Monthly Archives: August 2021

Anger

word

There once was a little boy who had a bad temper. To help his son with this problem, the boy’s father gave him a bag of nails. “Every time you get angry and want to lash out,” the father said, “hammer a nail into our fence out back.”

The boy nodded his head and agreed. Challenge accepted.

The first day the boy drove 37 nails into the fence. To be honest, it felt kind of good to the boy, channeling all that aggression onto something like that. At least at first. But the emotional reprieve never lasted long. More feelings of anger soon set in. So back to the fence he went. The boy quickly realized the hammer was heavy; driving nails hard work.

Even worse, this new activity took up more and more of his energy each day.

Wanting to free up time to do all the things little boys enjoy, like running, laughing, dancing in the rain, the boy learned, ever so slowly, to better deal with his strong emotions and not lash out.

Many suns came up, many suns went down, hours turned to days then to weeks. The boy, it seems, was changing. The more he learned, the less he hammered. It was easier, the boy discovered, to work through big feelings than to drive those nails deep into the fence.

Then one day came when the boy didn’t feel the need to pick up the hammer at all. Proud of his progress, he excitedly ran to tell his father.

“That’s great,” dad replied, excited by the news. “But those nails really shouldn’t be in the fence. Why don’t you go and pull them out?” Again, the boy agreed. This undoing of his hammering took time. In fact, the boy found removing nails to be even harder work than driving them in. Finally, after much effort, he was able to tell his father all the nails were gone.

The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. He said, “You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one.”

The little boy then understood how powerful his words were. He looked up at his father and said, “I hope you can forgive me father for the holes I put in you.”

“Of course I can,” said the father. “Now let’s get to fixing this fence, my son. Mending fences is a two-person job. Let’s repair the damage done. Let’s do so, together.”

It was then, that the real work, of repairing what had been broken, began.

Costly, Common
That story* describes one way to deal with anger, pointing it outward as a weapon designed to harm. Another way is to bottle it up, keep things to yourself, letting it become a part of you. When we hold on to unresolved anger, and are unwilling to forgive, it hurts not others, but us.

A recent Mayo Clinic article shares what is at stake. Holding on to anger –

• Seeps into other relationships
• Limits our ability to enjoy the present
• Increases feelings of depression
• Decreases feelings of connection with others
• Causes our life to lack purpose
• Has the potential to cause us loads of physical harm

Yuck. That, too, is less than ideal. Anyone want to sign up for these symptoms?

Amazon.com currently lists more than fifty thousand books that touch on the subject of anger. The much more enjoyable topic of love clocks in only a bit higher, at seventy thousand books. While we infinitely value the latter – yeah love – it seems we need an awful lot of help working through the former.

While preparing this message I got phone call from one of our members, who wanted to talk about exactly this. He expressed a growing frustration over the spread of the Delta variant, how it didn’t have to be this way if more people had taken the vaccine and masking seriously, and had valued communal good over individual freedoms. I couldn’t help but agree. As a result of these frustrations he’s felt feelings bubbling up from within he can only describe as outright rage.

And because of this rage his angina is acting up, making his heart beat faster than it should. We spoke of the importance of staying in conversation, resourcing, finding healthy ways to release, and the need to forgive others who, speaking candidly, we both struggle to truly understand. At a minimum just to help us be physically more well. This is the here and now for him, and me, possibly you.

Wisdom
The Ephesians author writes something in chapter 4 about this oft-maligned feeling of anger that just might surprise.

Be angry, the text says. Be angry. With that the author confesses feelings of anger are –

• Natural
• Common
• Not going away, any time soon

Be angry. It’s worth sitting with that simple two-word statement some.

Anger isn’t something scripture minimalizes, avoids, or ignores.

Whether we like it or not, sooner or later, feelings of anger within us are going to come up. The question becomes what happens then.
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We know, hopefully, lashing out isn’t the answer. The boy who hammered nails in a fence, now in need of mending, is a good reminder of that. And holding anger in no better, decreasing our physical and mental health as it does.

Instead, scripture presents a third way. We are to speak the truth to our neighbors, for we are members of one another. While reflecting on this text I couldn’t help but be reminded of a conversation, now three decades old, that describes how this third way works.

Rift
In high school I have this vivid memory of a conflict between me and a friend, Kathrin. I remember being pretty upset. And was keeping those feelings bottled up inside. All day long we passed each other in the hallways, avoiding eye contact.

