There are many sins of the tongue—gossip, slander, swearing, coarse joking—but one sin may be even more displeasing to God than these: the sin of complaining.
Complaining and grumbling are mentioned nearly fifty times in Scripture, and it’s never a positive thing. Consider the story in Numbers 11. The Israelites had been freed from Egyptian slavery and were now journeying through the desert toward the land God had promised them. But after perhaps months of eating nothing but the miraculous manna God provided, they were getting tired of it.
We remember the fish which we ate freely in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic; but now our whole being is dried up; there is nothing at all except this manna before our eyes!
God’s response to their complaining? He would send them quail to eat, but it wouldn’t be pleasant. His verdict, delivered by Moses, was this:
Therefore the Lord will give you meat, and you shall eat. You shall eat, not one day, nor two days, nor five days, nor ten days, nor twenty days, but for a whole month, until it comes out of your nostrils and becomes loathsome to you, because you have despised the Lord who is among you.
Oh my. And yet how many of us would grumble if we had to eat the same thing three or four meals in a row?
Ephesians 4:29 gives us an important admonition. “Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.” The Greek word for corrupt, sapros, refers to something that is rotting or putrid. My complaining never imparts grace to those who hear it, but instead it poisons their hearts—and often their words as well.
The Underlying Problem
There may be times when our negative thoughts are related to a condition of depression. Experts tell us this can be physically induced and thus should be medically treated. While this could be the case, far more often our complaining has nothing to do with our brains or bodies. Rather, we have been led to believe we have a right to happiness, produced by a life that matches our desires. When those expectations are not met, we rebel.
Rebel? Isn’t that word a little strong? After all, shouldn’t we grieve when our health fails, when our finances collapse, or when someone we love dies?
But grieving and complaining are very different things. Grieving is the proper response to the loss of something valuable. If we don’t grieve, we didn’t really value it. On the other hand, complaining normally represents the loss of something we are convinced we deserve. Essentially, it says to God (and to those around us) that He has sinned against us.
It’s not a good attitude to have.
God is calling us to a higher walk, as Paul writes in Philippians 2:14-15.
Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world.
Complaining is easy…and it even feels good. It can bring a pleasant sense of camaraderie when a group of us find things to grumble about together. Or we may hope our complaining will pressure someone to make our lives better. Or we think it helps to at least “get things off our chest.”
A Changed Perspective
As I look out my window today, I see trees coated in ice. Large branches lie scattered about on the ground. Like thousands of others, I have been experiencing the miseries that come with the loss of power, long, cold days, and the inability to go anywhere. Yet amazingly, I have had no desire to complain.
Is it because I’m better than others…or maybe because I have a cheery personality? Actually, neither of these is true. What is different is that I’ve learned something important about the faithfulness of God that has given me an entirely different perspective on hardship. When a challenge has arisen as a result of the ice storm, instead of worry or self-pity, my response has been to watch how God will deal with it.
This doesn’t mean I should not do something myself in response to the challenge, or that I should never ask for help from others. But what actually matters most to God are my attitude and my words. And when I refuse to grumble or complain, I’ve consistently seen Him either resolve the situation—sometimes in really surprising ways—or else He has given me grace to endure it.
But behind what may seem too simplistic to be true lies a long season of practice, and also an understanding of God’s purposes. Unlike we often assume, God is not mainly interested in our physical well-being—He is more interested in His own self-revelation. He wants us to know His power, holiness, and love. And the only way we truly come to comprehend anything about His nature is to experience it in the specific details of our lives.
This is why I can choose to approach each hardship, not with dismay, but as another opportunity to see the hand of God displayed. But this decision isn’t some sort of technique that conceals my greater desire to have the problem removed. I honestly desire not only to know God more fully, but I also find great joy in the awareness that my trust actually pleases Him (Hebrews 11:6).
So my counsel is this: begin to listen to your words. Do they represent trust, or do they imply that God has been unfair? Of course, we usually blame someone other than God for our discomforts. But if God is truly sovereign, then behind these human sources, the government—or even “mother” nature—stands the choice of God to order our circumstances as He has.
This isn’t to say our challenges aren’t real or significant. Sometimes they can even be life-threatening. But if we truly believe God is who He says He is, and if we are truly redeemed followers of Christ, then the same miracle-working power we read about in Scripture is available for us in our day.
Don’t miss the opportunity hardships provide to see God’s strength and love displayed to you in real and personal ways. What’s more, He actually wants to use these very trials to shape you into the likeness of Christ—who, as we’re told in Isaiah 53:7, never opened His mouth to complain.
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