Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Anger”
Our Bible verse for today: “This is what the Lord Almighty says: Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor.” Zechariah 7:9-10 (NIV)
Our thought for today: “Righteous anger should result in action.”
As we near the end of our month of devotional thinking about the subject of anger, I want to circle back and address again the issue of righteous anger. There are some things that should make us mad and those things should move us to action.
In Zechariah chapter seven the prophet was teaching the people a lesson about faith that makes a difference. Empty religious ritual is meaningless to God. Actions taken to correct injustice or to show mercy are very meaningful to God. The people Zechariah was writing to were good at their religious rituals – they faithfully went to church, gave their offerings, and burned their incense, but they were much less attentive to social justice and to caring for those in need. Zechariah made it clear that God was uninterested in their religion if it didn’t include meaningful action in matters that were important to Him.
The same is true for us. Prayer, Bible study, faithful attendance at church, and making the coffee for your Sunday school class are actions that are helpful and meaningful. But if you then ignore hungry children, lonely widows, and homeless families, your religion makes little difference in the real world. God wants us to be the kind of Christians who will speak out against abortion and vote out of office politicians who support it. He expects us to be righteously angry about human trafficking to the point that we support ministries that help to stop it. We are to take steps to protect children from schoolyard bullying and women from domestic violence.
When a Christian is righteously angry it means that we find ways to apply power and influence to oppose sin and to correct injustice. Most times the application of power will take the form of pressure, persuasion, and influence; but sometimes it may have to be physical power, such as in the case of a nation waging a “just war”, or an individual intervening physically to stop an abuser from hurting a woman or a child.
The point is that we have to care enough to do something. We have to be angry about the situation because the Bible teaches us that these are the things that make God angry. And then we have to actually do something about it. Huffing and puffing, fuming and sputtering about a situation, is meaningless if we don’t actually take action to correct it.
Religious observances are of little value if individual Christians and churches and entire Christian communities have no observable concern for social justice, and for defending the defenseless, and for helping the hurting.
Some things should make us mad – to the point that we do something about it.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim
Oak Hill Baptist Church 