Chapter 9 - The
Brother… continued
Mat 5:21 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old
time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the
judgment:
Mat 5:22 But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry
with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and
whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council:
but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
Mat 5:23 Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the
altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
Mat 5:24 Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go
thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.
Mat 5:25 Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles
thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to
the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into
prison.
Mat 5:26 Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no
means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.
Bonhoeffer- 'Anger is always an attack on the brother's
life, for it refuses to let him live and aims at his destruction. Jesus will
not accept the common distinction between righteous indignation and
unjustifiable anger. The disciple must be entirely innocent of anger, because
anger is an offence against both God and his neighbor. Every idle word which we
think so little of betrays our lack of respect for our neighbor, and shows that
we place ourselves on a pinnacle above him and value our own lives higher than
his. The anger word is a blow struck at our brother, a stab at his heart: it
seeks to hit, to hurt and to destroy. A deliberate insult is even worse, for we
are then openly disgracing our brother in the eyes of the world, and causing
others to despise him. With our hearts burning with hatred, we seek to
annihilate his moral and material existence. We are passing judgment on him,
and that is murder. And the murderer will himself be judged.'
My thoughts-
Righteous
indignation, unjustifiable anger.
Even as I was
copying that paragraph above I was thinking about the last time I was angry
with 'my brother' (meaning anyone). As I
thought about it and knew it was just earlier today I was angry over something-
some perceived slight by someone, and because it was anger at a slight it was
so easy for me to believe it was justifiable anger, it was righteous
indignation-- but was it?
We know that Christ
became very angry with the moneychangers in the temple- and obviously His anger
wasn't a sin. We know that God can
become angry and not sin.
Exo_4:14 And the anger of the LORD was kindled against
Moses, and he said, Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother? I know that he can
speak well. And also, behold, he cometh forth to meet thee: and when he seeth
thee, he will be glad in his heart.
Moses became angry
and sinned not.
Exo_32:19 And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh
unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses' anger waxed
hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.
We know this as
well-
Psa_103:8 The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to
anger, and plenteous in mercy.
Now let's look at
some of the Proverbs dealing with anger-
Pro_15:1 A soft answer turneth away wrath: but
grievous words stir up anger.
Pro_15:18 A wrathful man stirreth up strife: but he
that is slow to anger appeaseth strife.
Pro_16:32 He that is slow to anger is better than the
mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.
And something from
Ecclesiastes-
Ecc_7:9 Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry: for
anger resteth in the bosom of fools.
Clearly anger is NOT
a good thing for us.
We scarcely give
what we call righteous indignation a second glance. We join with others being
angry when we perceive they have a right to that anger.
Clearly we are NOT
to embrace anger, that it's dangerous, not harmless as some like to believe.
The Bible has more
to say --
Eph_4:26 Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go
down upon your wrath
Eph 4:31 Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and
clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:
Eph 4:32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Rom 12:17 Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide
things honest in the sight of all men.
Rom 12:18 If it be possible, as much as lieth in you,
live peaceably with all men.
Rom 12:19 Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but
rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will
repay, saith the Lord.
Rom 12:20 Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if
he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his
head.
Rom 12:21 Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil
with good.
Jas 1:19 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man
be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:
Jas 1:20 For the wrath of man worketh not the
righteousness of God.
*******
Bonhoeffer- 'Every
idle word which we think so little of betrays our lack of respect for our
neighbor, and shows that we place ourselves on a pinnacle above him and value
our own lives higher than his.'
My thoughts-
So incredibly true.
We have such
arrogance in us! We believe we are so incredibly important that we need NOT
suffer in any way! We not only belief
that, we believe that we should NEVER be mistreated verbally or mentally, in
any way. And truthfully in the world to come, in that PERFECT world we won't
undergo any mistreatment. We long for this world and yet, we know that this is
not the world where this will take place. This is the world where our perfectly
innocent Savior suffered unimaginably.
Not only did our
Savior suffer horrors we can't imagine- Him in His innocence- but He did so in
SILENCE.
SILENCE!
There was a reason
our Savior did NOT cry out and rage against His ill treatment. There is a
reason for His stoic behavior in face of His torture. It was an EXAMPLE for US!
Yet we get upset at
the littlest of irritations.
How can we?
And not only how can
we, how can we justify that irritation?
How?
We rage and war
against the tiniest offense committed against us and Satan is right there in
all his horrific , insidious evil urging us on to feel the anger, to feed the
anger, to point that anger against any and all who we believe deserve it-- when
in truth NONE deserve it! None! Even if they torture us for no reason at all,
they do not deserve our anger. Our anger immediately has us putting ourselves
above them, and above our Savior. If He could suffer undeservedly and not even
complain, we have NO right to believe
that we have any right a all to complain. We deserve a lot of our
treatment just because we are such incredible sinners, it is Satan who wants us
to believe otherwise. Satan wants us to be SELF-RIGHTEOUS. Satan wants us to
believe we don't deserve any thing bad happening to us, and we have to fight
against it, rail against it, get angrier, and more angrier at the injustice.
Please LORD, help us
to understand! Help us to seek YOU and YOUR example as we live our lives and
Satan wars against us. As You prayed to
the Father, please, keep us from evil!
All in YOUR LOVE!
ALWAYS LORD, IN YOUR LOVE!
No comments:
Post a Comment