“Overcoming Our Anger”
I Samuel 18: 6-16; Ephesians 4: 25-27, 29-5: 2
We live in a world of anger, hostility, and rage beyond our wildest comprehension:
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“Road rage,” violence and killing on the highway are becoming normative in the densely
packed cities.
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Spousal abuse and violence in the home continues to plague our society.
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Terrorism, both political and religious, seems to never cease.
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Young people, seemingly frustrated by their lot in life, take guns and go to their schools
where they inflict unbelievable horror.
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For a while so many postal employees started acting out their rage that we developed a new
phrase — going postal.
Why? Why are we so angry? Why do we have such violence and rage within so that even the least little act produces the desire to kill? What can we do about our anger?Saul is angry -- better yet, let’s name his anger: he is jealous, resentful, and full of bitterness toward David. David has killed Goliath -- a feat that Saul should have accomplished but was too cowardly to try. David and Jonathan -- Saul’s son and heir to Saul’s throne -- had become best friends. David was living with Saul and Jonathan, but Saul soon perceived that David’s popularity was getting out of hand. David was a highly successful soldier and commander -- even though he had no military training. David was musically gifted and a great writer of poetry as many of the Psalms attest.Yet, there was another reason for Saul’s jealousy. Verse 12 of the 18th chapter of I Samuel says it best: “Saul was afraid of David because the Lord was with David but had left Saul.” Saul is unfaithful to God and now he sees that God has sent another to take his place. Saul’s sin was in disobeying God by not destroying all the property of the Amalekites. Rather, he kept the property for himself thereby showing that his Kingship was not about serving the Lord, but he was out for himself. God rejected Saul as king and uses the prophet Samuel to deliver that message. Now Saul realizes that the rejection is not just of himself, but of his lineage and that Jonathan will never become king after him -- David will be the king for the Lord is with him.How hard that must have been for Saul to watch as David’s actions were blessed by God! Anger built up in him as guilt and jealousy mingled to create resentment and bitterness. Time and again he sends David out on dangerous missions where he should have been defeated and killed. Time and again David returns victorious. For the rest of his life Saul will vainly pursue David trying to kill him, somehow believing that if David is eliminated then Jonathan will be king.Anger is one of the more difficult opponents we will ever face in our lives, because anger works subtlety to convince us that we are not in the wrong. The phrase “she is so mad she cannot see straight” illustrates this point completely. Saul was so angry that his thinking had gone completely haywire and he was now out of control. Anger distorts our perspective and as such is used as a tool of the Evil One to disrupt our world. Evil thrives on self-deception and when we allow anger to rule us we open ourselves to evil.
Anger masks itself in so many ways. Rarely do I see incidences of violence in congregants lives or
families. What I see is passive-aggressiveness in anger — where a person smiles at others on the
front-side but works behind the scenes to undercut and to bring doubt and confusion. Many a
family presents the image that all is well — yet when you talk with the children you discover that the
emotionally weaker or “passive” parent is undercutting the “dominant” or stronger parent.
Inherent in our struggle with anger is our supposed “Christian” understanding of anger as a sin -- and therefore wrong. We were not allowed to express our anger -- that would be blatant sin -- so we repressed it, pushed it inside. We developed other words to deny and conceal our anger: hurt; disappointment; frustration; upset. When we repressed our anger it was as if we placed a lid on a boiling kettle and turned up the fire: sooner or later that kettle would explode. And explode it does -- either through violence to others or to ourselves. We are like the rattlesnake, which in circumstances where it is angered and has no other option, will bite itself, poisoning itself. Anger repressed creates the situation in which we turn upon ourselves in destructive behavior. Crucial to understanding anger is the reality that no one else can really make us angry — they can only reveal the anger which is inside of us. If we blame another for making us angry then we are but allowing them to control us.
Anger is a normal human reaction that is both primarily physiological in origin. When we become angry our blood pressure rises, adrenaline is secreted in larger doses than normal, and sugar is released into our bloodstream. Our heart beats faster and our eyes dilate. This physiological response goes back to the origins of humankind and our living in situations where, when threatened, we had to “fight or flight,” to physically defend ourselves. The physiological response is a means of increasing our ability to defend ourselves or to escape danger. The problem is that, in our culture, threats are rarely of the type that demand a physiological response. However, the response mechanism — along with the adrenaline secreted in our system — is still there. When we repress this response we create the aforementioned pressure cooker.
