Angry About What?

 

Text: John 2:13-22

Focus: Anger

Function: To help people see understand when to get angry

¹³The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. ¹⁴In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves and the money changers seated at their tables. ¹⁵Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, with the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. ¹⁶He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” ¹⁷His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” ¹⁸The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” ¹⁹Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” ²⁰The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” ²¹But he was speaking of the temple of his body. ²²After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Good morning! This morning’s message is probably for me more than anybody in this room. Today we are going to focus on anger and hopefully help us to see when to get angry and what to do about it.I plan to keep the message positive.

I have always been uncomfortable around anger and have been uncomfortable using my anger as if somehow by using it I was sinning.

I know it is important for me to paint a picture of Jesus who loves everyone, accepts everyone and wishes the best for everyone.

I believe that God does indeed wish the best for everyone of us, because God defines God’s own self as love.

And I see Jesus then, the incarnate God, as Love incarnated. So, this image of Jesus cleansing the temple seems to be contradictory.

A little history. John the author of this gospel gives us 7 miracles and 7 parables of Jesus to ponder. He says that there were a lot more, but he focuses on these and his book is aligned with principles instead of a chronological account.

I say that because this happens at the beginning of the book and we also have an account of Jesus cleansing the temple of the merchants who are exploiting the people’s faith for profit at the beginning of Holy Week.

It could have happened twice or John’s mystical usage of 7 actions and the importance of them had John place the cleansing at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. The timing of it isn’t important, what is important is why he did it.

It is also important to note that Jesus did not commit violence against people. His actions were directed at the merchandise and the displays, according to the text. Of course, he had a whip which is an offensive weapon, so I don’t know what that means, but I am sure it got everyone’s attention.

And the object of Jesus’ ire is also made clear from the text. They were profiteering off of religion. The NT principle is found in Matthew 10:8 “Freely you have received, freely give.”

And in the context, Jesus was speaking about spiritual things and spiritual faith.

I think that means we are to be upset about the mansions the Televangelists possess.

So, Jesus got angry and since he was divine, didn’t sin by getting angry. Instead, he used his anger to make a change.

Anger is an emotion. It is neither good or bad. It is most often accompanied by a biochemical response in our lymphatic systems that pumps some adrenaline into our systems and then we are motivated to make a change.

It isn’t evil, it is part of how God made us.

But the Bible does talk about it. Maybe a verse that is familiar to you, the one that we got the adage not to go to bed angry with our spouse but to resolve our differences comes from Ephesians 4:26 “Be angry and sin not. Don’t let the sun go down on your anger.”

There is a command in there to actually allow ourselves the power anger has to change a bad situation. But there is also the caveat to not let the sun set on it.

In other words, as one writer I read last week put it this way, to allow yourselves: “the luxury of anger.”

I pondered that since I am sort of afraid of anger, probably because I had an example in my life that didn’t do very well with anger.

I pondered how it can be a luxury. I am not sure I would use the word luxury, but I would use the word “gift” to speak to how it empowers us to make the necessary changes in our lives. These changes, I believe, are all part of the process of restoration and salvation and abundant life that the Holy Spirit is working on for each of us.

In our text today, desperate people were being taken advantage of and that was unjust. Jesus got angry at injustice.

When I read the Scriptures, especially the writings of the prophets who were Holy Spirit inspired, I see God’s passion for justice.

James 1:27 tells us that pure religion, undefiled before God is to take care of people in distress and to rise above worldly influences. I take that to mean to keep our eyes focused on Jesus’ priorities for humanity instead of our own. Our reward is in heaven.

Another verse about anger that has informed me also comes from the book of James. James 1:19-20: ¹⁹You must understand this, my beloved brothers and sisters: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger, ²⁰for human anger does not produce God’s justice

One of the ways of the ways to manage anger is to wait to speak until after we have heard the other person and understand their viewpoint and then restrain our anger.

I take that to mean that we are to manage our anger into a positive result. It motivates of to make necessary changes. And by doing so, we are following the mission that Christ has given to us.

But the salient part of that passage from James is verse 20, “For human anger does not bring about God’s justice.”

Human anger can mistakenly lead to revenge. And if we give full vent to our wrath, we are working with human power instead of Holy Spirit power. The Spirit of God gently nudges us and others toward God’s plan for the world.

We see a lot of anger on the news and on television dramas. In our drama series, it isn’t until the protagonist gets angry that he or she solves the problem. They have finally said to themselves: “Enough is enough” so they make a change.

It is like anger is the go to drug of our emotional choices.

But then our images of anger fed to us by these other than Godly influences almost always brings us to revenge.

And the scriptures teach us that vengeance belongs to God.

There is a balance here. Anger leads us to make a change, but our faith keeps us from taking revenge. We trust that God will judge fairly in the end. Be keep on serving God in this life because we believe that God will indeed empower us to make change.

The title of the sermon is “Angry about What?” and the answer, I believe, is be angry about injustice, like Jesus was.

Jesus got angry when injustice happened. I believe part of what it means for us to be different from people who do not follow the way of Jesus’ teachings, and to take up our cross to follow Jesus is for us to also speak out and work against injustice.

The Church needs to influence the conscience of a culture.