Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Our topic today, which is anger.
Anger. So as we've done throughout all of this class, the goal and the aim of these classes is we want to let the person of Jesus be our guide, right?
We want to consider what he actually sounded like and looked like and taught.
A lot of this class is looking at what Jesus shows us in the Gospels by his behavior. So it's not so much didactic where we're learning from his teaching. Of course, we're always doing that. But we're also learning from his posture, his demeanor, his. Sometimes the Gospels describe, as we'll see in one of our texts today, even the expression on his face.
So how does he show and demonstrate anger? How does he model that for us? How does he show and demonstrate? Next time, Josh will teach on faithfulness. How does he show faithfulness in his everyday life? Mason will teach on compassion. Right?
That's often a sense of posture and presence to be compassionate. It starts with just being present, right?
So in all of these things, we want to look at Jesus kind of as our model. But just for a second, I want us to consider the, the topic of anger in and of itself. Because there is, I believe, a major misnomer about anger.
How many of you just kind of instinctively think anger is bad? Like it's kind of anger's bad, right? It's just, it's not good to be angry. Okay. We're kind of all there, I would say.
And to be fair, most of the time it is bad. Like probably 90%. This is maybe even being generous, maybe more than 90%. But 90% of the anger that you and I experience on a day to day basis, it's probably not righteous anger, right?
It's probably not anger that's directed towards a good cause.
That would be considered what, what kind of anger?
Very simply, it would be considered sinful anger. Okay. Now I'm, I'm not a psychologist, okay? So don't. But I, I do kind of wanted to give some categories of different kinds of sinful anger. So start with the most obvious one. Right.
Most obvious kind of sinful anger is what I will call hot anger. Okay. What do I mean by hot anger?
What do you guys think hot anger would look like in the moment? Road.
Several people said road rage at the same time. Wow. Maybe we, maybe we've, maybe we've had some road rage recently.
What'd you say, Joel? Instant, instant compulsive, impulsive anger, right? This is where you're exploding, okay?
Your face gets hot. Like you get hot around the ears. You Get a little bit red like me.
Maybe your chest tightens up and it starts pounding a little bit.
Maybe you're clenching your fists. Right?
This is hot anger.
And it's not just the. It's not just the feeling that you're getting. Usually, hot anger means that your will is checked in some way, right? Your will is being checked like you wanted something to go one way, and it's not going that way. And now you're reacting to it in a.
Like EJ said, in an impulsive manner. You're hot. That's hot anger. Okay, all right. Second kind is cold anger.
Okay. What would maybe you classify as a kind of cold anger?
Having bitterness towards somebody. Good. Yes.
It's a little bit. It's more silent. Right. You suppress it a little bit.
What else?
[00:04:43] Speaker B: Letting it fester.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: Letting it fester. Right.
I. I often.
Cold anger doesn't always show on your face. But what I found with cold anger is that if I'm ever.
If I'm not mad at somebody, but I do kind of want to vent, there's usually a few trusted friends that I'll go to and gossip about the person or the situation.
And I'm venting. I'm venting in my anger.
I'm usually judgmental.
There's some bitterness, like Carrie said, in me where I just. I kind of want to get it off my chest. And I'm not, like, raging about it. I'm not mad about it, but I am, like, ticked, you know, And I just want to go to somebody and. And vent.
That would be an example of kind of cold anger. Okay, so we got hot anger, cold anger.
The last one. What do we call this? I'll call this a kind of suppressing anger. And this one is arguably the most dangerous kind of anger, because this is anger that you internally swallow yourself and you experience just in the confines of your own heart. But you never confess it.
You're not showing it to anybody. You're just, like, letting it kind of wallow inside you. And the reason why I say this is the most dangerous is because this kind of anger, if it isn't properly dealt with and brought into the light, will eventually lead towards indifference and even hate.
Like, where you just stop caring about someone or something and you end up hating the person inside your heart because you haven't expressed or confessed or said any of this to God. Does that make sense? Like, you're allowing your flesh to, like, feed off of the narrative that you've created for this person or thing, and you're not Dealing with it. Like, you're not crucifying it, you're not expressing it. You're not letting it out into the light. You're just letting it kind of linger and abide in your soul. There's this famous quote that Brad says all the time. I'm not sure who said it. I think it's. I think it's. Honestly, it comes from the Buddhist tradition, but it says that holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
That's like. That's what suppressing anger will do to you, right?
You're drinking poison and expecting somebody else to die. But really you're the person that's dying because you're becoming more and more indifferent and more and more honestly hateful inside your soul towards someone or something. Does that make sense? Okay, all of these are sinful. All of these are sinful. Whether it's rage or bitterness and gossip or hate and indifference, These are all ways that we can express our anger. And there's even. This isn't holistic. I'm sure there's even more ways that our anger manifests itself in a sinful way.
