I had a handful of good and hard conversations this weekend at RESOLVED on complaining and the seriousness of it.Paul writes in Philippians 2:14 "Do everything without complaining or grumbling" (Philippians 2:14 Πάντα ποιεῖτε χωρὶς γογγυσμῶν καὶ διαλογισμῶν).
The sin of complaining is in essence saying to God: "God—I deserve better than what you have given me; I am discontent with what you have granted me at this time." Complaining—whether verbally spoken or inwardly hidden—is just as heinous to God. It is, at the core, a distrust in the sovereignty of God and the sovereign provision of God at that particular moment. It is distrusting the goodness of God.
Furthermore, complaining is not delighting in the LORD. It is the opposite of: Psalm 37:4 —Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart. Rather than delighting in God, complaining exposes a hostility toward the active providence and involvement in our lives at a particular moment.
Some ways to deal with the sin of complaining in your own life can include the following (this is a partial not an exhaustive list):
1. Pray daily and ask God for the grace to help you overcome the temptation to complain.
2. Remember regularly what you really deserve, namely, the eternal judgment of God.
3. Daily counsel your own soul to delight yourself in the LORD and in His sovereign and all-wise provisions that He graces to you.
4. Ask yourself when you are tempted to sin by complaining what God may be trying to teach you at that particular moment.
5. Learn to trust in God in every situation that He brings into your life by thanking Him for what He has done, how He is involved, how He is sovereign, and then respond to that with a grateful, teachable, and humble heart.
