Facing Your Trials Without Harboring Anger

When I was a high school senior, I heard a sermon about Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego where the pastor pointed out a detail in Daniel 3:27 I’d never noticed.
There was no smell of fire on them.

Everyone knows if you stand near a fire for even two minutes your hair will smell like
smoke for days. If you’ve ever been to a Mexican restaurant, you know fajitas will make
you smell of smoked meat basically for the rest of your life. But somehow these three
biblical men trusted God enough to face the fire and came out not smelling like smoke.
Guess what—you can too.

Walk Through the Fire without Smelling of Smoke

The pastor talked about how the smoke can represent bitterness and resentment.
Anyone who has dealt with betrayal from people they thought were their friends knows
there have been times, even after it was over, when they wished they could still clock
[enter person’s name here] square in the nose. But instead of letting others win and
have that much sway over us, let’s think how we can walk through those trials and come
out of them without harboring resentment or bitterness in our hearts.

Psalm 84:11–12 states: “For the Lord God is a sun and shield. The Lord grants favor
and honor; he does not withhold the good from those who live with integrity. Happy is
the person who trusts in you, Lord of Armies!”

God Wants to Bless Us

We can remember that the Lord is working for our good. He delights in blessing us and
delights in our joy. Wouldn’t a God who is working all things in our favor also take care
of the problems of our past? Sometimes all God wants to do is bless us, but if we are
caught up in the bitterness of the past, we are unable to receive those blessings. I can
recall times when I felt so hurt or wronged by a person and it just never seemed fair.
The questions God brought to my heart were: “Even in this, do you believe I am still
good? Do you trust me to be enough?”

The truth is that even when the people we care about hurt us or let us down, God is
sufficient. He is our daily bread, and he will always take care of us when others fall
short. Why should we harbor anger or grief when God has something so much greater
planned for us? We can go through a trial smelling like smoke or we can come out
unscathed. We can pick up our cross, learn what we can from the hardship, and step
into the inheritance God has for us.

In His Word

“And [they] . . . saw these men, upon whose bodies the fire had no power, nor was a hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them.” Daniel 3:27 (KJV)

Read all of Daniel 3. What stands out to you about the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego? Take special note of how completely they were protected from the fire.

In Your Life

Why should we harbor anger or grief when God has something so much greater
planned for us? What’s an area of your life where you are still harboring anger,
bitterness, resentment, or grief? Take note of that today and commit to letting it go to
instead receive God’s blessings.

We Recommend

If you enjoyed this devotional, check out The Lion and the Bear by Caroline Shankle
and Melanie Shankle. This 100-day devotional for young women from Caroline Shankle,
Melanie Shankle’s daughter, is a compassionate guidebook to defeating their giants by
trusting God and tackling things one step at a time.

Let’s Connect

Melanie Shankle is the New York Times bestselling author a popular speaker, and
cohost of The Big Boo Cast podcast. A graduate of Texas A&M, she loves writing,
checking to see what’s on sale at Anthropologie, and looking for the bright side. Most of all, she loves being the mother of Caroline and the wife of Perry.

Caroline Shankle is Melanie’s daughter and an animal science major at Texas A&M.
She graduates in May 2025 and is planning to pursue a master’s degree. In addition,
she hopes to write more books and speak to young women about the battles they face.
She wrote this book on Fruity Pebbles, coffee, and a prayer.