Now, all of that aside, this does not mean or indicate that anger in and of itself is wrong or bad. Right? Because after all, what does the Bible say about anger?
Be angry and do not sin. That actually originally comes from Psalm 4. 4, Psalm 44. Paul picks it back up in Ephesians, chapter 4:26. And he says the same thing. He says, be angry and do not sin. As in, he's like, commanding it.
It's like a command, like, be angry and do not sin. Okay, there's an early church father named John Chrysostom commenting on anger. Listen to what he says. He says, he that is angry without cause sins.
He that is angry without cause sins.
But he who is not angry when there is cause also sins.
Did you get that?
He who is not angry when there is cause sins. For unreasonable patience is the hotbed of many vices. It fosters negligence, and it incites not only the wicked, but the good to do wrong. But what if you're not angry at.
[00:09:57] Speaker C: All and you didn't do anything?
[00:09:59] Speaker A: There's no cause if there's no cause. Well, and see, Evelyn, that's a really good question. It depends on the cause. Right? There's some causes that sometimes call for our anger. Okay, like what?
[00:10:17] Speaker D: Like fear.
[00:10:18] Speaker A: Like fear?
Yeah.
[00:10:23] Speaker D: Something's going on outside. I fear first, and then I get angry.
[00:10:27] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Like. Like there are certain moments and certain Seasons that call that the most righteous way we might respond is in anger. So you think about the very character of God himself, right? When Moses is on Mount Sinai, he asks God, he says, lord, show me your glory. Pass before me. Show me your glory.
In other words, tell me the essence of who you are.
And when God responds, he tells him, when he passes by him, it says, the Lord descended in the cloud, this is Exodus 34, and stood with him there. Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there. See, again, this is just an aside, by the way. That's a pre incarnate Christ.
That's a pre incarnate Jesus. In my view, the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, this is what he said, the Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. He's describing his very character, his very glory to Moses in this moment. And he's saying that he's not angry at all, but that he's slow to anger. He's slow to anger.
So anger, specifically slow anger, is part of the glory of God. It's who he is. Which means that we can't look at anger and conclude and say that it's bad, Right? Because if we do and we say that all anger is wrong, we're criticizing the very nature and the very heart of God. God is slow to anger. He gets angry.
So here's the question, like, why would we want a God who is angry?
Why would we want that? Wouldn't it be better to have a stoic God, one who is always measured and controlled, never unleashes passion? Why would we want an angry God?
[00:12:31] Speaker B: So he can deal with evil.
[00:12:33] Speaker A: Yes, so he can deal with evil. Like, you think about it like, anger for God is never unjust. It's always just anger. It's always in the service of justice. Right.
Tim Keller says that if you never get angry about anything, you really don't love anything.
Anger is part of God's love, right?
Because if you love your children or you love your spouse, or you love your brother and your sister, and you see that they're threatened by someone or something, what is your response going to be?
It wouldn't be loving to just be stoic about it. Like you want to get angry, like defend them, Right. You want to protect them.
Thomas Aquinas says, anger looks to the good of justice.
And if you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust.
Anger looks to the good of justice.
One more quote. This is from Becky Pippert. She wrote a book called Hope Has Its Reasons. She says, think how we feel when we see someone we love ravaged by the unwise actions.
By unwise actions or relationships. Do we respond with tolerance as we might towards stranger? Far from it. Anger isn't the opposite of love. Hate is.
Anger isn't the opposite of love. Hate is. And the final form of hate is indifference. The more a father loves his son, the more he's angry at the drunkard or the liar or the traitor that's in the son. And if I, a flawed, self centered woman, can feel this much pain and anger over someone's condition, how much more a morally perfect God who made them right? You think about that. Anger is part of what it means that God is loving. Because if you have a God of love without a God of wrath, you don't have a God of justice.
Righteous anger defends that which is good.
Tim Keller has my favorite quote about anger and I'm going to write it on the board here because I just, I think it's so helpful.
He says that biblical anger, Biblical anger is energy aroused in defense of something good.
Energy aroused in defense of something good and released against something evil.
Does that make sense? Biblical anger is energy aroused in defense of something good and released against something evil. And this is where Jesus comes in. Because if you read the Gospels, Jesus did get angry several times. Even though he's the most loving, compassionate man to ever live, it's also fair to say that he's the most righteously angry person to ever live. He wielded anger perfectly every time. Okay, so the person of Jesus is going to model true anger for us. So here's what I want us to look at. I want us to look at three particular incidents in the gospels where Jesus expressed perfect self controlled self, slow and righteous anger. We're going to look at Jesus healing the man with a withered hand on the Sabbath in Mark chapter three.
We're going to look at Jesus modeling righteous irritation in Mark 10 when he insists that the children come to him.
