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Anger

            “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. (Ephesians 4:26-27)

          First, a note. “In your anger, do not sin,” is from Psalm 4:4, the Septuagint version. When I checked the verse, according to the NIV translation of the verse, it says, “Tremble and do not sin.” I’m not sure how the Greek scholars made the connection between trembling and anger. It could as easily be fear. But I love the image involved. We are being told we shouldn’t get so angry that we’re trembling with fury. If we’re trembling, that means our strings are pulled so tightly that they may snap – and lose self-control.

          We’re in a time when it is popular to be angry. People of different ideologies regularly talk about destroying one another. If questioned, they are likely to suggest that they have a right to be angry and that we should all be angry about injustice, crime, war, pollution, etc. The problem is, of course, that when one is really angry, one doesn’t tend to think clearly.

          And today’s passage doesn’t say not to be angry. It says that when you are angry, you shouldn’t sin. Returning to the idea that sin separates – when we are angry, we should not separate ourselves from those with whom we are angry. That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be a cooling off period in which both take a walk or otherwise spend some time apart, but the goal is to come back together and work out the problem promptly – before bed.

          Seething and stewing in one’s anger is not wise because it destroys the person who does it and tends to end up harming people around one, even if they weren’t part of the original difficulty. In cases of injustice, a matter may not be able to be resolved before the sun goes down, but that doesn’t mean that one’s anger cannot be resolved before bed. This is difficult. It’s much easier to feed anger, but as Paul noted, that gives the devil a foothold by which he may continue to defeat you.

          For those who are addressing some injustice or great problem, it can be useful to keep anger simmering or even boiling. Anger provides energy one can use to continue the battle, but it eats at everything around that person. One can be opposed to something without frothing at the mouth about it. Anger tends to lead us to use force against others rather than appeal to them and win their agreement. It replaces unity with oppression. In the end, even if the problem seems to be resolved, the relationship is damaged, and so are the people involved. I know – I used anger as an energy source for a number of years. It’s not healthy for anyone to operate on that fuel.

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