NRS Mat 5:21 "You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, 'You shall not murder'; and 'whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.' 22 But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, 'You fool,' you will be liable to the hell of fire. 23 So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. 25 Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. 26 Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.
“Anger Management?”
When is the last time you almost lost your temper?
This past week I was experiencing some computer problems in my office so I took some of my work home one afternoon in an effort to not get to far behind. It was about one o'clock in the afternoon when I arrived. The house was quiet and empty, which afforded a perfect opportunity for me. No sooner than I had set down to begin to type some work, then the phone began to ring. From vinyl siding and free vacations to new and improved long distance service it seemed that everyone knew that I was home. It was almost like there was a secret camera in my house, which told all of these folks that I was there. As each interruption came I could feel the tension building in my body which I am sure was expressed through the tone of my voice with each additional call. Finally I remembered something that I had recently heard on 60 minutes dealing with unwanted phone solicitation. With the next call I employed the strategy. As the representative was talking I interjected a question. I asked, “Does anyone really buy this stuff over the phone?” The phone went silent for a moment then the person on the other end tried to pick back up with the scrip that he was reading while I began to ask more unrelated questions. Fairly soon he was so flustered that there was just silence between us with which I politely said, “thanks for the call” and hung up. After an hour or so of dealing with these type of interruptions I was not much good to anybody, especially myself. Aggravation was alive and well!
Some of us at one time or another have probably struggled with our inner feelings when it comes to this emotion of aggravation which left unchecked can cause our tempers to flare. Likewise most of us would agree that unbridled anger in the wrong context could be a dangerous thing. Often we see examples of this happening with increasing reports of road rage and other crimes that were ignited with the slow burn of irritation that led to the explosion of unbridled anger.
For instance in the spring of 1894, the Baltimore Orioles came to Boston to play a routine baseball game, but what happened that day was anything but routine.
The Orioles’ John McGraw got into a fight with the Boston third baseman. Within minutes all the players from both teams had joined in the brawl. The warfare quickly spread to the grandstands. Among the fans the conflict went from bad to worse. Someone set fire to the stands and the entire ballpark burned to the ground. Not only that, but the fire spread to 107 other Boston buildings as well.[1]
What you might not know however is that recent research in the medical community suggests that even simple annoyances with which we allow to worry us makes us liable to increased health risks. This is the conclusion of several medical studies one of which comes from Doctors from Coral Gables, Fla., who compared the efficiency of the heart’s pumping action in 18 men with coronary artery disease to nine healthy controls.
Each of the study participants underwent one physical stress test (riding an exercise bicycle) and three mental stress tests (doing math problems in their heads, recalling a recent incident that had made them very angry, and giving a short speech to defend themselves against a hypothetical charge of shoplifting). Using sophisticated X-ray techniques, the doctors took pictures of the subjects’ hearts in action during these tests.
For all the subjects, anger reduced the amount of blood that the heart pumped to body tissues more than the other tests, but this was especially true for those who had heart disease.
Why anger is so much more potent than fear or mental stress is anybody’s guess. But one of the doctors said that until we see more research on this subject, it couldn’t hurt to count to 10 before you blow your stack.[2]
These doctors are not the only ones who recognize the potentially “life” threatening effects, especially to the heart, of being aggravated or mad which can lead to being hostile and angry. Jesus, as he walked this earth over two thousand years ago, while explaining to the disciples the difference between living as “Salt and Light” suggests this “Liability” in their spiritual health exists as well. Jesus says,
"You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, 'You shall not murder'; and 'whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.' 22 But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, 'You fool,' you will be liable to the hell of fire.
The liability, which the Lord speaks, is threefold; firstly if we are angry with a brother or sister we can expect judgment. This gives us the reality that Jesus is concerned about our motives and our thoughts as much as our actions. The warning is clear, if we walk around carrying contempt for each other in our hearts, we are well on our way for the next breach of Christian relationship, which Jesus describes as actually saying something hurtful or malicious to one another. Most of us are familiar with the old saying, "If looks could kill". This is exactly what the Lord is saying, they do. They do because they lead to the final and most serious form of the violation, which the Lord describes as calling a brother or a sister a fool. In the ancient texts this word had a meaning similar to the notion that to call a person a fool was to say that they were worth nothing. What could be more of an abomination in Gods eyes then to label one of his children that he loved so much that he would sacrifice his on son for, worthless? Likewise when we in our minds convince ourselves that a human being is worthless then we begin to witness untold atrocities unleashed upon mankind. The less value we place upon human life the more power we give to evil things in this world.
