Anger

Anger is another emotion that has become widely abused in not only secular society but also in Christian culture. What it is, where it comes from and when, if ever, it is appropriate seems to have become greatly misunderstood.

In my observation I've seen 3 major types of anger abuse (I'm no counselor so these are just my personal observations). The short fuse, the closet rager and the passive aggressive. The short fuse is that guy that just snaps at anything and lets everyone know how mad he is. The closet rager is the gentleman that you couldn't find a single fault in unless you were one of the unlucky few that was closest to him. They usually take they're anger out on immediate family members and live a "perfect" life to the world. The passive aggressive don't seem like they have ever experienced anger in their entire life. They go through life wearing such rose colored glasses it can sometimes be annoying. They tend to mask their anger with passive aggressiveness to keep that fine and dandy character.

So what is anger? It is an emotional reaction to, what we believe to be, an injustice. When someone tells you not to be so angry, they should be telling you to stop acting out in anger. A couple of weeks ago I got in a car accident. The other driver ran the red light and hit us and somehow I received the ticket. Was I angry? You bet I was! There was a clear injustice against me. Did that injustice make me angry? Absolutely not!

I understand if that makes no sense right now. Let me explain. When I become angry, it is my reaction to a situation. I essentially choose to feel anger. No one/thing can take responsibility for what I feel. That's kind of relieving if you think about it. If I do something, without sinning, and someone gets angry about it, I don't have take responsibility for it. That's not to say that you should be insensitive towards others and not try to reconcile. Unfortunately the world doesn't quite have a grasp on that reality yet.

In this example, I will be honest to my readers and tell you that I did in fact sin, but it wasn't purely my anger that was a sin. In Ephesians, Paul tells us not to sin in our anger. When I received the ticket and felt anger for the injustice, I hadn't sinned quite yet. When I got into the back seat of my mother's soccer mom van and started yapping about how stupid that blanking blankety blank driver was, I was sinning. Actually even before I began speaking I was sinning just by thinking those things.

It seems so easy to let anger drive our actions many times. That being said, we need to learn how to take control of that emotion that God has blessed us with and use in a way that it can glorify Him. I love the story of Jesus in Matthew 21 where he walks into the temple to find it turned into a market place and starts flipping tables telling the people that His house is a house of prayer but they turned it into a den of thieves. I'm not saying that you should start flipping tables every time you get upset. What I am saying is that you can use your anger to identify an injustice, rebuke it and correct it. Without feeling anger, I know sometimes I wouldn't even have the drive to correct a wrong doing. Rebuking people is pretty much never easy.

You'll also notice that once Jesus rebukes these people, he goes back to healing people. This is the perfect example of justified anger. Jesus doesn't hold a grudge against these people or let it ruin his day, he goes right back to doing his thing. You know what, I wouldn't be surprised if Jesus' blood paid for the sins of some of those buyers and sellers.

So next time something happens that makes you angry, don't harbor that anger and let it turn to bitterness or let everyone know how angry you are by having an outrage or try hiding your anger and letting it come out in passive aggressive defiance; face it head on, let it surface in a way that glorifies God and then let it go. I know that God glorifying anger seems like an oxymoron and it may be difficult to get over the idea that anger is across the board a sin, but with prayer and dedication, I can see some really cool things coming from some angry Christians.