Ephesians 4:26-27, 31-32
Dr David Banner was a specialist on the
subject of anger, the physiological and psychological dimensions of the
emotion.
During his research Dr. Banner was involved
in an accident involving Gamma Rays and soon thereafter, whenever he became
angry, he changed into a green-skinned creature capable of tearing through
doors and trouncing the toughest thugs.
Dr. Banner became the Incredible Hulk.
The Hulk caused an accident that blew up Banner’s lab, so the scientist
was out of work.
Of course, this was science fiction and they
never tried to answer all the questions the story raised. Questions like, Why didn’t anyone ever notice
the Hulk was wearing Dr. Banner’s shirt, tattered though it might have
been? Questions like, How did the
unemployed Dr. Banner afford to replace all those shoes?
The program had its tongue-in-cheek
moments. The opening showed the usually
mild Dr. Banner telling a nosy reporter from a tabloid, “Don’t make me
angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m
angry.”
You can probably think of a lot of people you
don’t like when they’re angry. Maybe you
don’t like yourself when you’re angry.
You see, each of us has a little of the Hulk within.
As we read or listen to the news, we suspect
there are a lot of “Hulks,” around, Hulks more dangerous than a comic book
hero.
Like Dr. Banner, many of us want to know more
about anger, especially about controlling anger.
Several years ago I examined what the Bible
said about anger and concluded the Bible pictures two broad categories of
anger: Loving Anger and Loveless Anger.
More recently, I’ve had the occasion to look
at what some psychologists have to say about anger. I found it interesting that some of them also
divide anger into two broad categories:
Aggressive Anger and Assertive Anger.
In two important ways what they say parallels what the Bible has to say
about what I called Loving and Loveless Anger
*
Both the Bible and the psychologists say that
anger has a proper place in our lives.
*
Both the Bible and the psychologists warn
that anger, even appropriate anger, can degenerate into something destructive
and unhealthy.
Occasionally, the Bible seemed ahead of the game
on anger. For example, for a while “pop
psychologists” warned that keeping anger bottled up inside was dangerous; they
recommended letting it all out in emotional explosions. This, of course, is contrary to what the
Bible says about avoiding “rage.” In
time, the psychologists began saying such emotional outbursts are actually
unhealthy.
As we examine the text we’ll discover that,
with God’s help, we can better understand and control our anger.
I
A PLACE FOR LOVING ANGER
Paul’s words come very close to being a
mandate—“Be angry….” He seems to be
saying that it’s never right to sin, but it’s often right to feel angry. Commenting on the verse, John Stott writes, “…the verse recognizes that there is such a
thing as Christian anger and too few Christians either feel it or express
it. Indeed, when we fail to do so, we
deny God, damage ourselves and encourage the spread of evil.”
Such
anger is a reflection of love—love for God, love for others, and love for
ourselves. The element of a proper
self-love is essential to this understanding of anger; it is reflected in Les
Carter’s definition of anger:
“Anger is the emotional response that is tied to one’s psychological
sense of self-preservation. Anger
involves standing up for one’s sense of convictions and one’s sense of
self-worth. When an individual feels
angry he is being an advocate for himself and his beliefs.” (Les Carter, Mind Over Emotions, Grand
Rapids: Baker Book House, 1985, p. 14.)
Such anger is never simply a matter of
self-love. Carter goes on to say that an
individual expressing such anger “is attempting to make a stand for his
personal convictions or self-worth while at the same time considering the needs
of other persons involved.” (Ibid., p. 6)
Loving anger as an expression of love for
ourselves can manifest itself in a variety of ways:
*
It may be reflected in the public statement
of our beliefs and opinions. For
Christians this is important to remember.
In Galatians we can imagine the fire in Paul’s eyes as he writes to
defend the truth of the gospel
*
It may be reflected in saying “No” when
necessary.
*
It may be reflected in setting
boundaries.
*
It may be reflected in openly seeking to
clarify issues.
*
It may be reflected as we insist upon our
rights when necessary.
This is not self-centeredness. The truth is, if we don’t care enough about
ourselves to respond with anger to injustices done to us, I doubt if we will
ever care enough about others to respond with anger to injustices done to them.
Loving anger expressed as love for God and
others may also be manifested in a variety of ways.
This is true because loving anger fuels the
heroic impulse to take a stand against evil.
