jesus gets angry

The words of the gospel from Mark 3:1-6

"Looking around at them with anger and grieved at their hardness of heart, Jesus said to the man, "stretch out your hand." He stretched it out and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel with the Herodians against him to put him to death."


First of all, if you notice Jesus was angry...Which means anger isn't always bad. sometimes it is not only good but necessary. the task in life is to be angry at the right times for the irght reasons.

Often times people will come to me and confess the "sin" of being angry. I often have to remind them that anger isn't in itself sinful. Sometimes it is a gift to us that enables us to get moving in the right direction.

the problem in our society is we don't get angry at the right times for the right reason. We don't let anger motivate us to take a stand for what is right and true.

Jesus takes a stand and he allow shis anger to become life giving.

We can use a few more christians in our society getting angry in the right way. Anger is not the opposite of love nor is it an opposite of tolerance. There are some things we should not tolerate.

Secondly, becasue of his act for standing up for life, Jesus becomes a marked man. The Pharisee's response is to get rid of him rather than be converted by him.

People will want to put us to death as well. In fact, a good sign that we are doing right is the animosity we draw from others.

Jesus didn't let other intervere with truth. He didn't back down because it offended the sensibilities of the Pharisees. They were wrong. We forget sometimes that not everyone is right, not everyone's opinion is worth guarding or tolerating. We must do what JEsus does, do good anyway.

Words from Pope Benedict
"being human is like a mountain-climbing expedition that includes some ardous slopes. But it is by them we reach the summit and are able to experience for the first time how beautiful it is to be."

Get on with climbing that mountain and let yor anger drive you upward never downward.

To the highest we go.