As Jesus followers we are called into the Kingdom Life. This blog will help us converse and learn what that means. It will contain thoughts on Scripture, Sermon Reflection, Leadership Training and interesting reads. -Pastor Jeff

Monday, May 8, 2017

Day 12: God’s Anger…My Stumbling Block

On Day 11, we began to explore the idea that there are certain themes and threads that tie together the scope of the Biblical story.  Over the course of the next few days, we will continue this exploration.  However, before going any further, I need to address the elephant in the room.  Anytime we begin to think about themes and threads, we are often met with this looming suspicion that what we will find at the end of our journey is an angry God.  The image of an incensed God, watching from Heaven with a giant cosmic gavel in His hands, ready to lower it on the heads of the sinful, declaring guilty and dooming us to hell has often influenced our spiritual imagination so thoroughly that we have trouble breaking free from this image.  We hear about a God of love, but what we expect to find is a God of anger.

Ok, so, I can’t spare you from the Biblical truth that, “yes, God gets angry.”  I wish I could, really.  I wish I could tell you that God is super loving, daisies and daffodils all the time.  But no, there are moments when the anger of God seems to erupt in the Scriptures…and the people of God find themselves on the short end of God’s temper.  To read the Prophets Isaiah, Ezekiel, or Jeremiah, you will be met with a God that clearly declares his displeasure with the people of God and warns them of looming judgment and their self-induced onslaught of chaos.  You can’t escape it.  If you go looking for it in the Bible, you can find it…and yes you can even build an entire theology around it.

However!!!  This is super important!  God is not arbitrarily angry nor is He rash with his judgment.  God is not prone to temper tantrums nor is He like a drunken angry daddy, unpredictable in his rage.  God’s anger is clear and consistent with His character (yes, that Lovingly Faithful character we talked about on Day 11).  To ensure that we don’t wander down the road of fear or turn Biblical interpretation into fear mongering…we need to briefly explore the “why” of God’s anger.  When does God’s anger burn brightest.  I want to name three consistent issues that often compel God to anger.

1.) Idolatry:  As the author of all creation, God has wired this world to declare the glory of the One God alone.  This world was created to operate best when it is in alignment and harmony with the Creator’s will.  The Creator has promised provision, care, purpose, and beauty to all of creation.  The Creator is unceasingly faithful.  The Creator of all things has not only created the universe but set our place in the universe.  But this Creator who reveals himself throughout the Scriptures is a God that can’t be controlled, domesticated, or determined.  He isn’t our play thing to exploit or manipulate to fulfill our desires.  No, this God is free to be as God chooses to be.  However, our story tells us that we struggle with this.  We’d prefer a “god” that we can control.  We prefer “gods” the way we want them rather than submitting to a God that seeks our complete an unbridled allegiance and obedience.  We make our own gods.  We craft “things” based on our selfish desires and then surrender ourselves to those very things.  We create and then call our creation god.  We yield ourselves to gods that are really no gods at all.  We yield ourselves to gods that make promises they cannot fulfill.  We bind ourselves to the illusion of god and miss the promise of the True God who’s promised care for us.  God’s anger burns brightly when we bind and shackle ourselves to “nothingness” in hopes that “nothingness” can provide purpose and meaning.  God’s anger toward our idolatry isn’t based on some insecurity God has when his people refuse to applaud His efforts.  God’s anger is a jealous love toward those who abandon the glory God promises and surrender themselves to the “less than” of nothingness.  For an example of this anger, check out Jeremiah 10:1-16

2.) Injustice:  When we turn Biblical faith into morality, we think only in terms of good and bad.  God gets mad when we are bad.  God is pleased when we behave ourselves.  That’s an unfortunate reduction of Biblical faith.  God’s anger towards our actions isn’t determined by random moral categories, it’s determined by the justice of God.  Let me explain.  In Genesis 1 (we read this a few days ago), we are told that humanity is created in the Image of God.  That’s huge.  We as humans bear in our created intent the reflection and image of God in this world….ALL OF US.  All humans bear in their lives a glimpse of the Image of God.  This means that each human being should be afforded the dignity incumbent with that Image of God.  When we mistreat one another…
When we exploit one another…
When we manipulate one another…
When we take advantage of one another…
When we treat one another as a means to our selfish ends…
When we abuse one another…
When we betray the vulnerability of the weak, the struggling, the broken and the weary…
When we … well you get my point.
When we do any and all of these, God’s anger burns brightly.  This means we diminish the Image of God in one another.  God has wired this world in such a way that we are to honor, respect, and extend dignity toward one another.  We are to live compassionately, merciful, gracious, forgiving, providing, generous, hospitable, and protective toward and with one another.  When we fail this primal calling, God’s anger burns brightly.  He laments our mistreatment of one another and condemns our betrayal of our high and lofty calling of being with and for one another.

3.) Syncretism:  Ok…we will deal more with this one as we continue, but I want to give you a bit of a definition right now.  Think blending.  Syncretism is a blending of pagan (those that aren’t committed to worldview shaped by the God of the Scriptures) pursuits and heathen (those driven by the lusts of the flesh) passions into the Spiritual life of the people of God, leaving a mixed and confused semblance of what was supposed be life lived in obedience to God.  Let me explain.  God has called us to be different.  He has created us to reflect His image in this world.  How we live matters.  God defines that difference throughout the Scriptures, setting boundaries around our pursuits and bridling our passions so that we never lose our way as those absolutely committed to God’s work and way in this world.  However, full allegiance to God is often hard to come by.  There are things in this world that we struggle to let go of, things that we value, things that make us feel good, things that promise to provide something for us that God seems to be lacking.  So instead of abandoning God altogether, we simply blend those pursuits and passions with our faith and call it spiritual.  For instance, if I already value wealth and prosperity and if I’m worried that God might want to bridle that pursuit, I simply find ways to spiritualize that pursuit into the faith and redefine the trajectory of my faith.  There are other examples that we will note as we move forward.  One great example of this is Israel’s pursuit of a King in 1 Samuel.  In this text, God had been their King.  He’d been taking good care of them.  However, they looked around to their neighbors and began to long for what they had.  So, they adopted, or blended, the pagan pursuits of security and comfort, abandoning absolute trust toward God.  This arouses God’s anger.

Ok…so these are three consistent themes in the Scripture that seem to spark anger in the heart of God.  You will notice, none of these are rash, random, or inconsistent.  They are wired into our betrayal of the created order and intent of God.  Each of these has damaging consequences leaving us broken, bruised, and CAPTIVE (we will explore the theme of captivity and the character of God as Liberator tomorrow).  God’s anger isn’t a rash judgment declaring “You’ve been bad and deserve to be spanked.”  No, God’s anger is the jealous anger of a God that watches as the love of His heart has abandoned His high calling and beauty, His purpose and provision for a “less than” kind of life.

Let’s dive deeper into Luke:
Today I want you to read Luke 10:1-24.  This is a beautiful passage about the missional calling of God’s people.  I want you to really step into this text today.  Instead of God calling the “72,” I want you to image yourself as one of those 72.  Listen to the commission of Jesus, the calling to make the Kingdom known, and the correction of Jesus when they begin to celebrate the wrong stuff.  Spend some time reflecting on this passage in light of what we’ve stated above: Idolatry (God’s Kingdom), Injustice (Care for the Broken) and Syncretism (Holding on to the identity of difference.)

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