Sometimes, our friends say things that come across a little too harsh. A family member comments that our home smells like pet odor. We get annoyed and want to tell her to mind her own business or better yet tell her that she has no clue how to take care of her animals. Things quickly get out of control. When is it a good time to sit down with your soul mate, colleague or friend and have a candid conversation about things that really irk you?
Jesus was outraged when the moneychangers were milking the folks to pay the Temple tax. For him, it was the gouging, the exorbitant rates, the fleecing of the pilgrims that got to him. It was the holiest of places yet! The Temple had become a veritable mall of ATM’s, a circus of noise and transactions. Jesus was merely acting in the ways of the prophets of old. Prophetic anger is what Jesus was showing, outrage at what should be not, but was, God’s honor and God’s people should not be treated like that.
This incident tells us something about Jesus, and something about ourselves. I believe people are measured by what angers them. True, anger can be dangerous. But anger that leads to reform, transformation and making ourselves into the best version of who we can be be is a respectable and desirable emotion.
We are judged by what angers us and what does not. Anger can become the Lenten energy that motivates us and forms the basis of reflective questions for this season. Such as: We get angry if we get stalled behind a slow moving vehicle and miss the first episode of our favorite TV show. But are we angry over our unemployed neighbors, or our young people not getting subsidies to help with college? The massacre in Libya, the massive greed of corporate executives and our leaders in government.
Are we angry that our seniors will not get a cost-of-living increase this year? Over the graphic violence and lack of respect for women in the media, the corruption of sports, the growing chasm between the very rich and very poor?Are we just merely disgusted, a feeling that stays within us, but really angry, that moves us into action? Are we angry over our own buying into the culture’s norm of success: high consumption, low reflection, fierce competition, and tepid cooperation? Are we angry over our selfishness and petty jealousies, our picayune lying and cheating, our lack of a generous spirit, our failure to develop a truly spiritual life?
I don’ t know if you ever looked at it this way before, but Lent might be the season to get angry enough to overturn old tables and set up new ones. Which new ones might we set up? Here’s a sample of my Monday's night's Lenten Penance Service Lenten reflection.
Love the things that are worth loving. Some things are not worth loving, like SUVs, trucks, celebrities, or our addiction to the “screen” meaning our computers, cell phones and plasmas, or flirting with a temptation that comes in all shapes and sizes, colors and prints. The things worth loving are family, faith, God, Jesus, friend, neglected kitties, dogs and horses.Strive for integrity of character, meaning I will not do anything to compromise my integrity. I will not yell and scream at anyone, always have it my way or the highway, engage in self-destructive behavior like drinking, drugs, gambling and overusing my prescription medicines. I won’t cheat on exams or my income taxes. I won’t do anything to get ahead or gain the whole world at the expense of my soul.
Immanuel watches over us as we reflect: "Trust in him at all times; pour out your heart to him, for God is our refuge.” (Psalm 62:8).
Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends that you help surrender the anger that blinds us from your patient and understanding love. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those you trespass against us and give us the insight to humbly turn ourselves over to you.