And finally we're going to do a case study in our table groups of the most famous portrayal of Jesus anger, which is his cleansing of the temple, his overturning of the tables. We're going to actually overturn tables. I'm just kidding.
Don't want to do that.
And there's more that we could talk about too. That's not even a complete picture of Jesus anger. You know, he gets angry with the disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane. When he says, could you not keep watch for an hour?
He has anger towards the Pharisees many, many times in Matthew 23, when he calls them whitewashed tombs, he calls them hypocrites.
He confronts the disciples for their lack of faith. So there's much more that we can learn from. But I think zooming in on a couple of these pictures will be helpful for us. And we'll see kind of how he models. So let's start with Jesus healing the man with the withered hand.
I'm going to read this story out loud to you. Just know I'm combining all the synoptic accounts of this story from Matthew, Mark and Luke into one.
So if you want to follow along, maybe go to Mark chapter three and look at verses one through six. But know that I'm going to be adding in the other pieces of the story to get the full picture. Does that make sense?
So listen to this.
On another Sabbath, he, Jesus, entered the synagogue and was teaching. And a man was there whose right hand was withered. And the scribes and the Pharisees watched him to see whether he would heal on the Sabbath so that they might find a reason to accuse him.
But he, Jesus, knew their thoughts. And he said to the man with a withered hand, come and stand here. And he rose and stood there.
He said to them, which one of you who has a sheep, if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not take hold of it and lift it out of. How much more value is a man than a sheep? And he said to them, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, or 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. And said to the man, stretch out your hand. And he stretched it out and his hand was restored. But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.
Fascinating story.
So the first thing we see in this story is that the Pharisees have planted a man in the synagogue with a withered hand. Okay? So he's there for a reason. They're using him as a prop, okay? They're manipulating the pain of somebody else to trap Jesus. Cause they're trying to get him to break the law of Moses in their eyes.
And Jesus knows all of this. Cause remember the text from Luke says, he knows their thoughts, he knows what they're trying to do, okay? So already Jesus is aware of three injustices that are at play in causing his anger. To fester. Okay?
They're trying to trap him and discredit him as the Messiah. That's number one. They're trying to get him to break the law of Moses.
And they're using this man's disability as a prop.
They're using it as a prop. They're not treating him like an image bearer of God. He's nothing more than a pawn to the Pharisees.
[00:20:45] Speaker C: They trap him.
[00:20:46] Speaker A: They're trying. They're trying to trap him, to get him to see whether he would heal or not inside the synagogue. Because there's a. There's a law against working on the Sabbath. You're not supposed to work. And they would see healing as a form of work. So they're trying to. They're trying to get him to discredit himself or to fall into their little plan. Does that make sense?
[00:21:13] Speaker C: Are you thinking of a physical trap.
[00:21:15] Speaker E: Or being caught in the net or something, trying to think he's going to break the rules?
[00:21:21] Speaker A: Yeah, they're trying to see if he'll break the rules, and then they can catch him and say, aha, we got you. You broke the law. Okay, so because you think about it, too, a withered hand means a hand that is either paralyzed, deformed, or shrunken due to some sort of underlying condition like nerve damage or disease. And people with physical disabilities, including those with a withered hand, were often marginalized in society. So in Jewish culture, physical imperfection was sometimes associated with sin or judgment. Brad talked about today in John 9, the disciples who asked about the blind man, whether it was his sin or whether the sin was from his parents, whether it was hereditary. And like Brad said, he said, they're missing the point.
So not only that, a withered hand would severely limit your ability to work in the community, especially in a culture where manual labor was the norm.
So he wasn't considered a productive member of society, which probably led to financial hardship. Okay, so he probably, this man with the withered hand probably isn't well off financially. He is most likely poor. But let's get back to Jesus. What's his first response? Remember, we want to watch him closely here. He's teaching us about anger. What does he do first?
He says, yes, who's that, Katie? Yeah. He says, tells the man with the withered hand, come and stand here. So he gets the man up in front of everybody at the synagogue. Okay, now this is important because what does him standing up in front of everybody do?
It makes them pay attention to him in a different way. Right. It Sends the message that you're not a prop anymore. Just the fact that he's getting him to stand up, he's humanizing him. Okay? He's humanizing him. And he immediately begins working on their hearts by working on what they're seeing. Okay, so what are they doing with the guy? It's an attempt to. Jesus is hoping to ignite their compassion.
He wants them to see what they're doing here. And again, this is why the anger is going to start to fester, because Jesus has compassion for this man. They clearly do not.
Okay. The next thing he does is he's appealing to them with a classic rabbinic argument where you move from the lesser to the greater. So he gives an illustration of a sheep falling into a pit on the Sabbath. Right? So like, like what's, what's lesser than a sheep that falls into a pit? Like, are you going to take care of that if it happens on the Sabbath? Are you gonna go rescue your sheep? Okay, so in other words, he's, what he's trying to show is that if you do that, you guys, you're not obeying the law either. Because if you would grab a lowly sheep from a pit on the Sabbath, how much more compassion should you have for a human being made in God's image?
