July 15, 2024 / Anger

Hey, Calvary Fremont –

A lot of people are angry. One website reported that people are angry these days due to stress, frustration, resentment, and fear. I tend to get angry when I don’t get my way. I know – that’s what babies and toddlers do. (Come to think of it, that’s what children, teenagers, and adults do, too!) I also tend to get angry not with people who disagree with me, but treat me like I’m a moron for holding the position I do. You can’t watch the news without someone saying that Trump supporters are complete morons or that Biden supporters are complete morons. How moronic is that!? Scorn is the grammar of anger.

It’s almost obligatory to heap scorn on those who get in our way and who disagree with us. And this is true even in the Church and on Christian websites. The COMMENTS section of almost any forum where discussion is invited quickly descends into the fiery quicksand of scorn and counter-scorn. It almost seems that if I don’t destroy you and your heretical, false, apostate, stupid, Christ and Bible rejecting position, I’m not doing my Christian duty!

Two days ago someone attempted to assassinate of Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania. Some people on the Right immediately blamed the Biden campaign. Some people on the Left accused the Trump campaign of staging this and criticized former President Trump for not denouncing violence. The grammar of anger affects every syllable coming out of some people’s mouth. Some people never miss an opportunity to heap scorn on those they despise.

I’m watching a presentation on YouTube where Person A and Person B are critiquing Person C for his theological position on a certain topic. Person A is kind and cordial toward Person C whereas Person B is scornful and dismissive of Person C. As the episodes unfold, Person A is beginning to express the same scorn and derision as Person B toward Person C. (I hope you followed that.) The Bible has this to say about this –

DO NOT ASSOCIATE WITH A MAN GIVEN TO ANGER; OR GO WITH A HOT-TEMPERED MAN, OR YOU WILL LEARN HIS WAYS AND FIND A SNARE FOR YOURSELF. PROVERBS 2:24-25

This may mean that you can never watch the news again. Have you ever turned on the news in a good mood and by the time you turned it off you wanted to go strangle a Republican or a Democrat (or just about any politician)? Wikipedia defines propaganda as communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda using loaded language to produce an emotional rather than a rational response to the information that is being presented. Hitler and the Nazis were experts at this.

Hitler put Joseph Goebbels in charge of the Nazi Propaganda Ministry. Today it would be called the Ministry of Fake News! The day after Hitler shot himself, Goebbels poisoned his six children with cyanide, shot his wife, and then shot himself. Goebbels is dead, but his Ministry of Fake News survives. Today, you can find any network using Goebbels’ strategy of loaded language to produce an emotional rather than a rational response to the information being presented. I can’t turn on any news channel where either Trump or Biden are not having scorn poured out upon them and being made fun of continually and mercilessly. This is ungodly. The grammar of anger is everywhere. Goebbels has risen from the dead.

Since the grammar of anger is everywhere – in the Church, in the media, in politics – how should I respond to this? How do I keep from being swept up in the frenzy of scorn? The Bible has this to say about that –

REST IN THE LORD AND WAIT PATIENTLY FOR HIM; DO NOT FRET BECAUSE OF HIM WHO PROSPERS IN HIS WAY, BECAUSE OF THE MAN WHO CARRIES OUT WICKED SCHEMES. CEASE FROM ANGER AND FORSAKE WRATH; DO NOT FRET; IT LEADS ONLY TO EVILDOING. FOR EVILDOERS WILL BE CUT OFF,

BUT THOSE WHO WAIT FOR THE LORD, THEY WILL INHERIT THE LAND. PSALM 37:7-9

Anger leads only to evildoing. Resting in the Lord and waiting patiently for Him will keep you from anger. It won’t keep you from having values and the passionate commitments of those values, but it will keep you from speaking Fake News and being upset by Fake News.

Be blessed and stay healthy and follow Jesus – Pastor Tim