This is seen in the lives of many great Christians who made an impact on
their cultures. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s
anger at slavery prompted her to write passionately against the wicked practice
in her popular Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Catherine Booth’s anger at the poverty of
London’s slum-dwellers led her to work tirelessly beside her husband, William, as
they built a Salvation Army. Dietrich Bonheoffer’s
anger at the injustice of the Nazi regime caused him to crusade against Hitler.
Loving anger allows us to focus our energy on
defeating injustice and doing good. In
fact, it often enables people to accomplish more than seems humanly
possible. When Harriet Beecher Stowe—who
openly acknowledged God’s guidance in her work--visited Lincoln in 1862, the
President is said to have greeted her: “So this is the little lady who wrote the
book that made the big war.”
Loving anger can accomplish much that is
good, but we have to keep in mind that loving anger can easily degenerate into
a less noble attitude or emotion. So, as
we consider the place for loving anger, we also have to consider…
II
THE PERIL OF LOVELESS ANGER
While Christian love allows us to be properly
concerned about our own needs, it is never focused only on our needs. When something happens and we become focused
only on our needs, love is corrupted.
Loving anger becomes loveless anger.
When this happens, our focus becomes meeting our own needs, gaining
superiority over others, retaliation for offenses real and imagined.
Whereas loving anger stresses the need for an
open, honest acknowledgment of our feelings, loveless anger often does its work
under the guise of living above such emotions as anger. Once again, Les Carter helps us understand
one way this is seen in what is curiously described as “passive aggressive
behavior.”
Carter writes:
“This type
of aggressive anger is the most subtle and perhaps the most difficult to
handle. The individual is very slyly
communicating anger while not ‘owning up’ to it. Behaviors in this category include the silent
treatment, holding grudges, social withdrawal, deliberate ignoring, cold and
icy glares, laziness, procrastination, giving half-hearted efforts, chronic
forgetfulness, and chronic tardiness.” (Ibid., p. 16)
We’ve all known such people. Sometimes we have behaved in this way.
Loveless anger, however it is manifested,
brings with it some inherent perils.
Paul lists some of them in this passage.
It’s important to note how Paul begins this
discussion. He warns that anger can give
Satan a foothold. In other words, Paul is warning us that such anger can become
the beachhead from which Satan may mount an assault on the rest of our lives.
How does this happen?
Loveless anger may lead you to loveless words
and actions. An angry spirit will often
recruit the tongue for its work. You
might not strike out with a clenched fist but you might strike out with callous
words. We’ve all known those whose anger
finds expression in cursing, shouting, screaming, and name calling. Sometimes such persons give vent to their
anger by throwing things or even physical assault. We wonder if Paul knew people who were too
dangerous to be allowed to drive a chariot when they were angry.
In verse 31 Paul uses words which embrace
most of these behaviors.
*
He warns against “brawling.” The word suggests making sure everyone knows
the reason for your anger. The brawler
gives everyone standing at the coffee machine a detailed indictment against the
person who has inspired his or her wrath.
*
He warns against “slander.” Our word slander has a somewhat narrower
meaning. Here it means any form of
speaking against another person. The
Amplified Bible translates it as “evilspeaking, abusive or blasphemous
language.” Slanderers may engage in
put-downs, gossip, and sarcasm directed at someone who has angered them. Sometimes slanderers may spread outright lies
or innuendoes about the object of their anger.
*
He warns against “every form of malice.” These words imply doing whatever you can to
hurt another person. The fact that
there is “an epidemic of family violence in the US” (quoting Sandra Arbetter)
reminds us that such malice may involve physical violence.
Paul understood that loveless anger has the
power to destroy relationships. The word
translated “wrath” focuses attention on damage done to a relationship. “Bitterness” speaks of anger allowed to grow
old. It speaks of a resentful spirit
which continually refuses to be reconciled.
At the church I served in Texas there were
two brothers who had grown up in the community.
They had a third brother who was angry with both of them. This brother had not spoken to them in
decades even though they lived less than twenty miles apart.
Paul understood that loveless anger was
ultimately harmful to the angry person.
In fact the Bible tells us that rage and anger are
self-destructive.
As Job said, “the fool is destroyed by his own angry passions.” (5:2) Grumpy old men may be fun in the movies but
in real life they are time-bombs waiting to self-destruct. One writer says, “In the grumpiest men, the guys who often feel like swearing and
smashing things, anger more than tripled the risk of nonfatal heart attacks and
fatal coronary heart disease….”