Knowing something had come between us, as I walked from one classroom to the next, Kathrin approached me, quoting Ephesians 4. “You know,” she said, “scripture says we shouldn’t let the sun go down on a disagreement. We really need to talk about this.”

I remember being kind of impressed. This was not the typical public-school conversation my teenage self was used to. It couldn’t have been easy for her. It seemed brave.

I also remember not really wanting to talk to her about it. Stewing in my own juices a bit longer? Yeah, that was more my thing. It was tempting to hold on to that anger some more and decline her request. I considered the option. But deep down I had a sense Kathrin was right. We should probably talk. It was time for me, in that moment I decided, even if just a little, to grow up.

So we talked.
We reconciled.
We are friends to this day.

And for the life of me I can’t remember what it was that had come between us. But you know what? The details of the conflict don’t really matter much anymore. For the fence had been mended. Healing was now complete.

Redux
Today’s Ephesians 4 text uses language that, like anger, we don’t often dwell on. The devil makes an appearance, as does stealing, evil, bitterness, wrath, slander, malice. Again, yuck. Who wants to slog through life with any of that?

Instead, we are offered a better way, a chance to leave all that behind. Claimed as a beloved child of God, in the waters of our baptism we have been made clean, guided by the light of Christ, being remade into a new creation. It is this new creation within that offers so very much more than the chaos our world often deals.

As a new creation we are asked to put away that junk drawer collection of human nature – the mudslinging, bitterness, and malice – setting it aside, for good.

We are called, instead to live into our identity as Christ followers by imitating our creator. We are called to live in love. We can do that by –

Mending fences,
Working honestly,
Building up,
Being kind,
Forgiving.

Just as Christ has forgiven us.

When conflict arises within community – it does, and it will – we may be tempted to follow the ways of our old selves, resorting to –

Screaming,
Slander,
Gossip.

Speaking ill of others, behind their backs, attempting to tear one another down.

Or perhaps we’re more inclined to bottle our anger up, keep it inside, causing physical, mental, spiritual harm.

Christ asks us to follow a third way. A way that speaks the truth, in love, to others. Be angry. But do not sin. Don’t let the sun go down on your anger. Instead, go to the other person, listen, learn, seek to understand.

Release anger.
Forgive.

For it is only then, when we put down our hammer and nails, that we can become imitators of God. It is then, while mending the fences we’ve damaged, doing so together, it is then when our ultimate healing can truly, and completely, begin. Amen.

*adapted from https://jamesleath.com/notes/a-story-of-anger-and-forgiveness

One

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A few days ago Senate Republicans and Democrats joined together, voting to take up a $1 trillion dollar bipartisan infrastructure bill. The step paves the way towards funding significant upgrades for roads, bridges, rails, transit, water. Better known for being bitter rivals in recent memory, the two parties set aside their differences, finding common cause they could both support. Many crossed an aisle that more often than not divides. What was separate had been united. Their shared efforts favor a greater good that benefits all. The two came together, almost magically it seems, as one.

This past week we watched as over 11,000 athletes from 206 countries came together at the Tokyo Olympics, joined by a shared passion of competitive sport. Setting aside differences in culture, ethnicity, religion, language and governance, it is a spectacle to behold. We naturally cheer for our country (go USA!) Yet there is so much more beauty to this must-see TV than merely rooting for lines drawn on a map. The Olympics represent a celebration of difference, amid a backdrop of jaw-dropping human achievements that constantly amaze. Billions worldwide, for these two inspiring weeks, become a global village, of one.

One of the biggest stories from Tokyo so far is that of Sunisa Lee. Sunisa’s family immigrated to the US from Southeast Asia in 2003 when she was a toddler. Part of the Hmong ethnic group, her family settled right up the road in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Sunisa’s past year was marked by multiple challenges that made her Olympic path more difficult than most. Sure, training during the unknowns of pandemic couldn’t have been easy. But there was more. Two close family members, an aunt and an uncle, died due to COVID. Her father suffered an accident, becoming paralyzed from the chest down. Then came increased anti-immigrant sentiment. Increased anti-Asian sentiment came too.

Nevertheless, Sunisa persisted, making history as the first-ever Hmong American Olympic gymnast. Earlier this week her lofty performance earned Sunisa the gold medal of the women’s all-around. With the achievement she entered rarified air.

