The Proper Solution
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1000 Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching Constructive Anger
The remarkable chairman of the Chrysler Corporation, Lee Iacocca, when addressing the graduating class at the University of Michigan, as reported in Time, June 20, 1983, said, among other things:
I want you to get mad about the current state of affairs. I want you to get so mad that you kick your elders in their figurative posteriors and move America off dead center. Our nation was born when 56 patriots got mad enough to sign the Declaration of Independence. We put a man on the moon because Sputnik made us mad at being No. 2 in space. Getting mad in a constructive way is good for the soul—and the country.
Lord God, bless Your Word wherever it is proclaimed. Make it a Word of power and peace to convert those not yet Your own and to confirm those who have come to saving faith. May Your Word pass from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the lip, and from the lip to the life that, as You have promised, Your Word may achieve the purpose for which You send it, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.
16 And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. 17 And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, 18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 20 And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.
Lee Iaccoca - how many of you remember that name, and the man who saved Chrysler - Plymouth from ruin, primarily by getting the U.S. Government to bail him out with military orders and lon guarantees? He became a man who people found to be wise, worthy of emulation… and wrong! Getting mad didn’t accomplish those things - Being faithful to a purpose did.
“Get mad?” There are a lot of people who think that Lee’s words from above really came from above, and that being angry is a sound way to address perceived problems. The past couple of years, we have been inundated with angry people. Angry people have been defining our politics, angry people have been defining our morality, angry people have been trying to redefine the tenets of the faith.
Anger does have some points in its favor - anger breeds energy. Moses got so angry that he broke all 10 commandments at once! David got so angry that he was about to get drenched in a fool’s blood until a wise woman named Abigail stopped him in his tracks. Jonah got so angry that he tried to chastize God over a weed!
But Jesus got angry, right? And isn’t there a verse of Scripture that says, “Be angry, but sin not?” Isn’t it ok as long as I handle the situation before sunset? Sure - in fact, there are two!
4 Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah
26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger,
It sounds like, in order to fulfill the Scriptures, you have to be angry by yourself, and meditate on that situation until it no longer boils your blood, or, deal with the situation quickly - don’t let it turn from a molehill into a mountain. and only Jesus can truly be angry without sin.
As I look at this congregation, I don’t see any angry faces here though, so I guess you all are doing pretty good.
19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
None of these are you guys, as far as I can see. All these smiling faces looking at me.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
This sounds like what I see in front of me! When the secretary called me this week for the sermon title and references, she didn’t give me any drama about why this weeks sermon information wasn’t ready last week! Nobody grumbled about why I didn’t bring about 500 people through the doors with me just by breathing, or why haven’t I single handedly solved the problems of the Chicago Bears and Cubs simultaneously. This looks like the parish of a lifetime! You all came out in this cold weather to worship the Lord when a lot of people are looking for any excuse to go to the Livestream service at the High tech church of the holy couch!
It’s like in our text today - when Jesus read the Scripture and sat down, the crowd was hanging onto his every word.
21 And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth. And they said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?”
Jesus operates under a disadvantage from me though. You know the saying, “Ignorance is bliss?” You see, I can only go by what I see, unless God gives me knowledge concerning you, which, generally speaking, I don’t need to fulfill my vocation of a strategic mission developer. What God has declared about humans in general is enough for me to recognize that I need to preach the Gospel here today, not because you all are obviously sinful, but because you are declared to be people for whom Christ died, and you have confessed yourselves to be poor miserable sinners, to whom I have responded, as a called and ordained servant of the Word, with Christ’s Word of absolution - proclaiming “liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed...”
We did that earlier this morning, and you all made that earlier confession freely, not under compulsion, so I accepted it as true and responded as I am ordered by my Lord to those who confess their sins, with forgiveness.
But Jesus’ next words tells us something about those worshippers in Nazareth - and about Jesus. Unlike me, Jesus could see into the thoughts and intents of the heart, while I can only go be outward appearances and trust in what God has revealed by His Word.
23 And he said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘ “Physician, heal yourself.” What we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.’ ”
Beneath their reverence, their attentiveness, was a desire, not to rejoice in the fulfillment of “the exceedingly great and precious promises,” but to see a show. They wanted Jesus to perform - do a miracle in your hometown like you did in that place that you moved to. Don’t hold out on your home town like that - come on, man!
“God on demand” - that’s what people say they want when you ask them why they are resisting God’s free offer of forgiveness in Christ. They want God to fix things for them before they will acknowledge that they are in the presence of the Lord. they want God to earn their trust by doing for them the things that they heard about in Sunday School as a child. Some folk don’t leave the community of the Church, though, after all, you can get a good cup of coffee at church, and you get to know some nice people. So they keep coming, not because they truly believe in the reality that “Christ is for you,” as Rev. Dr. Gregory Seltz would say every week on the Lutheran Hour before he was called to Washington DC to serve Christ and His Church there. No, they just come because it’s comfortable, and friendly.
What indicates that your love for the Gospel has slackened? When should you “consider your ways?” Maybe when your fruitfulness seems to be thinning out, or the flesh seems to be your place of reference more than the Spirit does. Maybe when you stop seeing others as being in the same boat as you are, that of “sinners for whom Christ died,” and you feel no desire to "proclaim liberty to the captives.” Maybe, when you no longer see Jesus, you just see hungry folk, sick folk, naked folk… all who pull on your time, talent, and treasure, but contribute nothing to your satisfaction. Maybe, when your life is governed by your flesh rather than by the Spirit of Christ.
That’s when you find little joy over one sinner who repents as compared with in the 99 who had no need. That’s when you look forward to how your ears will be tickled this Sunday, rather than to how God is coming to sup with you, indeed, is hosting a feast for you, a feast featuring the forgiveness of your sins. When “Good Friday” just doesn’t seem to be as “good” in your heart.
24 And he said, “Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown. 25 But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, 26 and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. 27 And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.”
I guess Jesus was pretty clear, wasn’t He? In the days of Elijah, during the famine, why did God send Elijah, not to His children, but to Zarephath in Sidon, and why, during the time of Elisha, the many lepers in Israel were left unclean while Naaman, a Syrian, received the cleaning touch of the Jordan River?
Why does it seem like God is no longer drawing people to faithful congregations like this one, or St. John’s and Good Shepherd in Gary, but it seems like there are crowds at all of the “angry places,” the places where Word and Sacrament is not enough? Is God no longer with us?
Of course He is, as sure as I know that Jesus loves me because the Bible tells me so, I know that God is with us and is still forgiving sins as His promise is received because the Bible tells me so. When Jesus said to them, “today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing,” He meant it, and when He says today, “I forgive you, all of your sins,” He means it.
28 When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. 29 And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff. 30 But passing through their midst, he went away.
They got angry at the One who brought the Good News because He didn’t give them a shimmy and a shake; He didn’t work according to their expectations. They sought to push Jesus over a cliff, and it seems that our culture has sought to do the same to His Church. But they could not touch Jesus then, and they cannot touch His church now. God’s Kingdom will come, and His will shall be done. The Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached to all the world, and then the end shall come.
So we still have a charge to keep, and a God to glorify. There is still a purpose for Salem, and for you in the Kingdom. God didn’t forget Israel, even when it seemed otherwise. Eventually, there was the sound o fan abundance of rain, and eventually, while God didn’t send Elisha to cleanse the lepers, He sent one better later, who cleansed not just a few lepers of leprosy, but an entire world of sin.
And the peace of God, that passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.