For the past month and a half I've been a student again; I've been doing a CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) unit, and it's been a really good experience. This unit is a step towards being able to pursue different chaplaincy paths, but more than that, it has proven to be an opportunity for deeper personal understanding, growth, and healing. My second week of the unit, the director of Spiritual Care where I'm doing my unit told me, "CPE is all about you." This was a bit of a shock to me, because my mindset was that it was helping me learn how to be a better chaplain, but in this unit I've learned that self-care, and knowledge of self, allows us to provide better care to others. It is in our own pain that we can relate to the pain of others.
This past week we were supposed to go over the Enneagram, however, since everyone else in my class has had that didactic before, and I'm familiar with the Enneagram, the educator decided to go in another direction to make the unit more beneficial. Initially there was disappointment, I was looking forward to learning more about this from someone else, all of my learning has come from audiobooks, and the songs and podcasts from Sleeping at last, and I was looking forward to learning more about it from an actual in the flesh teacher. Being a 1 in a world with 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 is a bit of a challenge at times, and one day I'll probably write a post on my life as a 1, but not today.
Instead of the Enneagram, we talked about anger, and this proved to be a very enlightening topic. Culture sees anger as bad, dangerous, evil, and from a religious perspective, sinful. The reality is, this isn't the case. Anger is a human emotion that is wired into all of us, and if anger is a sin, then God has sinned multiple times.
"Then the anger of the Lord burned against Moses" -Exodus 4.14a
"Then Moses entreated the Lord his God, and said, 'O Lord, why does Your anger burn against Your people whom You have brought out from the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?'" -Exodus 32.11
"Now the people became like those who complain of adversity in the hearing of the Lord; and when the Lord heard it, His anger was kindled, and the fire of the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp." -Numbers 11.1
"So the anger of the Lord burned against them and He departed." -Numbers 12.9
"So the Lord’s anger burned against Israel" -Numbers 32.13
"All its land is brimstone and salt, a burning waste, unsown and unproductive, and no grass grows in it, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord overthrew in His anger and in His wrath." -Deuteronomy 29.23
"therefore the anger of the Lord burned against the sons of Israel" -Joshua 7.1b
The Psalms tell of God's anger; the prophets speak of "the day of the Lord's anger". Throughout the Bible we see God get angry, and as people, made in the image of God, anger is built into who we are. Anger is not a sin. Paul says in Ephesians "Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity." (4.26-27), and God's word's to Cain in Genesis 4.6-7, "Then the Lord said to Cain, 'Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it.'"
Anger can lead to all kinds of evil, but anger in itself is not evil, and we need to stop treating it as if it is. Anger is an emotion, present in God, and anger can bring about a lot of good. It is because people are angry about things that change takes place; people are angry over injustice, inequality, mistreatment of the weak and helpless, and so they rise up and act to do something about it. The question should't be, "How do I keep from getting angry?" or "How do I suppress my anger?" but rather, "What am I angry about and how do I channel that to bring about change?"
Right now I'm angry about the situation I'm in, and what my daughters are being put through. My anger is fed by the fact that I am powerless to do anything about the situation. I'm angry that I'm being punished for something I never did. I'm angry about what my daughters have to deal with. I'm angry.
Anger is not a sin. Anger is not something to be suppressed. Anger is an emotion seen in God, and we, as His image bearers, were created with anger as an emotion. Be angry, but in your anger don't sin.
Fight the lion, 1 Peter 5.1-11
TO GOD ALONE BE THE GLORY!
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