Does that make sense?
So Jesus is giving them an illustration. He wants them to repent. He wants them to say, ah, yes, good point, Jesus, you're right. Right. We should look at the spirit of the law, not the letter of the law. Right? That's what he wants them to do. But that's not happening. Okay, so here's what happens at this point when Jesus makes the illustration. He's got him all right? Because he asks him the question afterwards after the sheep illustration. He says, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill? He's got him because then after he asked the question, what do they respond with silence.
They probably got their hands crossed, like, gosh, well, I don't know. Probably save them, you know, but they're not going to say it.
They're too hard hearted. Okay, Is this a place full of.
[00:25:53] Speaker F: Pharisees or there, like people there as a church?
[00:25:59] Speaker A: Yeah, this would have been in the synagogue. So you would have had people of all sorts or of mostly Jews right at the time.
But it says that it was full of both scribes and Pharisees. So they're watching in the crowd. They're watching what Jesus is doing by standing him up in front of Everybody. So there would have been a crowd there, but most likely of more Jews than like outside followers or Gentiles. But we know his disciples were there as well.
[00:26:33] Speaker F: I guess it just surprises me that like people that aren't scribes or Pharisees aren't saying anything either maybe.
Is he directing all his anger towards the Pharisees or is he kind of.
[00:26:46] Speaker A: Frustrated with people that aren't willing to speak up? In this particular instance, it's more directed at the Pharisees because they've, they've planted this guy in the synagogue for, for him to try and, and you know, make him uneasy and get him to break the law of Moses. So he, he knows, he knows that like this is, this is a, a directed kind of attack on him.
[00:27:17] Speaker E: He's probably angry too because there are.
[00:27:19] Speaker D: Other people, people in the room.
[00:27:20] Speaker E: And so it's causing, it could cause them to doubt. So like the Pharisees acting out in this way is causing like other things.
[00:27:29] Speaker A: To have like other people to watch this question.
[00:27:32] Speaker E: Yeah, so I think that that would be frustrating too.
[00:27:35] Speaker A: Yeah. It said the whole, the whole room was silent. So whoever it, I, I mean to your point, like it, it, it probably was disappointing in the moment if there were out people there that were not scribes and Pharisees to also not be responding with compassion or love towards this man.
And honestly, this is what does it for Jesus because it says he looked around at them with anger. Right? You can imagine his face, like the face of Jesus is angry. He's dead serious, expressing this kind of disgust at this stubborn self righteousness that just refuses to yield. Okay. And it hits him so much that he's grieved about it. It's like he feels this fierce form of sadness. This is painful for Jesus because not only are they not getting it, but they refuse to get it. You know, that's what hard heartedness is.
It's not that you're just confused about something, it's that you refuse to actually be compassionate. Right? You, you refuse to actually live with a sense of grace and a sense of presence.
So their silence here speaks volumes. They don't want to admit that the righteous thing to do would be to have compassion, even if it's on the Sabbath. And the last thing, Jesus very publicly tells the man to stretch out his hand in front of everybody. So in his righteous anger, he wants everyone to see what he's about to do. He wants this to be very, very public so that everybody sees it.
He's going to show them that, yes, it is lawful to heal on the Sabbath, that it is lawful to do good and to save life rather than harm or kill.
And everyone in the room watches this twisted, bent hand open.
And notice what the text says.
It says this in all three gospel accounts, that his hand was restored, that his hand was restored so that not only does it imply that it was physically healed, but that Jesus is restoring him.
He's seeing. It's an implication that he's restoring his hand not just in the physical sense, but to the community, to the people of God. There's a restoration happening. He's restored ceremonially, right? He can now partake in the works of the law. He's restored to the community, to the people of God. He can do things in the temple now. He's restored to society.
That's why I think the Gospel writers use that language.
They want to show that Jesus is fully and holistically rest restoring this man. So I think that there's. I think there's three things that we can take from this particular incident about Jesus. Anger. The first one is that his anger is restrained.
His anger is restrained, is under complete self control. The display of his anger is through his expression. He's looking at them with anger. Okay?
He's displaying anger through his face. And then he's grieved. And then he gets quiet. And you notice his sentences. He says shorter things as opposed to longer things. He says, stretch out your hand, you're restored. Like he's being very, very careful in his language.
Anger that's unrestrained often takes one problem and adds to another. Anger that's unrestrained is going to escalate things, right? Jesus. Jesus is showing restrained anger.
Remember, this is energy in defense of something good released against something evil. The second thing is that his anger is focused on needs outside of himself.
