Jeff's Journal
Matthew 5:21-26
This passage selected me.
I didn't select this passage.
When preaching from the Lectionary,
passages are selected by a committee
of preachers and scholars years in advance.
Another pastor and I discussed this.
He said he wasn't going to preach this one.
It was too hard.
We get angry.
Anger is normal and natural.
But Matthew is talking about anger
which is about to set up a permanent barrier
between two people divided by circumstances
and behavior which one or both can no longer tolerate.
I would say that usually, anger also involves unresolved issues
and other stress from our lives.
If your father did not love you the way he was supposed to.
you may eventually take some of your anger over that
out on your own children, for example.
Anger comes from high standards unfulfilled.
Anger comes from extreme disappointment.
Anger comes from a lack of reciprocal affection
or abdicated responsibility.
Many of these situations are chronic.
A sibling continues to hurt your feelings.
Someone with substance abuse
just continues to abuse those substances
and destroy their life right before your eyes.
What about those situations
where your anger is chronic and the cause
unlikely to change?
Jesus says go reconcile.
We say, "it is not possible."
But maybe what he is saying is this:
"Have a plan. Work the plan. Do the little thiings.
Reach out many times, not just once."
Forgive seventy-times seven, but do what you have to do.
Christians are to break the cycle of anger, bitterness and hatred.
Doing what you are supposed to do, does not always depend
on someone else doing what they are supposed to do.
Remember, they fall under the same teaching.
They should be coming to meet you somewhere in the middle.
But there is a peaceful feeling that should eventually come
from doing the right thing in a world gone wrong,
whether the one who is the recipient of your anger
is willing to meet you half way — or not.
It is what God requires.
Moving to the deeper places,
Jeff