Wednesday, September 23, 2015

EmmDev 2015-09-23 [Jonah's Journey] Anger's Autonomy

Anger's Autonomy

But the LORD replied, "Have you any right to be angry?"...
6 Then the LORD God provided a vine and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the vine. 7 But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the vine so that it withered...
9 But God said to Jonah, "Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?"
"I do," he said. "I am angry enough to die."      (Jonah4:4)
In the face of amazing grace, Jonah is angry.
Not a little ticked off, but deep down angry.
He is furious and feels he has a right to it.

Maybe he feels his anger is justified:

  • Maybe people from Nineveh had hurt him personally.
  • Maybe his identity consisted of a theology where God was not to be messed with.
  • Maybe justice is a big deal in his life.

Sometimes anger can develop a life of its own.
Anger can run away with itself and become autonomous.
Before we know it anger is driving our whole life.

Look at Jonah.
First he's angry about God sparing Nineveh.
Then he's angry about a vine that grew up overnight and was destroyed by a super-vine-munching-worm.
And he's angry enough to die!!

Even when one looks at Jonah's behaviour in chapter one there is evidence of this festering anger there too. Jonah would rather sleep in his cabin and let the storm wreck the boat, crew and passengers than deal with God. Then he'd rather drown in the ocean than repent.

Anger - it can make us irrational and it can poison our lives.

We don't know why he's angry...
Maybe he also didn't know anymore...
Maybe he'd been angry for so long that it was just there waiting to erupt.

Did he have the right to be angry?
In both cases the answer is "Absolutely not!"
But there he is - stuck in anger's autonomy.

In the next few days we'll see how God deals with him...
(But in the meantime, let's learn from him and recognise how anger can get out of control in us.
Some have even suggested that depression is just anger deprived of energy and turned inward.
Let's ask ourselves whether we are in the grip of anger...)