His anger is focused on needs outside of himself. In this case, the needs of the crippled man. It's not about how they're making him feel about the injustice that's being being done to one another. His anger isn't about him. His anger is in defense of him. Does that make sense?
It's not just that. And Jesus, by the way, had every right to bring his feelings into it, but he doesn't. He's talking about healing on the Sabbath. And the third thing, lastly, is that he's honest in his anger. Okay? He's honest in his anger. He's clearly angry. Everybody can see that he's angry. And he's not afraid to show it. The whole room knows it. Okay, so Jesus is Fully alive to his own anger. He's not suppressing it.
He's fearless in it. Remember, Jesus is. Jesus is a warrior. He's at war with evil, okay? He's very skilled with his anger. He meets it as appropriate for the occasion. His timing is right. His targeting is perfect. Okay, this is. Again, I go back to this. This is why it wouldn't be helpful to consider Jesus as a stoic, okay? Because how would a stoic react in that situation?
Emotionless, emotionless. They would just accept it and try and appeal to reason and virtue as more triumphant. Jesus doesn't do that. Jesus is open and honest and expressive. His anger is clear and out in the open in the most righteous possible way. Okay? So he doesn't suppress his anger. His anger's not hot and his anger's not cold either. Do you see that?
It's very measured and it's very clear because it's in defense of something good released against something evil. He's releasing his anger properly. Does that make sense? Okay, so that's episode one. Episode two.
This is Jesus. And we'll call it irritation. Jesus and irritation, okay, because we probably all wouldn't describe ourselves as angry people, but we all get annoyed, right? Like, we all experience irritation daily or weekly in our lives. Hopefully. You do.
Go to Mark, chapter 10. This is Mark 10.
Thirteen to verse 16.
Mark chapter 10, verse 13 to verse 16.
This is what it says. It says, and they were bringing children to him that he might touch them.
But the disciples rebuked him. Rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, let the children come to me. Do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on him. So here's what's happening. The text doesn't indicate this, but we can assume with a pretty high degree of probability that the they who Mark is talking about who are bringing children to Jesus are mothers. Okay? It's most likely that they who are bringing these children are mothers. So there's mothers bringing their children to be close to Jesus, to be near him.
When it says that he might touch them, that's implying that he might bless them, that he might hold them and declare some kind of benediction over them.
So this makes sense. The moms are seeking blessings for their own children.
They clearly see something in Jesus that not everybody else sees. Right?
And that's why they wanted him to bless him.
And again, this is a very, it's very telling for us about Jesus relationship with children. Because what it's showing us is that Jesus values little children. He's indignant when he sees this. He wants the children to come to them, for them not to be hindered, right? And so the kingdom of God means that if you want to be Christlike, whether you have children or not, you're going to want to care for kids, because that's the heart of Jesus. Okay? So that's just something aside. And also another thing too. In the Greco Roman world, children did not have very much inherent value or worth, right? This is why the disciples were probably annoyed.
Or when it says that they rebuked the moms, they thought that Jesus doing this was a waste of time.
They were trying to be good time management people, right? Where they're like, hey, we got somewhere to go, like, we got places to be.
And for the disciples, children are not part of that picture.
So when Jesus sees the disciples rebuking them, he becomes this word, indignant. Now, indignant has a pretty broad semantic range. In Greek, it can mean displeased, but it probably most likely means annoyed or irritated. Okay?
And we're not used to thinking of Jesus again, being irritated, right?
He's very, very frustrated, annoyed with his disciples because he not only says, don't hinder them from coming to me, he said, he takes it one step further and says, hey, as a matter of fact, if you don't receive the kingdom of God like one of these children, you can't even come in, you know, Like I get.
You can feel the irritation in his voice there. Because Jesus ultimately wants that heart. That's the heart that he has with his father, right?
Like there's times in the book of John when Jesus is teaching and preaching where he sounds like a child, okay?
When he says, the son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees his father doing. For whatever the father does, the son does likewise. That's childlike language, okay?
It's like he was basically saying, I only see what my father's doing. I, I can't do anything apart from my dad, right? Because whatever my dad does, that's what I'm going to do. That's a faithful child loving his father. That's what childlike faith looks like. Okay? So Jesus wants this to be the DNA of his kingdom. Jesus wants this uniquely childlike openness and honesty. He doesn't care that children can be loud or chaotic in fact, he invites that. He wants more of that because of his love.
And here's the thing too. Paul Miller says this. This is so helpful for me. When I first heard it, talking about Jesus anger. He says that Jesus anger, in almost every case, his anger is focused on one or two things it's focused on. And I'll write it on the board, either a blocking, a blocking of love, or a blocking of faith.
When Jesus gets angry in the Gospels, it's often divided 50, 50 by a blocking of love. Or like, as in some kind of anger, injustice being done to someone else, their love is being blocked, or your faith is being blocked. Like, he sees a lack of faith and he gets upset about it. Right?
