An author named Jackson Brown wrote, “You can tell a lot about a man by the way he handles these four things: a rainy holiday, lost luggage, a busy store, and tangled Christmas lights. I would definitely add traffic to this list of annoyances. But you probably get that feeling, almost like nails across the chalkboard whenever this list of annoyances is mentioned.
Have you ever been frustrated? Of course we all have. Our frustrations are usually caused by small annoyances that eat away at us. Maybe a family member leaves their clothes on the floor. Or the neighbor’s dog keeps barking, or the customer service department is just not helping us with a problem. There are plenty of potential sources of frustration, and we are indeed living in trying times.
Often frustration can be caused by overstimulation or sensory overload. Sometimes there’s just so much coming at us all the time, whether things are just too loud or too repetitive or interruptive. Many struggle with people invading their personal space, being touched too much, and dealing with others who cross particular boundaries over and over again. That causes a tremendous amount of frustration.
Sometimes frustrations can be even bigger or longer lasting in scope, such as not being able to find a mate, or to have a child. Maybe you imagined your whole life turning out quite a bit differently than it has. It’s nowhere near what you thought it would be. And you don’t see an alternative path. Then there is feeling frustrated with the direction of the world, or perhaps with God? Why do we feel this way?
I have some points for us to consider to help us deal with frustration. A frustration is commonly defined as the feeling of being upset or annoyed, especially because of the inability to change or to achieve something. The point that I want to stress from this definition is that whatever the problem is that may be the cause of our angst is not really the frustration. It’s much more about our reactions to it.
Now for us humans, that is almost always a negative reaction. Because we tend to react negatively to these situations, our frustrations can very easily grow into various levels of unrighteous anger. Have you ever heard somebody who is obviously very angry and you question them about that? And they come back at you with, “I’m not angry. I’m just frustrated.” We tend to believe that our frustrations are completely warranted and justified. “After all, I wouldn’t be frustrated if I hadn’t been wronged.” We do like to rationalize. In the same way, we can rationalize all kinds of inappropriate behavior tied to our frustrations. We tend to believe that our frustrations are actually righteous anger.
In actuality though, we all want what we want. No matter whether it’s a big problem or a small annoyance, when it’s not the way we expected or hoped, it can be frustrating. Our expectations are not being met. We may ask ourselves why a problem keeps recurring or won’t go away, and we think we deserve better. “I’m a good person so why does God keep letting this happen to me?” So let’s define it a bit differently.
Frustration is an emotional response to an obstacle to the fulfillment of our individual will. Stop and think. What is a roadblock in your life that is causing you frustration right now? And when you think of that thing, go back and read the definition again. Frustration is almost always the result of our “will” not happening. And for us humans, it’s almost universally about us wanting to impose our will into a situation. It’s about control, needing to control things or people. It can feel so normal. But it is usually a manifestation of our selfishness, and consequently, it usually has a profoundly negative effect on you and others around you. And oftentimes we don’t realize how much of an effect it has.
There are many places in God’s word where people are dealing with personal frustrations. For example, the frustrations of Abraham and Sarah when they were having difficulty conceiving a child. There are also examples of frustrating situations within Samuel, David, Jonah, and Jesus’ life. Obviously, some knew how to manage their frustrations better than others.
The main point that would be the most helpful is understanding the spiritual need for our growth and development through perseverance. Frustration really is just one form of trial that we must overcome and part of that is seeing and rejecting our will and replacing it with God’s will for us.
“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Romans 5.1-2 NKJV).
So we start off with justification by faith. Because of the faith of Jesus Christ, who died in our stead, we can be declared by God as holy and because of that, we can have peace with God. The futility and frustration that creation was subjected to doesn’t have to live within us. Our will doesn’t have to reign supreme. Being able to stand against that futility and frustration is such an incredible blessing and gift that it should be at the forefront of our minds, no matter what the circumstances that we are experiencing. The hope that’s mentioned is not just a weak possibility. It’s more like an anticipation of a certainty so that our perspective on life as a whole should be changed. In the next verses we see the process and why it’s so important.
“Not only that, we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance and endurance produces character and character, produces hope,” (Romans 5:3-4 ESV).
So as our perseverance, our dealing properly with our frustrations is experienced, character can be formed. Which simply means that we have matured by being proven and tested. And as character is formed, our hope is further nurtured and strengthened. This is not a weak kind of hope. It’s powerful and satisfying.
“and hope does not put us to shame because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, (which) has been given to us.” (Romans 5:5 ESV).
Our hope is not shameful. It’s incredibly satisfying because we can better see the overall plan, vision and purpose that God has for us and all humanity. Our sufferings and our frustrations, no matter how small or great, are placed in a certain light where they begin to make sense. This may all sound rather intellectual, but it’s really the key.
The spirit of God in us, when called upon and exercised, can help us develop to the point that our outlook on life doesn’t allow frustrations to take hold of us. Maturity can only be obtained by dealing with all kinds of challenges. Frustration and anger based on our will is a downward spiral. But faith, character and hope, based on God’s will, is an upward spiral.
For those bigger frustrations in life, we need to continually go to God and ask for readjustment to whatever His will is for our lives. And conversely, if we have problems with frustration it usually means that we’re walking by sight, not by faith in both the big and the small annoyances. It’s extremely important to consider all this because once frustrations set in it gives a place for Satan to work.
Satan knows how humans think and he wants us to get frustrated because frustrated people tend to make poor choices and decisions. Frustration can very easily turn to desperation and a desperate person is quite easy to deceive. We can begin to look for answers to our frustration in all the wrong places and open our minds to all sorts of opinions that will lead us down a slippery slope.
We’ve got to learn to let things go. That doesn’t mean that we give up on a problem. It simply means to learn to let go of the need to control people and things. When we learn to hold the complexities of living in the world down at the low level where they belong and instead put faith in God first, we won’t allow frustration to take root in us.
Two biggest behaviors for us to consider in helping to build and maintain this mindset are first, asking God every single day to align us with His will and to help us to stop thinking that we know the correct path. That can’t be just a phrase that we utter. We need to realize the need and then humbly ask for help. Every frustration, whether big or small, needs to be viewed as if we need to learn something by going through it.
The second big help is to daily focus on a blessing in our life. Doing this exercise can turn our whole day around. It’s that kind of thankful mindset that God wants to see in us and it’s a powerful antidote to frustration.
Now there’s one final item that I want to mention regarding frustration and that’s the fact that when we read God’s word, it appears that God Himself at times exhibits frustration and anger. But we know that He cannot sin, and so we can look to those examples throughout His word on how He deals with it. When we look at them, we see that His anger is not based on selfishness or on Him being inconvenienced in some way. It’s because of our violation of His character, which is entirely based on outgoing love. The anger there is meant to restore relationships that sin destroyed.
I’d like to conclude with a couple of scriptures that I find very encouraging whenever faced with challenges that could lead to frustration and anger.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths” (Proverbs 3:5–6 ESV).
“Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time He may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you” (1 Peter 5:6–10 ESV).
Those are very powerful passages that enhance the points covered in Roman 5.
Tim Vail