Disappointing Expectations

"the heart may sorrow"

Proverbs 14:13

Does God feel disappointment in me when I do something I shouldn't; or when I don't do something I should? 

I know I occasionally feel disappointed in the decisions my kids make.  But I think the difference ~ if there is a difference ~ is that I don't know what decision my kids are going to make until they make it.  I, you see, am not omniscient.  So I can have hope, right up until they make a decision, that they will make the right one.

God, on the other hand, knows already how I'm going to decide, in every choice that will ever come my way.

So does disappointment come upon the death of hope?  Or can God feel disappointed in something He always knew would happen?

Well, disappointment can only be had if one has hope.  Disappointment is the feeling when someone fails to live up to your hope or expectations.  I don't think God has that problem. 

But He does feel sorrow.  I know in Genesis 6, right before the story of the flood, God expressed through His writer, that he was sorrowful ~ verse 6:  "And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart."

So unfortunately, I think I have to admit that I am sometimes ~ maybe frequently ~ the cause of God's being sorrowful.  Hopefully not to the extent that He is sorry He ever created me... But yes, I bring Him pain every time I sin through selfish refusal to love others as myself, and Him above all. 

And maybe, in a way, it's worse than the disappointment I feel in others, because my disappointment only comes when the person disappoints me.  God's grief has the potential to exist long before my sin takes place. 

It makes me more grateful than ever that He forgives, and gives us chance after chance to do the right thing.  

~ "You will be sorrowful,

     but your sorrow will be turned into joy" ~

John 16:20 

~