Oftentimes The Only Thing You Can Do Is Just Let It Go

Romans 12:19-21, Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”

I am age 59. I sometimes wonder how I managed to make it this far in life alive. Many people don't. I have lived in the city of Pensacola since 2021. A couple years ago, I read in the local news about a 52-year-old local man who was sadly killed when a dump truck struck his vehicle. When I think back over my life—the numerous close calls with death, crazy people and life's unpredictability—I am surprised that I've made it this far. I am thankful to God.

That being said, I cannot tell you how many times there have been throughout my life, when I felt totally helpful in a situation. I have often wished to God that I had some supernatural power to hurt people—to force them to face the consequences of their bad attitudes, their reckless ways, their woeful lack of love and concern—to force them to care! Unfortunately, neither I nor you have that power, short of breaking the law and going to prison for committing a crime.

More times that I can remember, cruel people have hurt me, stolen from me, humiliated me, defrauded me, been mean to me, and made me wish that I had the power to execute vengeance upon them. What saith the Scripture? Our text passage from Romans 12:19 teaches that vengeance belongs to God alone. This passage is a quote from the Old Testament from Deuteronomy 32:35, “To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste.” I love that phrase, “their foot shall slide in due time.” In other words, the old adage is very true that: “What goes around comes around.”

God PROMISES, His integrity is at stake, to avenge all wrong doing. I used to sometimes get angry at God, thinking that someone hurting my feelings was too trivial a matter for Him to avenge; but dear reader, that is simply not true. If someone hurts your feelings, and you feel like deleting them or hurting them badly, you can rest assure that God will avenge you friend.

While driving, I have had mean people blast their car horn at me just because they could, just to be a jerk, when I hadn't done nothing wrong. One woman blasted her horn at me in McDonald's drive-thru last year. I hadn't delayed to keep up with moving traffic. I did nothing wrong. That unkind gesture from her ruined my day. What she did lingered in my mind and I was sad the whole day.

I wish that I could merely let things go when incidents happen, when mean people hurt my feelings, and not let anything affect me; but it does affect me, and I have never been able to just move on like nothing happened. It takes a day or two, or three, for me to calm down and things to go back to normal. The reason why is because I have a large heart. I am a caring person. The flipside of caring is that I am also a very emotionally sensitive man. I get my feelings hurt very easily. I learned a very long time ago that tender-hearted people do not mix well with cold-hearted people. I want nothing to do with cold-hearted people.

Jesus Said In This World, 'Ye Shall Have Tribulation'

Jesus said in John 16:33 that in this world we shall have tribulation. There is no escape!

I admit that one of the hardest things for me to do is to just “let a matter go.” I could spend an entire day sharing with you the horrible painful things that people have done to me over the years. Considered the shocking things that some evil people to do hurt others, I feel fortunate. Yet, my pain of soul is real, lasting and difficult to survive with.

After 19 years of marriage, my wife divorced me in 2006 against my will. I cannot express in words the inexplicably painful emotional pain of soul and feelings of betrayal that I endured. I just wanted to die. Many people were cruel toward me during the divorce process and afterwards. I was alone. Pastors and churches were unkind and abusive toward me, leaving me for dead during the darkest years of my life. But God's grace saw me through.

I realized one day that as long as I am alive, it matters not if I live to be 90 years old (I don't want to live that long), people are people are people, and they WILL hurt me. People equal pain. I haven't lost faith in the goodness of the majority of humanity (as far as sinners go), but since I don't know who to trust I am leery of humans in general. So, I live by the old adage: “Be nice to everybody, but trust no one.” I am at the place in my life where I don't want to step outside my front door anymore. It seems that half of the time when I leave my home I get my feelings hurt by mean, selfish, angry, hurting and belligerent people. It's a jungle out there!

I have been suffering since 2004 with chronic debilitating burning neck pain, burning nerves throughout my upper body, and the entire right side of my body feeling half asleep. I can only obtain half of the prescription pain medications that I need. These medical problems only exasperate my suffering. I have little patience. I am easily frustrated and irritated. People do not understand, nor do they cut me any slack. That makes things much more difficult for me.