The desert monastics had an understanding of the human personality as a chariot pulled by two horses (passions): desire and anger. The charioteer was reason, but when the passions took over reason was lost and the chariot would careen out of control.
What can we do so that when we become angry we do not careen out of control or sin -- as Paul says -- but deal with our anger creatively and constructively?
RECOGNIZE
First, we must recognize our human propensity to anger and discover the sources of our anger. Have you ever had someone tell you to calm down and you replied, “Mad? I’m not mad!” We need to reflect upon our behavior and understand what reveals our anger. Where is the threat to us or our family? Is it real or is it imagined? Why are we threatened? Is it financial? Social? Spiritual? Vocational? Is our response appropriate to the situation or are we overreacting? Is our anger indicative of our own lack of self-esteem, the sin of not seeing ourself as a child of God?
Inherent in our struggle with anger is our supposed “Christian” understanding of anger as a sin -- and therefore wrong. We were not allowed to express our anger -- that would be blatant sin -- so we repressed it, pushed it inside. We developed other words to deny and conceal our anger: hurt; disappointment; frustration; upset. When we repressed our anger it was as if we placed a lid on a boiling kettle and turned up the fire: sooner or later that kettle would explode. And explode it does -- either through violence to others or to ourselves. We are like the rattlesnake, which in circumstances where it is angered and has no other option, will bite itself, poisoning itself. Anger repressed creates the situation in which we turn upon ourselves in destructive behavior. Crucial to understanding anger is the reality that no one else can really make us angry — they can only reveal the anger which is inside of us. If we blame another for making us angry then we are but allowing them to control us.
Anger is a normal human reaction that is both primarily physiological in origin. When we become angry our blood pressure rises, adrenaline is secreted in larger doses than normal, and sugar is released into our bloodstream. Our heart beats faster and our eyes dilate. This physiological response goes back to the origins of humankind and our living in situations where, when threatened, we had to “fight or flight,” to physically defend ourselves. The physiological response is a means of increasing our ability to defend ourselves or to escape danger. The problem is that, in our culture, threats are rarely of the type that demand a physiological response. However, the response mechanism — along with the adrenaline secreted in our system — is still there. When we repress this response we create the aforementioned pressure cooker.
The desert monastics had an understanding of the human personality as a chariot pulled by two horses (passions): desire and anger. The charioteer was reason, but when the passions took over reason was lost and the chariot would careen out of control.
What can we do so that when we become angry we do not careen out of control or sin -- as Paul says -- but deal with our anger creatively and constructively?
RECOGNIZE
First, we must recognize our human propensity to anger and discover the sources of our anger. Have you ever had someone tell you to calm down and you replied, “Mad? I’m not mad!” We need to reflect upon our behavior and understand what reveals our anger. Where is the threat to us or our family? Is it real or is it imagined? Why are we threatened? Is it financial? Social? Spiritual? Vocational? Is our response appropriate to the situation or are we overreacting? Is our anger indicative of our own lack of self-esteem, the sin of not seeing ourself as a child of God?
There is one type of anger that can not only be useful, but has its source in God: righteous
indignation. The Bible speaks of God being angry toward sin and evil and what they have done to
creation. God’s wrath is not sin, but his conscious and never failing opposition to all that is evil.
When we see people being taken advantage of, used, and abused by others, then there is something
that rises within us. This anger can be an incredible positive as we use its energy and passion to
focus us in the proper perspective. I have never met a person who accomplished anything in life
who did not have a fire burning inside, who did not have a passion about what they are doing.
However, successful people learn how to manage that passion rather than to let it control them.
An all too common practice is to misplace the focus of our anger. When someone or something disappoints or frustrates us, but we cannot respond to them for whatever reasons we will repress that anger and then let it out at someone or something where we feel safe. The typical analogy is not far from the truth: The boss makes us mad so we go home and fight with our spouse. Our spouse makes us mad so we take it out on the kids or the dog.
If overcoming our anger is to be of vital importance to us, we must understand the devastating effects of anger upon the soul. Roberta Bondi lists three such effects noted by desert monastics:
• Resentment blinds the reason of the one who prays.
• Brooding over injuries and wrongs suffered destroys our memory of God and God’s grace.
• Anger irritates the soul and during prayer it seizes the mind and flashes the picture of the offensive person before one’s eyes.
These effects upon our soul are the reason Jesus taught us to make peace when we want to come before God. If we are not at peace with our fellow human beings we will find ourselves unable to pray, unable to focus, unable to do the things that we should do. They and the situation, not God, will be first and foremost in our lives.
