The admonition in Eph. 4:26 is to be angry and sin not. It has a timely rejoinder with it – let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Anger has a shelf-life and if kept beyond that it becomes poisonous; it will either kill you or shrivel you up like an old prune – it is not accidental that bitterness is included with wrath and anger and malice in v.31. Anger is not always easy to define, because expressions of anger can range from open hostility to cool indifference. It might be someone who, with nostrils flaring, screams abuse at you or it could be the little boy who, told to sit down by the teacher, sits down but is still standing up on the inside. In fact, latent anger can be often hidden so well – Judas was not suspected by the others (John 13:26-29). Compare him with Ahab when his request was refused by Naboth (1 Kings 21:4,5): maybe nobody outside the palace knew how angry he was.
Neurologist Mortimer Ostow in his study The Psychology of Melancholy, reported, “Depression at every phase of its development includes a component of anger, whether visible or invisible, whether conscious or unconscious”. The latent anger and resentment often rise to our consciousness as baffling waves of negativism – depression. In time the depression becomes such a virulent force that it is diagnosed as the cause of the problem, when, quite often, it is the effect. Then perhaps the pain of depression causes anger and the beat goes on. Many depressed people have chosen to shut down and no longer engage with their world because they have discovered that all their best efforts to make life work on their terms have failed. Nothing works to give them what they deeply desire, so they quit. It’s hopeless.
Be angry! Is all anger right? (God asks Jonah this in 4:4,9) James 1:19,20 says that the wrath of man works not the righteousness of God. Prov. 15:18 reminds us that a wrathful man stirs up strife while Prov. 29:22 warns that a furious man abounds in transgressions. Marcus Aurellius said; he who is excited by anger seems to turn away from reason…the soul does violence to itself when it turns away from any man, or moves toward him with the intention of injuring. But some anger must be right. What angers God? Good question, because it might help us educate ourselves about what we are to be angry about. If we can align ourselves with God’s thinking we will be angry like God. We are to grow in this. Ex.34:6,7 describes God as being slow to anger, but He gets angry often (Ps.7:11), no doubt because He has a lot to be angry about!
What causes anger? The prime cause is God! Strange? Understand that I’m using this in the loose and inaccurate sense that we use it – like when we say “You make me so mad” – we ought to say “I choose to make me mad when you do that”. So it’s not that God makes us mad but that we choose to get mad at God. I’ve noted over the years, rather ironically, its so easy for people to get mad in a Bible study of all things! – usually at God for something He has said! The apostle John extrapolates Cain’s behaviour to include references to envy and hatred, but the emotion given notice to in the original record is anger. Was Cain angry with Abel? Yes and no. His prime anger was with God. But you can’t fight God so how is it expressed? You take it out on something that God loves – Abel. Saul persecuted David but his real problem was with God. Same with the Devil – his real problem is with God but he takes it out on God’s creation.
So Cain was hurt and angry and his pride was wounded. What to do? He could have and should have repented and things would have been restored between himself and God. But when it came to God’s terms or Cain’s terms, he chose life on Cain’s terms. And the last we see of him is still in this angry war with God.(Gen. 4:17). Instead of accepting God’s punishment and being a wanderer, he builds a city and infected his progeny (the same thing happens after with flood with Babel).
Jonah also illustrates how wrong beliefs about God can lie at the root of this emotion we call anger. He was angry with God for sending him to Nineveh in the first place. After a bout with stomach acid in a fish’s stomach he goes. He then had ideas that God should destroy the city of Nineveh – at least that would make the trip profitable. But God spared Nineveh and Jonah was angry with him all over again. His anger was fueled by his obsession with his own needs, and his ideas about what God should or shouldn’t do. Thinking affects feeling and anger is a feeling. Can’t help an emotion at the time because the beliefs that produce it have to be changed. That takes time, education, humility: we can take the time to change our thinking once the anger has arisen. That will help defuse it and continued changing of thinking will help mitigate the onset of anger in the future.
