“I hate those who pay regard to worthless idols, but I trust in the LORD.” — Psalm 31:6 (ESV)
For a long time, I’ve wrestled with something in my heart I’m not proud of: a disdain for people who keep chasing idols. I’ve rebuked myself for it, assuming the bitterness was simply ungodly. But recently, I sat with Psalm 31:6, and it made me stop and ask a harder question — not whether my feelings were acceptable, but what God wanted to do with them.
Let me describe the disdain I mean. Have you ever had a friend who genuinely loves Jesus yet keeps circling back to the same idol? You’ve gently pointed out where the Lord seems to be putting His finger, and they just… can’t see it. What begins as a sincere longing — you want them free, you want them to trust God fully — can curdle over time into frustration, even bitterness, as the stubbornness persists. It can be infuriating. If you’ve loved someone like that, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
So when I read David’s words — “I hate those who pay regard to worthless idols” — something in me felt seen. He doesn’t say “I hate the sin.” He says he hates the people. For a moment, I thought: finally, permission. But I’ve learned to slow down before I borrow a feeling from a psalm.
Here’s what I had to reckon with. David’s hatred is covenant language — the zeal of a man set against the committed enemies of God (he says as much in Psalm 139:21-22, “Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD?”). It’s holy and just. Mine isn’t — mine is tangled up with impatience, wounded pride, and the sting of not being heard. And notice: in Psalm 101:3, the psalmist says, “I hate the work of those who fall away” — the hatred lands on the deeds, not the person. Even the CSB Study Bible’s note on Psalm 31:6 says those close to the Lord “should hate what he hates.” What God hates is idolatry — the worthless idol itself. He does not hand me a license to hate my brother who’s caught in it.
That matters because the friend I’m frustrated with is exactly the person the New Testament tells me to handle with care: “restore him in a spirit of gentleness, keeping watch on yourself” (Galatians 6:1); “be kind to one another, tenderhearted” (Ephesians 4:32). I wouldn’t go so far as David to say I hate my friend, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t deeply annoyed — and that’s the honest emotion God wants to get His hands on.
My friend Scott Engelman used to say something whenever I’d complain about this: “Blake, sheep are messy.” If you set out to help people grow in their faith, it will be messy and frustrating. But here’s what undoes me every time I remember it: God loves me in my mess. I have idols too — ones I’m slow to see, ones people have patiently pointed out while I remained blind. If He’s that patient with me, who am I to run out of patience with them? When I stop defending my disdain and start remembering my own mess, my love for these messy sheep comes back to life.
There’s a strange freedom in naming the frustration honestly rather than hiding it. God isn’t shocked by it — but He won’t bless me for holding it, either. He wants to melt it down into the patient, hopeful love He’s shown me. Hating idolatry is right; God does. Hating the idolater isn’t my job. Loving them — and staying available while God does the one thing only He can do, open their eyes — is.
BIG IDEA: God hates idolatry with a holy, just hatred, and it’s right for us to hate it as well. But He never authorizes us to hate the person caught in it. The frustration of loving a struggling friend is real — God’s call is to let Him turn that frustration into patient, hopeful love.
Questions to Ponder: Is there someone whose idol you can clearly see — and whose stubbornness has begun to harden into disdain in your heart? Be honest about what’s beneath the frustration: is it love for them, or wounded pride because they won’t listen to you? And when you remember your own idols — the ones God and others have patiently borne with — how does that change the way you see your friend?
Application: With your journal in hand, bring the Lord the friend who frustrates you — and be honest about how much of that frustration is really about you: your pride, your need to be right, the sting of not being heard. Name it plainly. Then repent — not of loving your friend, but of the selfishness tangled up in that love. Surrender them and the outcome to God; their eyes are His to open, not yours. With your hands now empty, fix your gaze on Jesus and ask, “Lord, what would You have me do here?” Then do the one thing He prompts — a word of encouragement, an act of care, simply showing up — and love your friend the way Christ has loved you in your own mess.