We celebrate triumph, amid adversity.

We celebrate –
A woman,
A Minnesotan,
An Asian,
An American.
A recent immigrant.

Finally, we celebrate, most of all, a fellow child of God.

For out of the many groups Sunisa claims, it is that final identity that binds us together, into one.

As I sat at the local library to prepare this message, I watched as a white woman approached a black man, and asked him to turn down the volume on his headphones. I could hear the sound of hip hop tunes being played ever-so-slightly, twenty feet away. Once corrected, he complied; the playful beats disappeared.

Noticing the environment we shared more now, I then heard several other conversations nearby. Each conversation was louder than the offending music. At least as best I could tell. If volume weren’t the criteria for his correction what was? As I looked over at the 6’3” black man with a head full of braided dreadlocks it was difficult not to wonder why he had been shushed. It was a reminder that the two, for far too long, have not been treated fairly, or consistently, as one.

On any given day 115,000 couples here on earth get married. Each member of the pair brings all they are to that moment, by way of DNA, family history, life experience. They share their strengths, their weaknesses, their everything. The sacred act of marriage is a public commitment to have and to hold, from this day forth, for better and for worse, in sickness and in health, to cherish and to love. To do all that, with any luck, for the rest of their lives. Still unique beings, differentiated in so many ways, a new creation in this joining has been formed. The two, in the eyes of God and all those assembled, have become one.

From those sacred unions the two are united, not just in Spirit, but in flesh. And when their union comes together just so, and the creative spark of life gestates to completion, it is a miracle we relish. A new life is born. And those news lives are so cute! The family of two has become three. Later they may become four, five, more. Regardless of size they share this common identity. As a family, the many still, God willing, are one.

For the 2.4 billion Christians in the world that claim the faith, in many settings there is an almost automatic next step, baptism.  We bring that adorable new life to the community, and by water and the Spirit they are reborn anew, joined to the body of Christ. Parents, Godparents, and all those gathered commit to bring, nurture, support this new life in their faith journey. When asked if we will do all this, the community replies, in unison, we do. With that vocal commitment we walk with the newly created one, their whole life long, for the sake of the One.

Every weekend Christians globally come together outdoors, in homes, in sanctuaries. We join, either in person, online, or thousands of miles away, alongside fellow believers in the holy catholic church. We stake claim to the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, the life everlasting. We eat the bread, broken for you, drink from the cup, shed for you, taking it into our innermost being. With that singular act Christians set aside differences large and small, joining their savior across time and space. With that singular act billions are united, together, as one.

And when our life here on earth is complete, and it is time to say goodbye, we gather, a final time, to celebrate the transition from one state of being to the next. Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. We pray that rest eternal grant us, O Lord. We imagine light perpetual shining on us, now and forevermore. We look forward to reunions, and peace, becoming fully connected with our Creator and all of creation.
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In that moment of transition, from the here to the hereafter, all those various identities we claim fade away. In their place we are unified, once and for all time, into the One.

In just three verses from the opening of Ephesians 4, the author repeats this theme of oneness seven times:
One body,
One Spirit,
One hope,
One Lord,
One faith,
One baptism,
One God and Father of us all.

Seven.

A holy number.
A complete number.
A perfect number.

Repetition signals importance. The Ephesians writer must have sensed divisive energy in the faith communities of the early church. Divisive energy that exists still among us today. Divisive energy that far too often keeps us more apart, than together, as One.

At the library, the black man with muted headphones caught my glance. The two of us got to talking. Devante moved here from St. Louis recently. He appreciates his new town, in many ways, very much. But how he’s treated, I learned, based on the color of his skin, unfortunately follows him everywhere he goes.

We lamented this reality.

Devante then shared his vision of the future. “One day I hope a black man can pass a white man on the street and neither of them think twice about it. They just trust each other from the start. Why wouldn’t they? That’s the future I dream of.”

I found myself nodding along, also desiring this utopia.

While society slowly bends toward the long arc of justice, if we’re honest with ourselves, we must confess that we’re not quite there.

But we can be.

As we look to the future, let us stake claim to our faith. A faith that calls us, in no small way, to set aside our differences. To join together. To love, support, cherish, respect, honor and be, alongside all of God’s creation. Bringing creation together, once and for all, into the One.   Amen.