We don’t tend to think of Jesus as an angry guy.
After all, he was the preeminent teacher of love, grace, and compassion. It was Jesus who brought us radical and counter-cultural ideas about forgiving and loving our enemies and “turning the other cheek” instead of taking revenge on others who harm us.
Is it any wonder then that we associate Jesus with gentleness and kindness? When I was a kid growing up in the evangelical church, they even described Jesus in glowing terms as “meek and mild,” as if this were some kind of compliment.
Type “Jesus” into a Google image search, and you’ll find a plethora of images that support this idea. Jesus is often seen looking suitably ethereal — boasting a glowing halo — and surrounded by small children or cradling a little lamb in his arms. But, while Jesus certainly was both gentle and kind, it seems that, somewhere along the line, we fell for the lie that Jesus was also a little bit soft.
However, when we take a closer look at the biographies of Christ, there were a number of times we see Jesus get mad and even react violently. How does that mesh with your picture of Jesus?
If there is one word that I wouldn’t use to describe Jesus, it’s the word “mild.” He was more than capable of anger — just as capable as any human — in spite of his divinity. Here are some of the moments when Jesus saw red:
1. The kids being pushed aside
In August this year, Christ The King Church in New Jersey made headlines for all the wrong reasons. During his sister’s baptism service, a 7-year-old autistic boy was kicked out of the church for playing with a ball. The parish later apologized, but understandably, the offended family had already decided never to come back.
What a sad indictment on the church that it should get so offended at children behaving like children. It was certainly my experience growing up in the church that children were to be seen and not heard. This, in spite of the fact that one of the times that Jesus got mad in the Scriptures was when Jesus’s disciples told a group of children to go away: “Jesus is far too busy and important for you.”
Here is the account:
People brought their small children to Jesus so that he could lay his hands on them to bless them. But the followers told the people to stop bringing their children to him. Jesus saw what happened. He did not like his followers telling the children not to come. So he said to them, “Let the little children come to me. Don’t stop them, because God’s kingdom belongs to people who are like these little children. Mark 10:13–14
In light of this episode in the life of Christ, where he clearly welcomes children, it strikes me as odd that many churches segregate children to some far-removed corner of the church property so that the adults can worship God in peace and quiet.
How about we design worship services that are inter-generationally friendly so that we can all participate together? We ought to stop patronizing children and start to treat them as people who have things that they can teach us and meaningful contributions they can make.
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2. Loading people with religious obligation
The overarching goal of Jesus’ life and, indeed, his death was to remove all barriers between humans and God. So, you can imagine that when he saw human beings creating more barriers, it made him angry.
The chief offenders in this regard were a group of people called the Pharisees. The Pharisees were a bunch of religious leaders in Jesus’ day, who were renowned for knowing and keeping all of the Old Testament laws and trying their darnedest to impose those laws on others. You could say they were your ancient fundamentalist believers.
In fact, the Pharisees were so concerned with keeping the laws in the Bible that they even created laws to help people keep the laws. By the time Jesus rocked up in human history, the Pharisees had developed a list of over 600 different laws and laws about laws. As a result, they were living out this kind of heartless, cold, and arrogant brand of self-righteousness — the kind that looks down on others and judges others while simultaneously congratulating oneself on having it all together.
In their rush to live holy lives and enforce the same standards on others, the Pharisees completely missed the true heart of the faith and the point of Jesus’ life and ministry — to make God freely available and accessible to all. For that, they drew the ire of Christ. Here is what he said:
Jesus replied, “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them. Luke 11:46
I suspect that, even to this day, those who burden others with religious activity and obligation still anger God. He didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son to die to release us from the obligations of the Law only to have humans impose the law again.
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3. Keeping the rules at the expense of being kind
The logical end of burdening people with religious obligation is an obsession with rule-keeping that ends up trumping basic human kindness. However, sometimes the kind and decent thing to do is to overlook the rules in order to show compassion, mercy, and love. Jesus knew this and demonstrated it.
Take this example where Jesus heals a man on the sabbath, thereby breaking the strict sabbatical laws — the ones that the Pharisees were particularly fond of:
Then Jesus asked the people, “Which is the right thing to do on the Sabbath day: to do good or to do evil? Is it right to save a life or to destroy one?” The people said nothing to answer him. Jesus looked at the people. He was angry, but he felt very sad because they were so stubborn. He said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” The man held out his hand, and it was healed. Then the Pharisees left and made plans with the Herodians about a way to kill Jesus. Mark 3:4–6
Here Jesus technically breaks the rules in order to be kind. He gets angry that the people can’t seem to grasp that this is what really pleases God.
Have you ever considered the fact that the number-one law-breaker in the universe is God himself? How can I say that? Well, we seem to forget that every time God forgives and shows mercy to a person, rather than punishing that person for their sin, he is breaking his own rules — for the sake of compassion. When it comes to rule-keeping, God is consistently inconsistent. With God, mercy triumphs more often than not!
