If I am going to be honest, this is a subject that has always intrigued me, yet it is still so confusing for me to understand. I started learning about it this last winter, when I was struggling with how to righteously deal with somebody hurting you. At this point in time, a lot of my initial reaction was to be mad, because I was wronged. I liked feeling that way for a while, because I felt justified in my anger because of the fact that I was wronged. After a while, though, I took a step back and saw what the current condition of my life was, and I didn’t like it. My thoughts were so harmful, and the music that I listened to was not lovely, kind, or tender. Instead, it was brutal, harsh, and unforgiving. I had to admit to myself that I was taking this too far, and that despite what happened to me, I was reacting in an awful and ungodly way. What hurt the most was realizing that I was reacting in the way that the world wanted me to.So, I began studying what the Bible has to say about anger, and what I learned shocked me.
The anger of Jesus
I feel like anger has a very negative connotation, so it was interesting when I remembered that Jesus had moments of anger when he was on earth, the most famous incident being when he turned the tables in the temple.
“The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables.” (John 2:13-15)
This passage in itself makes one big statement about anger: it isn’t sin. In fact, it is a crucial part of our lives! Anger is an emotion, and God gave us emotions to help us express ourselves. I honestly don’t know where we would be without emotions. They can lead to bad situations, but they can also be a huge blessing. And since Jesus was human while on this earth (while still fully God), we see a full spectrum of emotions while he was living: sadness, joy, calmness, and yes, even anger.
“Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man with the withered hand, ‘Come here.’ And he said to them, ‘Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?’ But they were silent. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out, and his hand was restored.” (Mark 3:1-5)
The one thing that I see in common with both of these occurrences is the purpose behind God’s anger. A lot of times, our anger can be fueled when something doesn’t go the way we want, or somebody is getting on our nerves, but Jesus was only ever angry when he recognized that something wasn’t right in the world. Sin isn’t something that should be a part of our world, and so when Jesus saw a sinful heart, it made him angry, because he knew that sin doesn’t belong. This is what is called “righteous anger”, and that is very different from the way our world deals with anger.
This shows that anger isn’t a sin, but why is it bad then? That is because our reaction to anger is often what makes us sin. Oftentimes, this shows up as a spontaneous and impulsive reaction to feeling anger: hurting somebody, using hurtful words, and many other examples. Anger makes us more susceptible to listening to temptation.
Jesus contrasts this impulsive reaction with his timing: in the temple, before Jesus overturned the tables, notice that he had to make a whip of cords before driving the merchants out of the temple. This takes time to do, which means that Jesus wasn’t acting impulsively. His reactions were carefully thought out, which allowed him to keep control of his emotions and not act strictly on how he felt in the moment.
A lot of times when we are angry, we want to react immediately. However, that can end up badly very often if we do not allow ourselves time to process everything and respond in a graceful and righteous manner.
How to be angry
Anger isn’t something that we need to avoid at all times, but something that we need to learn to handle in a careful and righteous way. “Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent.” (Psalm 4:4). This verse has two different commandments: be angry, and do not sin. Similarly, Ephesians 4:26-27 says to “be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil”. The Bible has made it clear that we are to be angry, but also that we should not sin in our anger. Righteous anger is actually very good; it helps us see that sin does not belong in the world, and it pushes us to be a light in a sinful, dark world.
However, we must be careful in our anger. “Know this, my beloved brothers; let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God.” (James 1:19-20). Similar to Jesus’ reactions in the New Testament, we need to be not easily angered. “Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly.” (Proverbs 14:29). If we are angered easily, that means we are allowing these emotions to get the best of us, which is not wise. If we are slow to anger, we are able to react in a way that bears good fruit.
If we are angered quickly, many things can follow: gossip, fighting, and bad intentions. This is worldly fruit, and is the way that a sinful would react. It is our job as followers of Christ to be set apart from the world.
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Hopefully you learned a bit more about anger, and how it fits into your everyday life. Let me know what other words you’d love to see a word study on: I would love to hear from you! <3
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