In
Proverbs we are told that anger blunts our ability to make rational decisions
because “a quick-tempered man does
foolish things.” (14:17)
Finally, loveless anger can destroy those
things which are most precious to you. The
Dispatch recently reported that Ohio
has many dams that may not be safe and could cause major damage if they
failed. Think of that when you read the
proverb: “starting a quarrel is like
breaching a dam….” (Proverbs 17:14) Unbridled,
unloving anger can harm your relationship with God, mar your life in the
church, and spoil the harmony in your family.
With all this in mind, how do we deal with
loveless anger without denying ourselves the right to loving anger?
A
PRESCRIPTION FOR BALANCED ANGER
1. Deal
with your emotions by submitting your entire personality to Christ.
Be open to allow Christ to shape, mold, and
transform you. When we open ourselves to
his work Christ begins to develop the spirit of meekness or gentleness in
us. The biblical word “meek” (praus) is so often misunderstood. It is not a synonym for wimp. It implies power under control. William Barclay explains the meaning of the
Greek term: “The man who is praus is the man who is always angry at the
right time and never angry at the wrong time.”
2. Deal
with your anger by owning your feelings.
Acknowledge that you are sometimes
angry. For some reason, Christians often
try to deny that anger is part of their lives.
With red faces and steam drifting out their ears, they say, “I’m not
mad, only hurt.”
Maybe they’ve been taught that all anger is
bad. That simply not true. There is a proper place for anger in our
lives. It keeps us from becoming doormats
and victims.
By honestly owning our anger we can seek
God’s wisdom in expressing our loving anger and seek God’s grace in expelling
our loveless anger.
3. Deal
with your anger swiftly.
When Pat and I were standing in the reception
line at her wedding, a friend whispered to her, “Don’t go to bed angry.” Modify that advice a bit and it would fit a
lot of situations. I’ve seen a lot of
drivers who needed to hear, “Even if the boss is a jerk, don’t get on the
Interstate angry.”
When Paul warns against letting the sun go
down on our wrath he is not saying that if you get angry at the crack of dawn
it’s okay to fume until sunset. He is
warning against allowing our anger to simmer, warning us against letting our
anger turn gray. He is warning against
cherishing our grudges.
I suspect it’s even dangerous to keep loving
anger unresolved for too long. Paul is
certainly saying we must keep a watchful eye on any type of anger. Unless we are very careful even loving anger
can lose its focus and become something ugly.
Perhaps this is why so many who may have begun with an honest attempt to
defend cherished Christian principle have fallen prey to a lifestyle of carping
criticism and name-calling.
4. Realize
that dealing with anger involves a spiritual pilgrimage.
Along the way this pilgrimage may lead us to
a better understanding of ourselves, our needs, our weakness, our fears, our
pride. This pilgrimage may lead us to a
deeper understanding of forgiveness, especially forgiveness directed toward
those who have inspired our anger. This
pilgrimage may inspire new depths of compassion within us. Paul even dares to suggest that we might come
to a place where rage is replaced with tenderhearted understanding.
5. Seek
God’s wisdom in shaping your response to loving anger.
A little girl complained to her pastor that
her older brother and his friends had built some traps to try to catch birds.
“What did you do,” the pastor asked.
“I prayed that God would keep the birds out
of the traps,” the little girl said.
“Anything else?” the pastor asked.
“I prayed that if the birds went into the traps,
the traps wouldn’t work,’ she answered.
The pastor asked, “Is that all?”
The little girl answered, “No, after I prayed
I went out and kicked the traps to pieces.”
Loving anger calls for action. Loving anger might lead you to a redemptive
confrontation with another person. It
may lead you to march in a protest. It
may prompt you to write a letter. It may
lead you to run for office or join a group of like-minded men and women. When we are confronted with such challenges
we need God’s help in deciding what to do.
CONCLUSION
Dr. David Banner longed to be free of the
Hulk within him. Even though the Hulk
did so much good, Banner was constantly afraid of what the beast might do.
The Bible teaches us to be circumspect
regarding anger but it never calls for us to try to rid ourselves of this
powerful emotion. It doesn’t because God
knows how much good can be accomplished by one person who is angry for all the
right reasons.
Let this emotion be directed by the power of
love.
