Outrage: When Your Heart Is Filled with Revenge

The Fall of Jerusalem - the priests sing a song of outrage

Psalm 137:1 NRSV

By the rivers of Babylon— there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion.

Psalm 137:2 NRSV

On the willows there we hung up our harps.

Psalm 137:3 (NRSV)

For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

Psalm 137:4 NRSV

How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?

Outrage when wronged - an open wound.

Psalm 137:5 (NRSV)

If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither!

Psalm 137:6 NRSV

Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth, if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy.

Really?! What about hundreds of years of warnings?

Psalm 137:7 NRSV

Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites the day of Jerusalem’s fall, how they said, “Tear it down! Tear it down! Down to its foundations!”

Psalm 137:8 NRSV

O daughter Babylon, you devastator! Happy shall they be who pay you back what you have done to us!

Psalm 137:9 NRSV

Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rock!

And now you point the finger, but who are you really outraged by?

First, some proverbs about outrage..

Proverbs 29:22 (NRSV)

One given to anger stirs up strife, and the hothead causes much transgression.

James 1:19–20 NET 2nd ed.

Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters! Let every person be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger. For human anger does not accomplish God’s righteousness.

What this psalm teaches us about us:

1. No doubt, wrongs wound us.

2. We tend to rewrite history - by leaving out the important stuff.

3. Having run out of weapons, we fight dirty.

4. Hurt people, hurt people.

But Jesus taught us a different path to handle outrage

Matthew 26:47 NET 2nd ed.

While he was still speaking, Judas, one of the twelve, arrived. With him was a large crowd armed with swords and clubs, sent by the chief priests and elders of the people.

Matthew 26:48 NET 2nd ed.

(Now the betrayer had given them a sign, saying, “The one I kiss is the man. Arrest him!”)

Matthew 26:49 NET 2nd ed.

Immediately he went up to Jesus and said, “Greetings, Rabbi,” and kissed him.

Matthew 26:50 NET 2nd ed.

Jesus said to him, “Friend, do what you are here to do.” Then they came and took hold of Jesus and arrested him.

Matthew 26:51 NET 2nd ed.

But one of those with Jesus grabbed his sword, drew it out, and struck the high priest’s slave, cutting off his ear.

Matthew 26:52 NET 2nd ed.

Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back in its place! For all who take hold of the sword will die by the sword.

Matthew 26:53 NET 2nd ed.

Or do you think that I cannot call on my Father and that he would send me more than twelve legions of angels right now?

Matthew 26:54 NET 2nd ed.

How then would the scriptures that say it must happen this way be fulfilled?”

Matthew 26:55 NET 2nd ed.

At that moment Jesus said to the crowd, “Have you come out with swords and clubs to arrest me like you would an outlaw? Day after day I sat teaching in the temple courts, yet you did not arrest me.

Matthew 26:56 NET 2nd ed.

But this has happened so that the scriptures of the prophets would be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples left him and fled.

Outrage? What about His?

1 John 2:1 NASB

My little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous;

1 John 2:2 NASB

and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.