Right now, we’re in the middle of a blog series looking some of the hard questions we face when our Christian leaders turn out to be faithless, sometimes following decades of cover ups. Hopefully this discussion will help us gain a sense of relief, fellowship, and equilibrium in the midst of these tectonic shifts in the world of Western Christianity.
Here's a map of this series, to help you orient yourself:
1. Is Christian faithfulness impossible?
2. I'm so disheartened. What can I do?
3. I'm so heartbroken. How do I deal with this?
4. I'm so furious I can't think straight. How do I tackle this?
5. I can't stop thinking about this epidemic of faithlessness. My thoughts feel obsessive. What can I do?
6. How do I protect myself from sinning like them?
7. How can I help myself heal?
8. How can I deal with my other questions?
Let’s continue…
4. I'm so furious I can't think straight. How do I tackle this?
Guard your heart, Precious One.
Fury is a righteous emotional reaction to abuse and evil. But it can so quickly become unrighteous.
You are not alone.
Jesus became angry along a few different dimensions, but one of the things that seemed to rile Him most was abuse levelled at ordinary people by religious leaders. This type of leader holds a special place of power, and has access to a certain vulnerabilities that most people don't have access to. That's why the Bible calls our spiritual leaders to a higher standard, and also warns that those "who teach will be judged with greater strictness." [1]
Jesus became furious:
- At the Pharisees' hypocrisy and spiritual abuse (Jesus: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! ...You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?"[2])
- At the victimization of foreigners helpless to defend themselves against the profit-mongering religious leaders who had taken over the Gentiles' area of the temple in favour of creating a market there ("So [Jesus] made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables." [3])
- At those who would target His children for abuse (Jesus: "It is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble." [4])
Can you sense the ferocity in His words and actions?
Your reaction of anger towards the spiritual abuses of religious leaders in our day is righteous, Dear One. But you and I must be so careful with how we deal with it.
If we allow ourselves to spiral in our anger, obsessively thinking about it, gossiping about the thing that caused it, feeding it—we are in great danger. That's because we imitate the people we think about most.
If we allow ourselves to fantasize about the judgement and destruction of the leaders who have so grievously sinned, we are vicariously taking vengeance on them.
But this, too, is sin. "'Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,' says the Lord." [5]
Any time we presume to step into God's job description without His invitation, we are sinning. This holds true for choosing who lives and dies (i.e., murder), who should be worshipped (i.e., idolatry) and who should be judged/punished and when.
Presumptive attitudes are sinful because they are, at their root, pride:
God can't handle the big chair. He needs our help. We know better. He's too slow.
Can you see how twisted up we can become? Now we're judging God!
Let's make one thing very clear: the Lord loves justice [6]; "His work is perfect, for all His ways are just" [7], and He has even made justice the foundation of His throne [8].
But Jesus also said, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied." [9] Here, He was talking about us hungering and thirsting for our own personal righteousness, not the righteousness of other people.
Why does this matter?
When we've been oppressed and exploited, this can lead to an intense thirst for justice that becomes so sharp it transforms into a physical sensation.
Here's the twisting: if we're unwilling to wait for God's justice, if we engage in vicarious vengeance through fantasizing about the judgement of these fallen leaders, we replace hungering and thirsting for righteousness with an intense thirst for vengeance.
And here we are again—back to issues of trust.
Do we trust God to act with perfect justice at the perfect time? Can we let go of our own woundedness enough to entrust righteousness and justice to Him, according to whatever timeline He decides? Do we trust Him to act with justice?
If we do, the Bible promises "the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him." [10]
Later on, the Bible goes on to say, "In your anger do not sin. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold." [11]
Here's the thing about anger: it can become a mountain. When we allow the devil to gain footholds, we allow him to climb our mountain and he becomes the king.
We no longer bow the knee to Christ. No, our knees now buckle under the weight of anger. Our mountain becomes our oppressor, cascading like a landslide over top of us, and crushing the life from our souls.
Anger is not evil. Anger is information. Anger tells us that there's something wrong. Anger tells us that something urgent needs to be addressed.
But if we allow ourselves to stay in angry places for long, we imperil ourselves.
Here's a question I've found helpful:
Person X has already destroyed A, B, and C. Do I want to give him the power to destroy me as well?
Let's go back to the Bible's admonition, "Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry." [11]
If you've argued with your spouse, it's a good idea to try and resolve it before bedtime. But what about those big, grievous sins—like systematic abuse? Sins that have dismantled us in some way? We may not be able to deal with all of our anger in a single day. God knows this. He's not going to criticize us when it takes time to forgive. But we can still follow the principle of this verse.
The principle says:
Anger is a dangerous thing. Don't let it stay around, unresolved. Take steps to deal with it immediately. Bring it to Jesus—immediately.
We don't short-circuit our emotions, but we do share them with God, allow Him to soothe our hearts, and bring us to a place where we can eventually be released from the prisons that Anger is only to happy to construct for us.
Now we have a choice. We can wilfully engage in sinful, vengeful attitudes or we can run to the arms of Jesus. If we choose Jesus, He enables us to deal with our anger.
When we allow Jesus access to our anger He pulls out the weeds of bitterness by their roots, plants sweetness and forgiveness [12] in their place, and allows our hearts’ gardens to flourish and grow once more.
Next time, we’ll talk about what we can do with obsessive thoughts. We don't have to remain imprisoned by them!
NOTES
All references are taken from the NASB unless otherwise noted.
[1] James 3:1, ESV.
[2] Matt 23:29,33.
[3] John 2:15, NIV.
[4] Luke 17:1–2.
[5] Romans 12:19, Deuteronomy 32:25.
[6] See Psalm 33:5.
[7] Deuteronomy 32:4.
[8] See Psalm 89:14.
[9] Matthew 5:6.
[10] Isaiah 30:18, ESV.
[11] Ephesians 4:26–27, NIV.
[12] "Wait a minute," you might say, "This leader didn't abuse me personally. Why would I need to forgive?" A mentality of forgiveness isn’t required only when someone has sinned directly against us. It applies when people have sinned indirectly against us, too. Bitterness can crop up at any time in our hearts, and forgiveness is always its antidote. Forgiving someone doesn't mean we excuse horrific acts, but it does mean we don't allow them to destroy us. (I've written a blog series and a book about how to forgive; you can access them here and here.)
