Teenagers can be exhausting. They are developing a necessary sense of self, but they tend to interpret life only by how it affects them. Your 16-year-old may carelessly make a mess in the kitchen or forget to do his chores, assuming that someone else–usually his mum–will clean up after him. Yet he'll quickly take offense if his mum raises her voice to correct him. Why is everyone so mean?

God found Judah to be exhausting. He begins His fourth speech by saying they have wearied Him with their cynical complaints: ″All who do evil are good in the eyes of the Lord, and he is pleased with them″, and ″Where is the God of justice?″ (Malachi 2:17). Like a spoiled teenager, Judah saw everything through the prism of self. They wondered why God tolerated so much sin in others. Why didn't He punish the disobedient and bless the righteous, as He promised? Judah should be careful what they wish for. When the God of justice appears, things may not go as they expect.

Being in a rut can be exhausting, to us and to others. It's easy to develop a skewed view of the world. We've been mired in the same place for so long that we've forgotten how things look from other perspectives. We only see how this or that affects us. We turn casual conversations into referendums on our unjust plight. We fill the open spaces of our day with fretting, and mull over our options whenever there's a lull. We can't even pray for long. Our minds slip back into well-worn ruts of worry. Why are they so mean?

People in ruts often need sympathy, but also a reality check. We may feel certain that we're right, but we need to remember that right and wrong do not depend on us. That's important, because the vantage point from our ditch is bound to be distorted.

Thankfully, God has not left us to figure life out for ourselves. His Word tells us what is right and wrong, and what He expects from us. His Word may be tough to hear, especially when we're used to seeing things our way. It may not even feel right, because it rubs against our ingrained patterns of self-interest. When that happens, remember our feelings are corrupted by our fallen nature. We must trust the God who made us. He knows what's best.