Pain leads to anger and aggression. It has been observed when two animals close to one another are hurt they will frequently fight. People stuck in a hot room are more likely to get hot under the collar as well, than in a cool comfortable room. But thinking can change this, in fact we already so this: for example, if your dentist causes you pain you don’t punch his lights out. Why not? Because we rationally conclude that pain is a part of dentistry – we need to remember its also a part of life.
Anger can be destructive and drag us down. It is like a medicine which when used correctly is good for you but when used inappropriately, does damage. Some people are habitually angry and become obsessed with misery-causing resentments to avoid even some more horrible misery. What could that payoff be? Theodore Dalrymple said that our resentment of others and of past events helps us deny our own responsibility for our failings and unhappiness. If we think of ourselves as the innocent victim of circumstances, we are not a bad person or a failure, but indeed, we deserve sympathy and help. For some people, our parents are seen as the cause of our problems and failures. Such people obsess over and over again that a critical parent destroyed their self-esteem, or an alcoholic parent made them totally ashamed or a busy parent made them feel worthless: poor parents are made responsible for our lives and we are relieved of any responsibility. That’s a big payoff. If we portray ourselves as mistreated by a cruel world, we appear to be righteous, totally blameless, and it seems unnecessary for us to change or do anything about it. We become a victim, and in our day and age that is quite a status.
Somebody asked the question, “If we hate our anger as much as we say we do, why do we hang on to it?” Probably for a number of reasons. Anger has its purposes. Self-protection: I mentioned the dentist before – we hate going to the dentist because we hate pain, but we still end up going because we want to save ourselves some greater pain later on. Now quite apart from dentists, we live in a world filled with pain and a part of that is mine to have and to hold, but we’re not masochists. So we can choose anger over pain. It’s why people fight – a wife would rather fight with her husband rather than face the ache of his cool indifference. Or the child who would rather fight with his parents than deal with their lack of attention, and perhaps the fighting will gain some attention. It’s probably easier to get angry with the boss and clam up, rather than abuse him and tell his how much he hurt you.
King Saul did this. Behind his anger was fear. He felt threatened by David’s success and popularity, but David was a loyal servant. His problem was with God and when told he was to be rejected, rather than place himself in the hands of God he determined to persecute David till the end. He’d rather deal with his anger than his fear. He also chose anger as a means to deflect just criticism for when his plan to trap David and have him killed at the New Moon feast was exposed, he became furious at Jonathon and labelled him as a traitor and fool – all to take the spotlight off himself.
Anger can also be used as a means of protection like barbs on a porcupine. It can be used to create space by creating a wall of intimidation. A classic example is King Herod who was tormented by a paranoid fear that resulted in a rage that destroyed hundreds of Jewish boys under two years of age. He even killed his wife and boys because he feared they would get rid of him and take his throne. It was said in his day that it was better to be a pig in Israel than one of Herod’s sons because you had a better chance of survival. He trusted no one and had no concept of security in God. It’s ironic, but once God is eliminated from the picture we must find other ways to survive. So we look to things or others to supply what only God can supply – security in an insecure world. But it doesn’t work because who can come off the bench and fill in for God? And when they don’t fulfill our desires we become angry with them. Unfulfilled demands give rise to angry battles – Jas. 4:1ffr. Asking God to meet our needs is one thing, but when they become selfish demands we change from humble children into arrogant rebels who want to manipulate God rather than have the wisdom of His way in our life. And you know what? God is not interested in encouraging the illusion that a world under our control would be a safer and better world than a world under His patronage.