Jesus is concerned about our motives because He understands that in the example given of murder that it is a result of anger. Our Lord would avert these crimes by rooting out the seeds that give them expression in our hearts. We cannot worship the One who is most Holy when we have malice or contempt built up inside of us.
As Jesus preached that day and used the example of the law against murder he was confronting their awareness and misunderstanding about murder and its root cause of anger. In error the Pharisee’ and the scribes had focused all of their attention on the external demands of such a command. Much like the prohibition to keep the Sabbath Holy and not to work on the Sabbath, all of their attention went into deciding what was considered “work” rather than the deeper, spiritual intention of the Law that says we must make time for God and God alone. For them it was perfectly acceptable for a shepherd to feed his sheep on the Sabbath, but it was an abomination and blasphemy for Jesus to heal on the Sabbath. So it was with the command not to murder the religious authorities of that day were consumed with punishment and quality of such an offense rather then the underlying source that led to the action. Jesus simply wanted them to understand that the difference between keeping the letter of the law and comprehending the spirit of the law, for it is the spirit of the law, which transforms the heart.
When we consider this teaching some may say, “Did not the Lord get angry as well”. And the answer would have to be yes. But notice the difference between human anger, which results in the destruction of each other, and the Lord’s righteous anger. Consider the time in the Temple courtyard where Jesus got angry with the moneychangers. When Jesus arrived at this most holy place to worship God what he found instead were people selling goods and conducting business as if they were on the corner square. This encounter has been called righteous anger because Jesus saw the things of God being polluted by the things of man. I often wonder if the Lord were here today and took a tour of some of our holy places, and what we have done to them at the expense of being culturally relevant, what he would think.
Nevertheless, Jesus understood the use of righteous anger in the proper context. Righteous anger is a divinely rooted emotion, intimately allied to our instinct for right; it is designed to be used for constructive spiritual purposes. According to Dr. David Seamands, the person who cannot feel anger at evil is a person who lacks enthusiasm for good. If you cannot hate wrong, it’s very questionable whether you really love righteousness.
Today in our world we see the destruction left behind by unbridled anger. In our fits of rage we say and do things to one another that can take years to repair if at all. Whole families are put at risk each time we give into one of the evil ones’ favorite tools. The sobering part however is like most sins of the flesh the danger is not realized until the damage has already been done. One of the most common expressions to describe losing your temper is to “fly off the handle.” This phrase refers to the head of a hammer coming loose from its handle as the carpenter attempts to use it. Several things can happen as a result.
First the hammer becomes useless—no longer good for work. When a person loses his temper, often he loses his effectiveness. Anything he says may not be taken seriously and is likely to be unproductive.
Second, the hammerhead—twirling out of control—is likely to cause some type of damage to anything in its path. The person who loses his temper causes damage even if he doesn’t realize it—perhaps physically to people or objects in his way, and nearly always emotionally to those who feel they are victims of this uncontrolled wrath.
Third, the repair of both the hammer and the resulting damage takes time. The person who loses his temper may recover quickly, but the victims of a hot temper rarely recovers as quickly.
So what are we to do? Scripture tells us to stamp out the potential for anger where it begins. We are to urgently make things right with all of those people, brothers and sister, which we can. And we should do this quickly because He suggests by His final analogy that the clock is running and we have little time left. Ultimately we cannot worship God and be in His presence with anger in our hearts. God sees our most inward crevices of the soul and demands that we worship Him in spirit and in truth. It is only by His grace that we can even approach and understand such a goal. But understanding the goal drives us to our knees in humble repentance. And when we repent with each other and mostly with God then the new life of discipleship has a domain to begin its reign in our hearts.
Amen