We all get angry. But there’s a right way and a wrong way to handle our anger. Moses handled his anger the wrong way and it cost him the Promised Land. After Moses let the Israelites quarrelling and complaining get to him, he didn’t remind them of the glory of the Lord. So, God told Moses that he wouldn’t see the Promised Land, instead the task of leading the Israelites into it was given to Joshua (have a read of Numbers 20 and 27). Jesus handled His anger the right way, and those who took advantage of the poor were exposed and thrown out of the temple. ‘Jesus went straight to the Temple and threw out everyone who had set up shop, buying and selling…now there was room for the blind and crippled to get in. They came to Jesus and he healed them’ (Matthew 21:12-14 MSG). The Bible says: ‘Be angry, and do not sin’ which means instead of just complaining about the problem, we’re supposed to do something about it. When we let our anger build up without dealing with it, we can end up letting all our anger out in the wrong way. Instead of letting it build up we need to deal with it. When we begin to feel angry, we need to assess why we’re feeling like that and talk to the people involved calmly. The Bible tells us that we not only shouldn’t sin when we’re angry, but we also shouldn’t ‘let the sun go down’ on our anger (Ephesians 4:26 NIV). And that means we shouldn’t leave any anger unresolved. We need to sort out issues with other people, and with ourselves, by inviting God into the situation and dealing with conflict in a mature and Christ-like way.