CONFESSION
After recognizing our anger we need to accept responsibility for our wrong use of anger and confess it to God. Confession is an admission of helplessness, that without God there is no telling what we would do. Through confession we are liberated from our anger.
Anger unresolved can be a terrible, terrible burden, which becomes like a ball and chain so that we are condemned to pull it behind us. In time this anger becomes so much as part of us that our identity is wrapped up in this anger. Who would I be without my rage? My indignation? Too often we accept the role of victim and in so doing condemn ourselves to a lifetime of anger and bitterness. Confession allows us to give that anger and bitterness to God and walk away from it -- ready to start a new chapter in our lives free from the bondage of the past.
Prayer can be a meaningful practice to release our anger. Have you ever what we call the “imprecatory Psalms?” Wow, there is some anger let out in those! The Psalmist asks God to bash his/her enemies and to destroy all their enemies’ heirs. Listen to Psalm 58: 6-7:
“Break the teeth in their mouths, O God; tear our, O Lord, the fangs of the lions!
Let them vanish like water that flows away; when they draw the bow, let their arrows be blunted.
An all too common practice is to misplace the focus of our anger. When someone or something disappoints or frustrates us, but we cannot respond to them for whatever reasons we will repress that anger and then let it out at someone or something where we feel safe. The typical analogy is not far from the truth: The boss makes us mad so we go home and fight with our spouse. Our spouse makes us mad so we take it out on the kids or the dog.
If overcoming our anger is to be of vital importance to us, we must understand the devastating effects of anger upon the soul. Roberta Bondi lists three such effects noted by desert monastics:
• Resentment blinds the reason of the one who prays.
• Brooding over injuries and wrongs suffered destroys our memory of God and God’s grace.
• Anger irritates the soul and during prayer it seizes the mind and flashes the picture of the offensive person before one’s eyes.
These effects upon our soul are the reason Jesus taught us to make peace when we want to come before God. If we are not at peace with our fellow human beings we will find ourselves unable to pray, unable to focus, unable to do the things that we should do. They and the situation, not God, will be first and foremost in our lives.
CONFESSION
After recognizing our anger we need to accept responsibility for our wrong use of anger and confess it to God. Confession is an admission of helplessness, that without God there is no telling what we would do. Through confession we are liberated from our anger.
Anger unresolved can be a terrible, terrible burden, which becomes like a ball and chain so that we are condemned to pull it behind us. In time this anger becomes so much as part of us that our identity is wrapped up in this anger. Who would I be without my rage? My indignation? Too often we accept the role of victim and in so doing condemn ourselves to a lifetime of anger and bitterness. Confession allows us to give that anger and bitterness to God and walk away from it -- ready to start a new chapter in our lives free from the bondage of the past.
Prayer can be a meaningful practice to release our anger. Have you ever what we call the “imprecatory Psalms?” Wow, there is some anger let out in those! The Psalmist asks God to bash his/her enemies and to destroy all their enemies’ heirs. Listen to Psalm 58: 6-7:
“Break the teeth in their mouths, O God; tear our, O Lord, the fangs of the lions!
Let them vanish like water that flows away; when they draw the bow, let their arrows be blunted.
Like a slug melting away as it moves along, as a still-born child, may they not see the sun.”
These are honest prayers, confessing the depths of our anger to God. I am not sure we ought to pray these prayers regularly, but I am sure that we should confess our anger to God and the reasons for our anger. Jesus taught us that central to our prayer is praying for our enemy, for the person with whom we are in disagreement. Despite what we feel, any disagreement is a two-way street and we can never assume that we are totally in the right and the other is completely wrong. If we can see them as a fellow child of God that will go a long way toward dissipating our anger.
EXPRESS ANGER APPROPRIATELY
After confessing our anger and praying over it, we need to express our anger appropriately. This may include going to the person and discussing the situation; going to counseling to work on healing the wounds of the past; getting involved in changing a social situation; or going to marriage counseling to work on our relationship with our spouse. There is no law that says that anger cannot be used to build rather than destruct, to create rather than to tear down. The positive nature of anger is that, if we will allow it, anger will reveal to us the places in our soul where we need work, our weak spots where we need healing.