I cannot take the time to explain to every stranger I meet what I am suffering through; and yet, I have to publicly interact with strangers on a regular basis. It is difficult. Most people are kind and agreeable, but there are always the few rotten people who are contemptible to say the least. It discourages me. I increasingly find myself telling the faithful LORD that I just want to go home to Heaven. I am a kind, loving, friendly, generous and nice man; but mean people keep hurting me everywhere I go, bringing out the worst in me in my pain. I rarely tell people off. It only happens when I get caught off guard, with no time to think and process what just happened. I truly do understand why people take their own lives, to escape this miserable life. I don't think I would ever do that, but I look forward to the end of my life's journey on earth.

It Is Rarely Easy To Let Things Go

I have learned painfully, again and again—that oftentimes when people are mean to me, and push my buttons, and I want their head on a platter—that there is absolutely nothing I can do to be avenged, and I reluctantly have to just let the matter go into God's hands for judgment.

I assure you dear reader that your Creator is not so busy, high-minded and pious that He is beyond caring about even your hurt feelings. It might have been a misunderstanding, but if you still got your feelings hurt by something that someone else said or did, the LORD must address the matter. What did Jesus say in Matthew 12:36, “But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.” Our earthly law enforcement thinks it a trifle matter when people's feelings are hurt, but such feelings have at times led to murder. I assure you that God does not take your words or feelings lightly. We must give account to God for our every word.

I try to live above reproach, but I horribly fail at times. For the 17 years that I lived on the island of Guam, I never gave anyone the middle finger. I don't think a Christian should do that. But since I've moved to Pensacola, I have flipped the bird at least twice that I remember at crazy drivers. I am a careful driver, which even my Florida driver's license reads. I stop and look for oncoming cars before I pull out into an intersection.

I didn't see any cars coming, but then when I pulled out, another car was on top of me before I knew it, BECAUSE THEY WERE SPEEDING! The local speed limit is 30 mph, but they are going 55 mph or more! When drivers speed, it changes the dynamics of everything, causing accidents (which aren't really accidents if someone is breaking the law by speeding). Pensacola police rarely ticket speeders. It's never easy to let a matter go, but oftentimes there's nothing else that we can do.

When I was younger, over 30 years ago, a punk driving  in Chicago got angry and in a moment of road rage punched his fist through my car window. My blood was all over the place because the capillaries in the human face have lots of blood going to them. The shards of broken glass cut my face up. I went to the Emergency Room and called 911. The Chicago police came, but the two bums that arrived were TOO LAZY to do their jobs. They did nothing. I found out later that the punk lived up in Evanston, Illinois. He just drove away after assaulting me and shedding my blood. I thought about going to Evanston to vandalize his car, but I didn't, fearing that I would likely get caught and go to jail instead. And also, that is not who I am. I have never avenged myself. I decided to leave vengeance in the Lord's hands as He promised.

I went to court, but the punk didn't bother to show up. The crooked judge put out a bench warrant for his arrest, but nothing was ever done. I had to go to a junk yard to buy an old window and replace it myself. The punk gave some lame sob story to the violent crimes detective that he had lost his job and his dog died; which somehow gave him the right to shed my blood? The ungodly police department let the punk go, and he was never held accountable. I am trusting God to punish that creep for what he did to me, and to punish the ungodly corrupt Chicago police and dysfunctional court system that failed me.

In this case, and hundreds more, there is absolutely nothing I can do to obtain justice. I have to let the matter go, which I did decades ago, trusting God to keep His solemn promise to avenge all evil. I have aggressively been run off the road multiple times by crazy drivers.

Nearly 40 years ago, one day when I pulled out of the exit of Hyles-Anderson College in Crownpoint, Indiana, to go to work, I heard a horn honking from the car next to me. I looked and a young punk was waving his erect penis at me, harassing a student of a Bible college. Woe unto that punk on Judgment Day! He was mocking Jesus according to Matthew 25:40. Dear reader, this world is full of sick, evil and insane fools.

