When it
comes to anger, there seems to be differing views about whether or not
Christians should ever become angry.
Many people believe that Christians should never get angry, or be
perceived as being confrontational, since anger reflects negatively upon their
personal testimonies of faith as well as the church. Realistically, many people, including
believers, get angry at many things. The
catch is do you let the sin of anger overwhelm you and possibly destroy your relationships
and friendships, simply by letting feeling of bitterness fester and grow into
full-blown feelings of resentment toward others.
For
example, just try being married and see how long you last before having a
confrontation with your spouse. Unless
you live in total isolation from the world – which is virtually impossible with
all of today’s modern technologies – your chances of running into potential
conflicts with others increase exponentially based upon your sphere of
influence. In other words, most of us
have to deal with family members, coworkers, neighbors and so on. Similarly, on an international scale, history
has shown that individual countries throughout the world are not immune from
conflicts and wars with other countries.
As for
anger, the Apostle Paul includes this sinful behavior among the list of many
sins.
“The
acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery;
idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and
envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that
those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.” (Galatians
5:19-21 NIV, italics added for emphasis)
“But
now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy
language from your lips.” (Colossians 3:8 NIV, italics added for emphasis)
However,
the definition of anger is not always black and white. For instance, Jesus was perceived as being
angry when he overturned the money changers’ tables and ran off everyone doing
transactions within the temple courts.
“When it was almost time for the
Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found people selling
cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all
from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the
money changers and overturned their tables.
To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of
here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” (John 2:13-16 NIV)
“Jesus
entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there.
He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling
doves. ‘It is written,’ he said to them, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’” (Matthew 21:12-13
NIV)
Looking
deeper into Jesus Christ’s actions and words, you will realize that Jesus was
angry at the situation and not the people…although, Jesus had to confront the
people to correct the situation. The
words that Jesus quoted in regard to the problem were from the prophets Isaiah
and Jeremiah, in that the moneychangers were defiling the temple by turning it
from a house of prayer into a den of thieves.
In
today’s churches, how many believers and church leaders are perceived as not
having the backbone to address any spiritual issues within their churches, for
the fear of not wanting to offend anyone?
In reality, many church leaders and members actually believe they are helping
to alleviate the problems in society by not
addressing pressing spiritual issues, under the guise of trying to live in
peace and harmony with one another.
Rather, some of these same believers and spiritual leaders are actually
contributing to various societal problems by letting sinful behaviors go
unaddressed among church members and leaders.
Just
look at the example of couples arguing within a marriage. What do you think happens if a married couple
gets into an argument and one party decides to hold a grudge against the other
for a very long time? Well, if too much
time passes, the bitterness can slowly turn into a harbored resentment towards
one spouse, which can eventually drag down the whole marriage – and possibly
destroy it – as well as contribute to detrimental health problems for both
parties involved, let alone dissolve any spiritual harmony in the family.
The same
could be said of people in bad employment situations. How many people come home stressed out from
work, but the stress is not from the actual work per se? Instead, sometimes the stress stems from
employees having to tolerate hostile work environments over long periods of
time, where sensitive personnel issues with other employees do not get
addressed in a timely manner or they just get completely ignored by the upper
management. So what ends up being the end
result? Usually the employees end up
with some kind of health issues and/or they just quit at the first opportunity.
Thus, the
below words of King David, later quoted by the Apostle Paul, ring true today.
“’In
your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and
do not give the devil a foothold.” (Ephesians 4:26-27 NIV)
“Be
angry, and do not sin. Meditate within
your heart on your bed, and be still.” (Psalm 4:4 KJV)
In
summary, Scripture commands individuals from losing their self-control on
objects or individuals while they are angry at any given situation. On the contrary, as believers mature, they will
understand the importance of using self-control while they are angry at the sin in any given situation. More importantly, people need to remember the
importance addressing any pertinent issues or disputes before the end of the
day…and especially not holding onto feeling of bitterness for extended periods
of time and letting them fester into full-blown feelings of resentment, which
can possibly contribute to detrimental effects on their spiritual, physical and
relational well-being.
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