“I am redeemed...but there are unredeemed parts of me....There are parts of me that have not yet heard the good news of Jesus Christ.” When I first heard that statement something clicked in my understanding of human nature and our relationship to God. For years I had been tormented by the fact that Christians, those who claim the name and power of Jesus Christ, continued to act in ways decidedly out of sync with our Lord. Paul may call us saints, but deep inside we know ourselves to be sinners. Nowhere is this more vivid than in the arena of anger. Despite all our professions about transformation to the contrary -- we still struggle with anger and its composite parts: rage, jealousy, frustration, resentment, bitterness and the like. It was only after hearing this statement that I began to understand life in Christ as a progression of development and growth. Rather than Christ instantaneously removing all the imperfections of sin from our lives, they are left for us to slowly remove through the power of the Spirit.
Crucial to creatively dealing with anger — and to our entire pattern of spiritual growth — is to become “other centered” rather than “pleasure centered.” A fellow minister wisely said, “If we do not make that critical shift, we will not only be unchristian, we will also be miserable.” Depression can be nothing more than anger repressed and held onto for years and years and years. If we cannot make the shift from the pleasure centeredness we knew as babies, children and adolescents to the other centeredness required for maturity we will be miserable. None of us are the axis around which the world resolves. At best we occupy a small portion of this terra firma for a few years and move on. If we cannot move to servanthood as our modus operandi we will build up residual anger and be completely unaware of it. Then one day, boom: the heart attack, stroke, ulcers -- or we lose it completely over nothing.
So there you have it: recognize, confess, and appropriately express our anger. Let us not be a Saul, controlled by our anger so that we become a tool of evil rather than good. Let us be a Paul -- in our anger do not sin. We will all be better for it -- and so will our world. The Kingdom of God does not come through anger and force, but through the wind of the Spirit. Hear the words of St. Paul
These are honest prayers, confessing the depths of our anger to God. I am not sure we ought to pray these prayers regularly, but I am sure that we should confess our anger to God and the reasons for our anger. Jesus taught us that central to our prayer is praying for our enemy, for the person with whom we are in disagreement. Despite what we feel, any disagreement is a two-way street and we can never assume that we are totally in the right and the other is completely wrong. If we can see them as a fellow child of God that will go a long way toward dissipating our anger.
EXPRESS ANGER APPROPRIATELY
After confessing our anger and praying over it, we need to express our anger appropriately. This may include going to the person and discussing the situation; going to counseling to work on healing the wounds of the past; getting involved in changing a social situation; or going to marriage counseling to work on our relationship with our spouse. There is no law that says that anger cannot be used to build rather than destruct, to create rather than to tear down. The positive nature of anger is that, if we will allow it, anger will reveal to us the places in our soul where we need work, our weak spots where we need healing.
“I am redeemed...but there are unredeemed parts of me....There are parts of me that have not yet heard the good news of Jesus Christ.” When I first heard that statement something clicked in my understanding of human nature and our relationship to God. For years I had been tormented by the fact that Christians, those who claim the name and power of Jesus Christ, continued to act in ways decidedly out of sync with our Lord. Paul may call us saints, but deep inside we know ourselves to be sinners. Nowhere is this more vivid than in the arena of anger. Despite all our professions about transformation to the contrary -- we still struggle with anger and its composite parts: rage, jealousy, frustration, resentment, bitterness and the like. It was only after hearing this statement that I began to understand life in Christ as a progression of development and growth. Rather than Christ instantaneously removing all the imperfections of sin from our lives, they are left for us to slowly remove through the power of the Spirit.
Crucial to creatively dealing with anger — and to our entire pattern of spiritual growth — is to become “other centered” rather than “pleasure centered.” A fellow minister wisely said, “If we do not make that critical shift, we will not only be unchristian, we will also be miserable.” Depression can be nothing more than anger repressed and held onto for years and years and years. If we cannot make the shift from the pleasure centeredness we knew as babies, children and adolescents to the other centeredness required for maturity we will be miserable. None of us are the axis around which the world resolves. At best we occupy a small portion of this terra firma for a few years and move on. If we cannot move to servanthood as our modus operandi we will build up residual anger and be completely unaware of it. Then one day, boom: the heart attack, stroke, ulcers -- or we lose it completely over nothing.
So there you have it: recognize, confess, and appropriately express our anger. Let us not be a Saul, controlled by our anger so that we become a tool of evil rather than good. Let us be a Paul -- in our anger do not sin. We will all be better for it -- and so will our world. The Kingdom of God does not come through anger and force, but through the wind of the Spirit. Hear the words of St. Paul
which close our text: “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children, and live in love, as Christ loved
us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Ephesians 5: 2
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