And both elements are at play here, right? Because the moms want Jesus to bless the kids, the disciples aren't allowing it. So they're blocking love.
And at the same time, the other 50% is lack of faith.
He's saying, no, no, no, no, no. You have to have childlike faith in order to enter this kingdom. You can't block somebody else's faith. Does that make sense? So it's either a blocking of love or a blocking of faith. That's often the pattern that we see.
So Jesus is modeling what I'll call good and healthy irritation.
This is especially true for our moms in the room. Because while it's true that moms that you love your kids and you love the childlike faith that they demonstrate, it's also equally true that your kids sin against you. Right?
Probably on a daily basis, your children sin against you. Now, that doesn't give you a license to respond and sin. But sometimes in legitimately irritating times, it's appropriate to feel irritated. Okay? So you shouldn't feel shame for that. Because what you're demonstrating in that moment when you feel irritation is you're just experiencing the pain of being sinned against as another image bearer of God. Right? Okay.
What you have to guard against in your own flesh is what it is that's legitimately making you irritated or angry. So in the same way, like we say, like, doubt your doubts. You know, like, if you have doubt, ask your doubt questions.
Do the same thing in your irritation or in your anger. Ask your anger questions. Why am I irritated right now? Sometimes, like I said, it can be legitimate for you to feel irritated. Other times it's not. Going to be. So interrogate it.
Am I upset because I'm not getting my way, or am I upset because someone did something that legitimately hurt me? Right. The latter of those Isn't irritation necessarily out of sin? Does that make sense?
So let's summarize this, and then I want us to do an activity.
Three takeaways from this story.
The first thing is that in Jesus, irritation. One, he's thinking about the children. Okay? He's thinking about the children. And when we're irritated, we often think about ourselves. Right? We're often thinking about ourselves. Secondly, he takes positive action. He takes positive action. He says something about it. He's dealing with irritation openly in community.
Our fleshly tendency, my fleshly tendency is to either stuff it and kind of seethe in our irritation our. Or we gossip to somebody else about it, like we talked about earlier. So he takes positive action. And three, this is the most important one. He lets go of it. He lets go of his irritation. It says that he took him in his arms and blessed them and laid his hands on him. He probably wasn't doing that while glaring at the other disciples, like, see, they're my children. No, he let go of the irritation. And he said he was allowing himself to be fully present and blessing them and being with the children. So he's thinking about the children. He's taking positive action, and he lets go of his irritation.
Okay, here's what I want us to do. The last few minutes that we have together, I want us to kind of do a case study on Jesus overturning the temple. I have a handout for us. When you do this, guys, take a few minutes, read this on your own, and then look at the back and really pay attention to how Jesus is responding. Okay? So look at his behavior, look at what he's saying, what he's not saying. And also look at the response of both the disciples and the crowds as well.
So take a few minutes, read this, and then work through the questions, and then I'll come back up and recap for it. Any observations that you had about how he was expressing his anger?
[00:45:23] Speaker G: I mean, certainly physically, he made a whip of cords.
[00:45:26] Speaker A: He made a whip of cords, Right. So there's a physical expression.
[00:45:29] Speaker F: I felt like he was doing it out of.
[00:45:34] Speaker A: Whip of quartz. Okay, what else did you see?
[00:45:39] Speaker D: It was passionate.
[00:45:41] Speaker A: Passionate? Yeah.
[00:45:46] Speaker F: Authority.
[00:45:48] Speaker A: Authority.
What do you mean by that?
[00:45:53] Speaker F: I was selling at my table. I feel like if I were to try to do that passionately and be like, you guys are wrong. Throw the table over. People are gonna throw fists or they're gonna get the cops.
[00:46:05] Speaker A: Right?
[00:46:06] Speaker F: But I think that he did it in such authority that people are like, all right, this is it. I guess he's right. You know, or like people are seeing it as an injustice. Like, why isn't anybody doing this?
[00:46:18] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:18] Speaker F: And he's the one that took the authority to. Who took the initiative to say, all right, this is how it's going to be now. Like, we need this stuff out. This is the house of prayer. This is not meant to be a trading room.
[00:46:33] Speaker A: Well, yeah, that's a really good point because it did take some bravery. Right. I mean, imagine like, if you're in this full temple where there's all this activity going on in the outer courts, and you're the only one doing something like that. Like, I don't have the gall to do, you know, Like, I don't have the guts to get up and do that. You know, what do you. What do you think, James?
[00:46:59] Speaker B: Is there a possibility that at that time the Father did something to the people and put something on their hearts that gave them the inability to kind of react in a way that would have been, like how he's talking about calling the cops or something like that. That the Father put Jesus in complete total right at that moment in time.
