What does it mean to grieve God?

People debate on how our behavior affects the emotions of God. Since we are human and often motivated by self-interests, identifying God’s purity of heart is a challenge. We know He feels love and gets angry, but are those the same as our emotions?

Story after story in the Bible shows God revealing Himself in human terms to help us understand. He says He is like a mother hen guarding her chicks and we know that isn’t about God having feathers. He says He is like a mother caring for her child or a father disciplining one who goes astray, yet we know He is neither man nor woman like we are.

At least two passages speak of God being grieved, one from the New Testament and one from the Old:

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” (Ephesians 4:29–30)

“In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old. But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit; therefore he turned to be their enemy, and himself fought against them.” (Isaiah 63:9–10)

In both, it says that the Holy Spirit can be grieved but what does that mean? Most of my dictionaries say it is about being sorrowful or sad, suffering concerning a loss, having a heaviness of spirit.

Tozer says when this term is used to describe the Holy Spirit, it is telling us that He loves us so much that when we insult Him, He is grieved; when we ignore Him, He is grieved; when we resist Him, He is grieved; and when we doubt Him, He is grieved.

My human response to grief was shaped by an early Christian mentor. When her husband died, she said that she could rejoice because he was in heaven and her grief was “just me feeling sorry for myself.” That seemed a good way to describe it. The missing person is gone and the one who grieves is not happy about it. But then I read this . . .

A woman, Jamie Anderson, wrote in her blog, “Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of our eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”

This touches me deeply, especially when I think of it describing the grief of the Holy Spirit when I am ignoring or disobeying Him. He is not feeling sorry for Himself. He is loving me and I’ve thrown up a wall so that His love has no place to go. His sadness is about me, not Him.

^^^^^^^^^

Dear Lord Jesus, for the many times I have spurned Your love, I deeply regret. I’ve talked about Your love being like water flowing from You through the lives of Your people, only that we block it, plugging up the flow with the sand of our selfishness. You feel sorrow and grief for us because we are missing out on the joy of abundant life and the delight of fully knowing we are fully loved.