ANGRY FAITH

ANGRY FAITH by Elder Joe Holder

I enjoy reading the reformers, - Luther, Calvin, Zwingli and all of those folks but I have to tell you I am somewhat turned off by all of them because there is an underlined anger in their writings that is not edifying and doesn’t do any of us any good. If we had lived in that time, perhaps we would have done the same thing. I’m not saying we’re better. I’m just saying that spirit, like it’s appearance in Cain will drive you farther away from God, not bring you closer to Him. Angry faith is not biblical faith at all, but a pretence. And when I focus my anger against you because I don’t agree with something that you did or that I don’t think you treated me fairly about something I may in fact be bidding a rebellious heart that is angry with God, and by the very act of giving place and feeding and fertilizing that attitude I am in fact moving myself farther away from where I have good reason and hope to meet with God in worship and fellowship than I would be without it. I’m not getting closer to God by anger, I’m getting farther away from Him by anger. I don’t need to go into the details - they are not relevant to this issue, but early in mine and Sandra’s marriage we became coincidentally involved in some church controversy. I tried to convince myself that I was right and those other folks were wrong. I tried to convince myself that what I had done was the upstanding thing to do. The episode lasted over two years. My friends, for two years I wrestled with an angry spirit, an angry heart. I have read in the Puritans of that beautiful methaphorical language of the English people with their own language that we need to go back and learn more how to respect and to use, that describe the moments when they struggled in prayer, when they tried to pray and it just didn’t seem like things were right, that it seemed as if iron bars closed the opening of heaven to their prayers. I know that feeling. I lived with it for two years. Every prayer I tried to pray I felt hypocritical. I didn’t feel genuinely convicted that those prayers were heard and it was not until I confronted and neutralized the anger in my own heart that I found the genuine joy of restored fellowship with God and I have to confess looking back - I was angry with God, not just with the people that received the focus of my anger. I can speak from experience and I can tell you anger will not draw you closer to God. You can be as holy as you wish, you can rationalize as much as you wish that that person or those people did something that did you wrong. It doesn’t matter . . . you’ll wake up some day at a distance from God, not closer. Hear my warning! It is real.