But granted that there is a place for anger, are all expressions of anger right? A common idea is to give full vent to it and you’ll feel better – you won’t get ulcers, high blood pressure etc. if you do so. For example, Psychiatrist John Marshall says “people feel there is real value in hitting, throwing or breaking something when frustrated”. God says “be angry but don’t sin”. Anger is not a license to hurt. So we have to be angry but control our spirit – He that is slow to wrath is of good understanding (Prov. 14:29). Again, Prov. 16:32 says that one who can control his anger is better than the mighty. Anger is not an excuse for disobedience – eg. swearing or negligence (anger is seen as a way of saying “I’m not in a position to behave responsibly right now. It is not an excuse for injustice (cf. Nebuchadnezzar: Dan. 3:19-22). Shakespeare, obviously borrowing from the Nebuchadnezzar incident, said “Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot it do singe yourself”. Or as Francis Bacon said, “In a fit of anger..do not anything that is not revocable”. Many believe that talking out anger helps get rid of it – or at least makes you feel less angry. Oftentimes that merely rehearses it. As you recite your grievances, your emotional arousal build again, making you feel as angry as you did when the infuriating event first happened. And with each subsequent rehearsal comes fresh anger. So why do we keep rehearsing? Because they haven’t been settled – either because we haven’t sorted our differences out (a la Matt.18) or because we choose to feel aggrieved. Blowing up is not the therapy it is commonly believed to be. As Dr. Redford Williams said “Besides, studies have shown that in the physical sense anger kills, whether you keep it in or let it out. It’s anger itself that seems to be the problem”. What is generally agreed is that of the three ways of dealing with anger:- stewing, spewing, or directing, directing is best. That is to express your angry feelings in some sort of assertive (not aggressive or abusive), or shall we say, constructive, way.
Of course we have to know the difference between what’s worth getting angry over and what is not. Do we want to be angry ALL the time?! Remember, sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Sometimes the best thing to do is let it go – often unimportant and quickly forgotten (cf. Prov. 19:11). Anger can take the form of a grudge that can last for years and years simply because we won’t forgive. We say things like “I forgive you but I won’t forget!”. We haven’t really forgiven at all. Not only does it spoil our relationship with others, it spoils our relationship with ourselves, and we are the person we have to live with ALL the time. Very often the feeling is, “Why should I forgive them – what they did was wrong!?” Is forgiveness only for those who do right by us? If it was it would make nonsense of the word.
Anger is inflamed by the words or attitudes we take when provoked: “Who does he think he is to treat me like this?!” Better to give the other person the benefit of the doubt – eg. “Perhaps he having a bad day” – so pray for the adversary (Matt.5:43,44). If God is slow to anger then learning from Him means we must adopt His thinking in order to be slow to anger – He remembers we are but dust (Ps. 103:14). Humour plays a part. As Tommy Cooper used to say, “It’s hard to laugh yourself sick – there’s few of us who can do it – laugh and be sick at the same time”. I don’t mean ‘laugh off’ your problem, but use humour to help yourself face it more realistically. Anger is a serious emotion but it is often accompanied by ideas that can make you laugh. Oftentimes anger is caused by blocked goals. That is, we want our way and when things don’t go our way we get angry. We can become very demanding as a result. Well, imagine yourself as the supreme deity cruising through life with your feet not touching the ground and all bowing before you and you having your way in everything. The more you think about it the crazier it gets and the more unreasonable it appears.
We need a reality check:- does God need me to police His universe and be custodian of the Lamb’s Book of Life adding and subtracting names at my whim? Many angry people tend to swear or speak in very colourful terms because thinking can get quite exaggerated in anger. So we use words like “always”, “never”; “the world is out to get me; “everything’s ruined”. So our language simply reflects that idea that the problem cannot be solved. We need to tell ourselves that “hey, this is frustrating, or upsetting, but it’s not the end of the world and maybe I need a break and come back tomorrow to fix it”. And expressions like “I demand”, or “I must have” are better being replaced by “I would like” or “I would appreciate”. Ps. 4:4 is instructive: In your anger do not sin; when you are on your bed, search your heart and be silent”. We should reflect prayerfully on our anger, and ask questions like: “What did I feel angry about today? Where is my anger coming from? Why did I feel so threatened that I believed my anger was a justifiable response? Why is my anger so intense over something so small? (or am I really angry at something else?) Is my anger for the benefit of another or is it directed against another? Did my anger further God’s interests or mine? Did I provoke anger in someone else today?
Be angry and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.