[00:47:18] Speaker A: It's possible like that. There's, like, you're saying maybe a restrained sort of common grace where.
Yeah.
[00:47:25] Speaker B: Like when we're reading how he told Moses and Aaron to go talk to Pharaoh, yet he kept. He kept hardening Pharaoh's heart.
[00:47:32] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:32] Speaker B: He was doing it purposely.
[00:47:34] Speaker A: Right.
[00:47:34] Speaker B: He didn't even allow him to, you know, whatever. So it's kind of like if God could do that in that sense, how could he not put something on them? Because didn't. Even after, when he left, they want to go to stone him, but he just slipped away in the crowd.
[00:47:50] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:50] Speaker B: God kind of like the Father allowed him to slip right away from people. What they were probably looking for him and then, boom, he was gone.
[00:47:57] Speaker A: Right.
It's certainly possible. It's certainly possible.
What is. What is. Go ahead. Do you have some. Mason, maybe you're about to maybe ask.
[00:48:10] Speaker G: The question that I.
[00:48:12] Speaker A: What was.
[00:48:12] Speaker G: What was the thing you're going to.
[00:48:13] Speaker A: I was. I was going to ask, like, what the. The third question on your sheet. What does Jesus anger reveal about what he values?
[00:48:20] Speaker G: I think that was somewhat in regards to maybe what I was just about to say.
[00:48:23] Speaker A: Right.
[00:48:24] Speaker G: The second question, the third question maybe.
[00:48:26] Speaker A: Go together in a sense of like.
[00:48:28] Speaker G: To whom or what is he releasing his anger?
Or what is Jesus defending against each time?
And I guess I never really noticed this, but I just think it's interesting how Matthew accounts specifically the children and the Pharisees response to what the children are doing?
The children are worshiping, or at least are worshiping from the things that they're seeing, the wonderful things they did is what he says.
[00:49:00] Speaker A: That's just after. Right.
[00:49:03] Speaker G: The Pharisees were indignant about what the children were proclaiming about what was happening.
[00:49:08] Speaker A: In front of them.
[00:49:09] Speaker G: Thought that was really fascinating because that to some extent speaks to why Jesus would be so angry, is that even the children were accompanying him and seeing all the wonderful things that he did is such a hard for children that he wouldn't want the spoils of what the Pharisees see to come onto them. That rather want the children to see the glory of God displayed through his person. Yeah, I don't think I've ever really noticed that. Just the Pharisees were indignant.
[00:49:42] Speaker A: No, that's really, really helpful. He's preserving the. He wants to preserve the purity of their, their faith and doesn't want them to see this corruption that's. That's taking place in his house. That's right, you know. Oh, that's great. That's great. Yeah.
[00:50:02] Speaker E: Making him question like, is he breaking the law? I think it was the same thing if there was people, other people in the room. And so again, it's like a protection of his ministry is ultimate, of his witness.
[00:50:16] Speaker G: And it's certainly not like from out of bounds for the Pharisees perspective to be thinking the same thing for the children. Like in a way the Pharisees and scribes are thinking what they think is.
[00:50:27] Speaker A: Best for the children.
[00:50:28] Speaker G: Yeah, well, let's guard them away from this crazy man who's doing these things.
But it's interesting how Jesus is even aiming to correct them and their approach to the children also.
So I just find that fascinating that there's two competing interests. One that is obviously fully unrighteous and the other, which is very much, I think you were saying this earlier, that's just tainted. It's just a confusion of what the law really was for.
[00:50:59] Speaker A: It's a really good point because you think about when Jesus does something like this, he knows how every, every person in his audience, if you will, is going to like take it and how they're going to interpret it. And each time, like in every way possible, it was the best thing for him to do. Right.
That's really good. What about as we kind of wrap up, guys, that last question, how can we redeem our own anger to reflect the person of Jesus in our everyday lives? Like just making it kind of more personal for you as we've kind of done kind of three case studies of Jesus anger, how does that inform our own anger? Right. And how we might reflect Jesus even when we get angry.
Slow to anger. Right.
[00:52:05] Speaker D: When you realize something's getting to you before you outburst, think about it. What would Jesus do? You know, don't get anger.
[00:52:17] Speaker A: Yeah. Slow to anger. Not. No to anger. And not blowing anger or like hot anger.
Just be slow to anger. Right. So again, what we're saying is don't not ever get angry. Right.
Thank you.
[00:52:40] Speaker D: Also, why is it making you angry? Like, I've been getting angry a lot in politics.
[00:52:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:52:47] Speaker D: And when I see somebody driving wrong or, you know, I have to call us through. Meaning you said, I mean, why is it making me angry?
[00:52:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Interrogate your anger. Ask your anger questions.
Right. Interrogate your anger. Doubt your doubts.
