We can easily put our lives into a “happy” bubble. Happy bubbles are made by us, not the Holy Spirit. In our happy bubbles, we think, “God wants me to always be happy; therefore, I will only accept things into my life that make me happy. After all, God is showing great kindness to me.”
God does want us always to have joy, but kindness implies that the giver of kindness tolerates the lack of reciprocating kindness. Consider a baby. A parent is kind to the baby even while the baby screams at the top of his or her lungs! Kindness does not imply superiority, nor does it imply pity. The one that shows kindness does so to be generous or considerate. As the baby grows, there will come a time when the parent will no longer tolerate the child screaming at the top of his or her lungs. This change in the parent’s behavior is activated by love.
While thinking about kindness, I went to the following verse:
Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?
Romans 2:4 ESV (biblehub.com)
The word kindness (Greek: χρηστότητος (chrēstotētos)) can also be translated as “kindness, goodness, uprightness, or gentleness.” As children of God, we should be full of joy and peace. As Scripture declares in Romans 15:13, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.“. However, we should not confuse “joy, peace, or hope” with God’s kindness to us during times when we allow sin into our lives.
We may talk about how good (kind or gentle) God is to us. We may pray, “Father, thank you for the kindness you show to me.” When we pray this, do we have in mind:
“God, thank You for Your kindness because I know You are doing this to lead me to repent of the things in my life that are sinful.
A parent loves his or her screaming child. And because of that love, the parent will begin to withdraw the kindness, demonstrated through tolerating screaming, from the child as the child matures. Likewise, if we abuse God’s kindness and refuse to repent, He will withdraw His kindness because of His love.
I pray you and I always come to our senses and repent before God withholds His kindness towards us.