Ungodly People Are Insensitive And Mean

I always feel bad and guilty, when in anger I tell people off. A cantankerous woman one day scolded me when I strayed a few feet off the public sidewalk while walking my dog, sniffing around as a dog likes to do. I saw the woman's coward for a husband go into the house, and he sent her out instead to do the dirty work, to rebuke me for being on their alleged stupid property. They should have a fence if they're that paranoid. I told her she had a problem. She made some nasty remark and I yelled, “F you!” (but I said the word). I felt so bad all that afternoon, apologizing to the LORD. I later gave a $5 bill in a gospel tract to a worker at Whataburger, trying to forget what had happened. People can be so rotten, selfish and mean!

I hate this horrible world! I cannot even walk my dog without bad things happening. One day while walking my dog, a deranged woman drove an SUV as big as a garage off the road into the cables securing the telephone poles on my street. The poles all shook violently and leaned sideways after she snapped the cable apart. After a few moments she crawled back into her vehicle and drove away. WTF. People today are wound-up, stressed, angry, on drugs, paranoid and quick to snap and run their ugly mouths. I am increasingly just letting the dog stay in her own yard, where no one can complain. My father used to say, “You can't get into trouble playing in your own back yard.” Most people place all of their emphasis on this temporary world. When they die, Hell will be the eternal home. They made their own choices.

I could go on and on about the horrible things and ugliness I have seen in people throughout my life, and no doubt so could you. I wrote this article to encourage those of my readers who have been hurt, betrayed, cheated, assaulted, or maybe just had your feelings hurt by a insensitive ungodly individual, uncaring pastor, et cetera. Many ungodly Americans today have become viscous. They're quick to tell you to get the hell off their property. They have no love, no compassion, no concern; only hatred for their neighbours. The inspired Holy Bible warned us that these "perilous times" would come in 2nd Timothy 3:1-7...

2nd Timothy 3:1-5, “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

When I read this inspired passage of Scripture, it describes all of the rotten people I just told you about, and countless more demon-inspired wicked people I've met in my lifetime. To be quite honest, I love Isaiah 13:11, “And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.” I long for this wicked world to be judged!

Although I share in God's desire for all men to repent of their unbelief to come to Christ (2nd Peter 3:9); yet I know that only a tiny few will ever do so (Luke 13:23-24), because of their love for sin (John 3:20). Although you don't have to be willing to give up your sinning to get to Heaven, you do need to humble yourself to acknowledge that YOU ARE A SINNER! No one has ever been saved who didn't admit that they are a guilty sinner in God's sight. Faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ is invalid unless you come to God for forgiveness on the basis that you are a guilty sinner (Romans 3:19-20).

If you have been deeply hurt by someone, sometimes there is nothing you can do except let the matter go into God's hands for judgment. This requires faith in God, that He cares and will be faithful to keep His promises to avenge and hold everyone accountable (Ecclesiastes 12:14; Romans 14:10-12). My nerves are burning horribly as I type this. My heart is sad at times because of umpteen ungodly people who have hurt me in recent years. There is nothing that I can do except lay my hurt feelings, wounds and heavy burdens at the Lord's feet, and claim His abundant “mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16b).

I know that this article has been quite a bit long, but I speak from a broken heart. I read something many years ago where Dr. John R. Rice (1895-1980) said when he gets his feelings hurt, he writes. I was so delighted to hear that, because that is exactly what I do. I write to bury my pain of soul into my ministry work, laying up treasures in Heaven (Matthew 6:19-21). When my feelings get hurt, and there is nothing I can do about it, I go through a self-counseling process. I think about biblical teachings and look for comfort in God's Word. ...

Colossians 3:1-3, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.”

It is so easy to get boggled down and drawn into the things of this temporary world—whether it be good hobbies that distract us from serving the Lord, a secular career that draws you away from the will of God for your life, or the terrible things that mean people do to hurt our feelings and wound our pride that discourage us and quench our zeal for God—life is a minefield.

Thank you for reading my ministry blog. To God alone be the glory.