[00:53:09] Speaker E: I was just thinking about a lot of the things that I've read outside from Wise Counsel and just the idea that, like, we have to own our limit. Who you pursue those moments. He is measured instantaneously because he's able to do that. We can't expect ourselves to be like, in that moment when we want to do hot anger.
[00:53:28] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:53:28] Speaker E: Just be like, okay, let's go. And then just be like split second later. Be able to respond in an honoring gracious way. So being slow to anger means like being sometimes literally slowing down and like walking away and taking a moment and. Or more than a moment. And then it calls for it.
[00:53:50] Speaker C: To.
[00:53:50] Speaker E: Help ourselves go to the Lord in prayer and remember truth and try to get to the root of why we're upset and then respond. But taking that moment to pause and.
[00:54:03] Speaker A: Calm down, that's helpful. Yeah.
It's going to take time. Right. It's going to take patience.
[00:54:12] Speaker D: Tito just answers one of the questions he wants. He says when he feels somebody angers him from his calm, he says, he basically prays. He says, glory to God and forgive the person that angered him. And he returns to his calmness.
[00:54:33] Speaker A: I love that. Hard to do, but that's what he is. That's good. Team know. Thank you. Katie, what do you think?
[00:54:41] Speaker C: Nothing profound. I just, I. I've been struck too, looking at all these three situations. And you said it at one point too, that his anger is in spite of his feelings, but rather in light of others feelings. Like, we're really gonna like, take time to reflect on our. Our anger. I think that it can be very telling. Is that anger stemming from my own feelings, which could be valid.
[00:55:01] Speaker A: We talked. Yeah, right, Right.
[00:55:03] Speaker C: But More so is my anger stemming in light of somebody else being wronged.
[00:55:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:55:08] Speaker C: Or injustice for somebody else. And so I think, like, it sounds like what I'm seeing at least in Jesus. Like nine times out of ten, it should be anger in spite of our feelings. But for others.
[00:55:20] Speaker A: Yeah. So much of it is other centered. Yeah.
[00:55:23] Speaker C: You know, it should be a righteous anger. Should be other centered.
[00:55:26] Speaker A: Yeah. And so I think that helps reflecting.
[00:55:29] Speaker C: On ourselves of like 1 out of 10 times, maybe this should be for me.
[00:55:33] Speaker A: Right, right.
Good word, Katie. House of prayer. He's.
[00:55:37] Speaker E: He's talking about how it's his father's house, so he's upset for the, you.
[00:55:41] Speaker C: Know, and then others are being shortchanged.
[00:55:49] Speaker G: I was gonna, in addition, I was gonna say, like, the other day, Rachel and I were playing basketball, and Rachel and I are pretty competitive. And especially if we're playing one on one, you know, it's like, oh, man.
[00:56:03] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:56:05] Speaker G: And at times it's not great, but at times it is good. It's fun.
I just was gonna say it seems like Jesus doesn't mince words. Like when he, like, it's not your first question, like, does he seem out of control? His words are like very pointed and controlled.
[00:56:23] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:56:24] Speaker G: And even again about the children, the Pharisees, they ask themselves the question, do you hear what these. What these are saying? And he says, yes. Have you never read and gives Old Testament scripture that they would know?
And essentially, like, that's good. Why are you, you know, why are you rejecting these wonderful things?
And I just think, like, I know for myself, like, the slow to speak things. I'm like, man, I. I just really need to be much slower. I think of people in my life who, if I've ever asked them a question, they just seem to have, like, a Christian is this way, like, seems to have like a three second pause before they say something. And I'm like, gosh, like, I could, like, I could really do that, you know?
[00:57:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:57:16] Speaker G: And not even just about my angriness, but just like that my words, like, wouldn't just be lost.
[00:57:23] Speaker A: That's good.
[00:57:24] Speaker G: They, like, they matter when I say something.
So it seems like Jesus, like, this doesn't ever seem to say something.
Just like offhand, it's like direct and pointed.
[00:57:37] Speaker A: 100. Yeah. There's a reason that James talks about slow to speak and slow to anger in that same kind of verse. You're connected.
[00:57:47] Speaker E: Well, he never belittles the person. Like, he's always calling them to an action, whether it's to let the children come or to leave.
[00:57:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:57:54] Speaker E: Or have the man shut down. It's always calling someone to an action. And he's not belittling.
He's calling out sin. Like he's not, not like attacking their identities or like saying like, you stupid, you know, like, I feel like a lot of times you're saying he's very intentional with his words. He's not like speaking a false identity into those people either. Like, he's not, I don't know. I think in anger it's really easy to speak like harsh words that are not honoring to the other person. And he never dishonored anyone. He called them to more or he tell them to leave. Like, there's nothing about dishonoring.
[00:58:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
Really good thoughts. Hey, for the sake of time, I'm going to wrap us there, but let's keep dialogue and let's keep talking about this.
