Righteous Anger

Posted on by John Lewis


Good morning!! Been reading Proverbs lately, and came across these verses. Don’t befriend angry people or associate with hot-tempered people, or you will learn to be like them and endanger your soul. Two simple verses from 3000 years ago that can speak directly to us in our lives today. Anger, rage, is contagious. If we hang around people who are angry, we will become angry. Myself in my own life, at home or at work, find it easy to get sucked in to someone else’s anger, someone else’s insult. I find myself quickly commiserating with the angry person and now I, too, am angry. Angry about what I don’t always know, I just know that my blood pressure is a couple of points higher than it was 2 minutes ago and it’s somebody else’s fault! This person has done something wrong to me.  


Except they haven’t. They probably haven’t even done anything wrong to my angry friend. Except now it’s not just my angry friend, it’s my angry friend and angry me. And the person we’re both angry at doesn’t even know my friend is angry, much less me. What a waste of time and energy.
This is how scapegoating begins. My friend was angry, now I’m angry, soon we can have a whole angry crowd. These days we all have angry friends 24 hours a day, all we have to do turn on our TVs, or participate in the angry text chain going around. How hard is it to surround ourselves with an angry crowd? Our entire political system is based on one angry, frightened crowd vs another angry, frightened crowd. For that matter, our whole society is based on that us vs them mentality.
But don’t we all have a right to our anger? Aren’t we supposed to fight for our rights, to be angry this happened to us, to fight to get what I deserve? Sure, if you’re living for this world. But if you don’t want to endanger your soul, you need to remember these words of Jesus – 



“God blesses those who are merciful, for they will be shown mercy. God blesses those whose hearts are pure, for they will see God. God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God. God blesses those who are persecuted for doing right, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.” ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭5:7-10‬ ‭NLT‬‬



“If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it.” ‭Luke‬ ‭9:24‬ ‭NLT
And one more time…

“And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul?” Matthew‬ ‭16:26‬ ‭NLT‬‬

“Don’t befriend angry people or associate with hot-tempered people, or you will learn to be like them and endanger your soul.”

‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭22:24-25‬ ‭NLT‬‬

http://bible.com/116/pro.22.24-25.nlt

John Lewis

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10 thoughts on “Righteous Anger”

  3. Excellent contemplation! I often find myself getting sucked into someone else’s fight and anger. Even righteous anger can be a trap. I am very jealous of the church sanctuary; there are proper and improper behaviours as is the case in many places. But where do I direct it? How do I handle it? Do I automatically assume the worst? Is there another reason? All too often the answers don’t make me look too good.

    So I ask for another shot at this. Fortunately, God is very forgiving!

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    1. Amen, and thanks be to God! I believe that probably most times we feel anger, it is misdirected. It almost always is revealing some defect within ourselves. I do say almost, because there is a place for righteous anger. I just haven’t totally figured out what and where that place is. I can’t tell the difference in my own anger.

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Published by John Lewis

My name is John and I am a 45 year old who had lived life separated from the power of Christ for most of my life. I have been in my recovery from alcoholism, gambling addiction, and sexual addiction since May 2014. I finally accepted Christ into my life in September 2014. I started reading the Bible in May 2014 at the urging of my 12 step sponsor. Then I found the scripture that changed my life. It is found in each of the first 3 Gospels, as I was pleased to find out. It is found at Matthew 9:12, Mark 2:17, and Luke 5:31, all at the calling of Matthew by Jesus. From Luke -"Later, Levi held a banquet in his home with Jesus as the guest of honor. Many of Levi's fellow tax collectors and other guests also ate with them. But the Pharisees and their teachers of religious law complained bitterly to Jesus' disciples, "Why do you eat and drink with such scum?" Jesus answered them, "Healthy people don't need a doctor - sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent."" Luke 5:29-32. I had to reread that in Matthew 4 or 5 times when I first came to it. At that point in time, I was the scum Jesus was chastised for eating with. And the response he gave...that he did not come for all those people who thought (with my agreement) they were better than me. That he came for ME!! That's the power of actually picking the Bible up and reading it. It changed my life. So now I still read the Bible every day, discovering new things about God and Jesus Christ. To paraphrase a certain Ethiopian eunuch, how can I understand the scriptures unless someone teaches me? So I read many books and listen to many podcasts. I am learning much from listening specifically to podcasts by Brian Zahnd, Allister Begg, and to a lesser extent Ravi Zacharias. This blog is kind of my spiritual journal as I learn to walk with Christ. And no, that walk is Not for Punks!!