Time and time again, we find zealous Christians with rocks in their hands ready to stone wicked sinners to death, believing that they represent God, but God is not among them.
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4. Human pain and affliction
A man who had leprosy came to Jesus. The man bowed on his knees and begged him, “You have the power to heal me if you want.” These last words made Jesus angry. But he touched him and said, “I want to heal you. Be healed!” Immediately the leprosy disappeared, and the man was healed. Mark 1:40–42
It seems unusual that a man coming to Jesus for healing would make him angry, don’t you think?
Biblical scholars have suggested a variety of reasons for Jesus’s anger in this passage of Scripture. Some say Jesus was angry because the man interrupted Jesus’ sermon, but that doesn’t seem to fit with the kind of patient acceptance with which Jesus, welcomed people. Others say Jesus could have been angry because this unclean leper broke the law of the day by approaching without alerting everyone nearby to the fact that he had leprosy — but if that were true, it wouldn’t explain why Jesus then willingly touched the man.
I think that the best explanation of this story is that Jesus’ anger was directed at the man’s hopeless situation. Some translations actually use the word “compassion” interchangeably with “anger.” Jesus was angry that this man was suffering. Doesn’t that speak volumes about the heart of Jesus for broken and hurting people?
5. Using religious worship for financial gain
Much like the modern church, the temple in Jesus’ day was supposed to be a place where people of all nations could find access to God. However, when Jesus arrives at the temple in Jerusalem, he found the place looking more like a shopping mall — complete with stalls and money changing hands.
Jesus was so appalled with the state of the Temple of God that he ripped through the place with a whip that he braided with his own two hands, overturning tables and driving out those who were exploiting religion for profit. It was a violent reaction against a religious system that took advantage of the poor and those who were genuinely seeking God’s favor. Here is the story:
When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” John 2:13–16
This account makes me wonder: What would Jesus make of our modern ‘temples?’ Would Jesus be upset by the overpriced books in the church bookstore? The barista made coffee? The ATM in the foyer? The twenty-minute long ‘mini-sermons’ given before the offering is collected, where an earnest plea for financial gifts is given with the promise of greater blessings in return?
Would Jesus take to our modern churches with a whip?
6. A very human reason
While Christians believe that Jesus was one hundred percent divine, many stories in the Bible remind us of his humanity. He experienced the full gamut of human experiences and emotions — including hunger.
In fact, on one occasion, Jesus was completely famished and, as luck would have it, he saw a fig tree up ahead. Unfortunately, at that time, the fig tree did not have fruit on it. This made the son of God angry, and so he cursed the tree:
Early in the morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered. Matthew 21:18–19
Many have attempted to spiritualize this little story, but for me, it simply demonstrates again that Jesus can relate to the common experiences of being human.
Photo by Jametlene Reskp on Unsplash
7. Silencing the Prophetic Voice
Throughout human history, religion has a habit of beginning as a life-giving force for good and then, over time, degenerating into something much less, usually at the hands of people who try to use it for personal profit or to wield and maintain power and control. That is why we need prophets and reformers to call people back to the true heart of the faith.
Of course, the prophetic voice always upsets the status quo, and that is why it is not often well-received. In fact, many of the prophets sent by God to call people back to the true heart of the faith have ended up paying with their lives — usually at the hands of religious folk.
In a moment of unbridled rage, Jesus rips into the Pharisees regarding the shed blood of the prophets of bygone days. Of course, Jesus would join the proud ranks of the persecuted prophets a few weeks later:
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. Go ahead, then, and complete what your ancestors started!
“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town.” Matthew 23:29–34
As the modern church descends into a precipitous decline, we are once again in need of prophets and reformers to call us back to the kind of life-giving faith that Christ intended for us. Of course, no one should presume to take up that mantle unless they are willing to pay a heavy price.
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Jesus — not a man to be messed with
In C.S. Lewis’s famous tale of ‘The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe,’ the messianic character is represented by a great Lion named Aslan. At one point in the story, the children consider what it might be like to meet him:
“Ooh” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man. Is he-quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion”…
”Safe?” said Mr Beaver …”Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”
He isn’t safe, but he is good.
This line is perhaps one of the greatest descriptions of Christ. We might like to think of him as gentle Jesus — meek and mild, but from time to time, Jesus got mad!
He is the Jesus who heals the sick and regards the unfortunate. But he is also Jesus who braids whips, and drives out those who oppress the poor. He is Jesus who goes toe-to-toe with the powerbrokers of the faith and calls out their hypocrisy. This same Jesus both welcomes small children and over-turns the tables of the rich.
He is the kind of man you would want as a friend but would fear as an enemy.
He is not a man to be messed with.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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