have you ever considered what it is like to be rejected by Christians? Mahatma Gandhi once wanted to convert into Christianism, astonished by Jesus but christians rejected him because he is an indian. And when he asked “what is the greatest wall to christianism in india” he answered “christians”.
Stop judging me christians, ive met Jesus your God and He is love. But you christians, are nothing but bitterness in my life. Period.
Mika, my heart goes out to you and in all honesty I have to say that I do understand that feeling of God ‘disappointing’ us. I have felt that in my life too and it took me a long time to realize that God wasn’t the one doing the disappointing but that it was sin in this world that causes such incredible heartache. In fact He was there right beside me through the entire trial. If you would like one of our mentors to contact you Mika just fill out the form here and someone will email you privately. http://powertochange.com/discover/talk-to-a-mentor/
Sarah, you said it so very well, that time does heal and that it gives you a different perspective on things.
The human part of me sometimes feels alone and let down, but when I stop rolling in my sorrow and look back at the situation I can see that it wasn’t God who let me down. I made my own choices and can even remember when that nagging feeling I had to change my mind at times. Time heals everything and to look back you sometimes have a different perspective on things. Sometimes you can even see why it didn’t work out “our” way. Most situations that I have blamed God for have been caused by myself or part of a greater plan. And to think that being a christian meant that life would be a cake walk is really silly of me. I am So grateful that he doesn’t close the door on me everytime I disappoint him, or I wouldn’t make it past a single day. I praise my Lord for his Mercy and forgiveness and require it on a daily basis.
I feeel like God is disappointing. I have some restrictions when it comes to him Because a few years ago God disappointed me. I feel like he let me down. I made the choice of choosing to live for God and God alone then all hell broke loose on me. I couldn’t understand. I didn’t understand why would God do this to me? I choose to live for him. Then I started question my beliefs and my relationship with God and Jesus. I know God has been trying to bring my back to Him but I just can’t see myself committing myself to him again. I know I need too but I can’t find it in my heart to trust him and love him again. I feel like I can’t let me guard down with him