Lay Down Your Anger

Jonah 4:4  "But the LORD replied, 'Is it right for you to be angry?'"

I love the Book of Jonah.  How many stories in the history of literature can say so much about the human condition in a mere two pages the way that Jonah does?  In Jonah we meet ourselves.  No matter where we are in our relationship with God, if we reflect closely we will find shades of who we are in this short tale.  Maybe we are haughty and feel superior to others.  Maybe we are full of pride.  Maybe we question God.  Maybe we are running away from God.

And maybe we are angry.

One of the first sermons I ever wrote, back when I was 24 or so, was on Jonah.  I spoke about how pride was the central issue of the book.  But looking at it again, I think pride shares the spotlight here with anger.  They feed off each other.  Jonah is told to preach to the Ninevites, whom he hates, and so in his anger at them he flees, thinking God has made a mistake.  When his experience at sea frightens [not "humbles"] him into submission, he comes back and does as God has told him.  But then he sits down in anger, as he knows God is forgiving his enemies.  His anger has transferred from the Ninevites to God himself.

And so God asks him, "Have you any right to be angry?"  Then he gives Jonah shade from a vine to comfort him, and almost as quickly allows the vine to die, angering Jonah even more.  "Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?" God asks.  "I do," Jonah answers.  "I am angry enough to die."

I think Jonah's answer is one of the saddest moments in all of scripture.  Jonah represents us all, and how we are able to let anger overwhelm us to such a degree that it blinds us to God's ability to love and to forgive.  It points to perhaps the worst aspect of our fallen nature, and to the chief means by which the enemy uses us as pawns in his game.  Anger can overwhelm us, disfigure us, and ultimately destroy us.  If we cannot identify and understand our anger, and ultimately let it go, then we are living our lives at great risk.

Yes, there's no getting around anger.  And it has its place.  Perhaps the most overly prooftexted passages of the New Testament are those regarding Jesus's cleansing of the Temple, which occurs in all four Gospels (a rarity in and of itself).  Seeing the money-changers in the Temple, "Zeal for his house consumed him," and Jesus began turning the tables, literally.  Of course, even the Book of Jonah shows us God's anger.  The entire tale only takes place because Ninevah's wickedness had caused God to act.  God was angry.  We, too, are prone to anger and sometimes it is justified and even necessary.  A person who could not feel anger would not be a super-saint, but instead a mere automaton.

But what Jonah knows about God is this: "You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love."  Jonah knows this, but he doesn't realize he should learn from God's example.  Neither do we, most of the time.  When we allow our anger to live in us, to fester, and to grow, we lose sight of God.  In time we worship our anger instead of God.  It becomes our motivation, it robs us of our judgement, and it poisons everything we touch.

If you've ever lived with anger, or, if you've ever lived with someone who lives with anger, you know how divisive and destructive it can be.  When Saul first became jealous of David, and then angry with him, he did not have the good sense, nor the spiritual maturity, to leave that anger behind.  Instead, he let it grow until it consumed him.  In 1 Samuel 24, when David has the chance to kill Saul in a cave, he instead lets him go, and only begs that he wake up to the truth. For a moment, Saul realized that David was right.  But his anger came back, and in the end it left him dead on the battlefield, by his very own hand.

Hosea says of such people, "They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind." (8:7)  Unchecked anger destroys not only the life of the one carrying the anger, it destroys entire families as well. 

Yet it doesn't have to be.  We know that God tells us to lay down our sins, our troubles, and our burdens.  But we are also called to lay down our anger.  It is a stunningly heavy weight, and it is also more personal and more attached to us than any bad habit or mark from a sinful past that we may bear.  Yet we are called to lay it down.  It may not seem easy, or even possible, but remember, with God's help anything can happen.  Think of what anger does and how it controls us.  Think of how it divides us from others and from God himself.  Think of how it torments us, warps us, and even owns us.  If you recognize these things, remember it doesn't have to be this way.  Let it go, let your anger go at last.  Lay it down and walk away.