Large Group #3 Debrief: Angry But Not Sinning

Speakers: Peter Buhler and Sam Elder

This is the first talk in a series called Nuances of the Faith, discussing the gray areas of Christianity. We believe the entire Bible is true and God's Word to us, but it's sometimes not so easy to understand, or seems to contradict itself, and we'll be focusing on those moments in this series.

This week, we talked about the emotion of anger. Should we as Christians be angry, or should we do our best to avoid it? And how do we deal with it? Keep reading to see what Peter Buhler and I (Sam Elder) had to say about it.

We started by looking in the Bible at passages that feature angry people. The most interesting was Saul, in 1 Samuel 11:1-11 (particularly, 1 Samuel 11:6) where the Holy Spirit comes upon Saul and he gets angry. An enemy king was attacking an Israelite town and threatened to gouge out everyone's right eye. There was clear evil and Saul's anger led him to unite Israel and defeat the enemy. We also looked at Jesus in the temple (John 2:13-17) and recalled the numerous times where God's judgment comes down. The conclusion: Wherever there is evil in this world, we should be angry at it.

At the same time, we read James 1:19-21. Human anger is not beneficial because we don't have a clear idea of what is truly evil. God sees everything clearly, so his anger will be perfectly targeted. Since our anger is imperfect, we should be very careful with it.

Next, we discussed how you deal with anger, particularly among Christians. Someone does something against us, or possibly does something against us, and what do we do? We read three passages that strongly encourage talking to them: Matthew 5:23-24, Ephesians 4:25-27, and Matthew 18:15-17. The last one gives very prescribed instructions for how to deal with a fellow believer: First, you talk to them one-on-one, then if that doesn't work, you bring other people, and then the church, in on in the issue. Don't gossip about it; talk to the person directly first. And if you're afraid of them, you're going to have to overcome your fear of man issues on this point. There might be extreme examples, like rape, where you shouldn't be left alone with them, but in pretty much every circumstance we'll come across, you should go to them alone. It's what they deserve as a fellow believer, a brother or sister in Christ, to be treated according to Scripture.

Peter and I are offering this invitation to the entire fellowship. If you see anything that we do as a little bit wrong or off or have any doubts about it, talk to us. We are opening ourselves to your rebuke.

If enough of us follow this advice, there will be times when you're on the receiving end of a rebuke. I've been there -- my pastor called me out for being too bossy back in the spring. These moments are important tests: How do you respond? Do you get defensive and fight back? Or do you make the opposite error and hide in your shell without addressing the issue? This is a gray area, where you have to realize which error you're more prone to.

Returning to the main line of thought, what if they indeed sinned against you? You are then called to forgive them. What does this mean? To help answer this question, we watched a 10-minute clip by Mark Driscoll, where he listed 10 things that forgiveness is not:

1. Forgiveness is not approving or diminishing sin.
2. Forgiveness is not enabling sin.
3. Forgiveness is not denying a wrongdoing.
4. Forgiveness is not waiting for an apology.
5. Forgiveness is not forgetting.
6. Forgiveness is not ceasing to feel the pain.
7. Forgiveness is not a one-time event.
8. Forgiveness is not neglecting justice.
9. Forgiveness is not trusting.
10. Forgiveness is not reconciliation.

We talked briefly about a positive definition, which came out something like this: To forgive someone is to no longer let the defining feature of our relationship with them be what they did wrong.

Finally, there are frankly some of us who have never experienced anything that awful, but much more find ourselves counseling others who have been wronged. I gave some thoughts on this from my own experience.

• First, if this is you, think about your friends. If none of them have experienced anything very bad in life, make sure you aren't avoiding the people who appear to have all the problems.
• When you advise someone who has been badly hurt, telling them to just forgive is not enough. You have to be willing to bear some of the burden yourself, just as Christ bears our burdens when we sin.
• Be very careful making overly general judgment calls if you haven't at least witnessed others who have been through much worse than you have. The hardest relationships are the ones from which you will learn the most.
• It's all too easy to assume that if something bad is happening to someone, it's their fault. Leave open the possibility that that might be God's calling for them, that the trials they face might even be a test to you instead of them.

We didn't have time for a discussion, but here were the discussion questions anyways:

Personal reflection questions

1. Is there anything you need to talk to someone about? Do it ASAP.
2. How do you handle wrong done to you or your friends?
3. Who is it hard to forgive?
4. How do you handle rebuke? What could you work on?
   
   Discussion questions
5. Some of our most serious interpersonal trouble can come with our own family. What should someone do if their family is demanding too much from them? They don't seem to change, and for some of you, they aren't even Christian.
6. Are there cases where you would advise someone against forgiveness? Are you really advising them against one of the things forgiveness is not?
7. Should a Christian ever divorce?
8. "Love the sinner; hate the sin." (It's not in the Bible explicitly!) Agree or disagree?
9. The opposite of forgiveness is bitterness. What is the difference between being bitter and still remembering the pain?
10. We've talked about the steps for for dealing with anger and disagreement between Christians. What about non-Christians? How do you treat them the same or differently?

Next week, we will hear from Pastor James Lee of My Father's House church, who recently returned from 10 years in the mission field in China, and who will be sharing stories of hearing God's voice that he's actually already written a book about. Come with questions and bring your friends!