Compassion and Anger

As I read the news and reflect on the nature of man and on the current state of the world I alternate between two perspectives and prayers. As I look at the wickedness of the world and the way that God’s laws are smugly flaunted I am moved to cry out for justice and wrath. I want God to strike the jaw of the wicked and smash their teeth. I want Him to smite them in His anger and wrath. I want Him to unveil His vengeance and to wreak havoc on His enemies. I want His power and justice to be revealed and for all to fall on their knees before Him.

Then I remember that such was I before He mercifully and gracefully drew me to Himself. I too not only did evil but approved of others who did likewise. I recruited people to participate in my perversions and debaucheries because misery loves company and because if “everyone is doing it” it can’t be wrong; or at least I didn’t feel as wrong. I recognize in the depraved celebrities of our age my own wickedness magnified and on display for all to see. I see the twisted delight that we take in the fall of the famous and I recognize my own sarcasm and mockery. The sins of my generation are my own.

When I recognize this, I am moved to cry out for mercy! I want healing for the wounded hearts I see. I know the hurt that drives them to seek numbness and release for I too was wounded and am finding healing. I cry out for God to pour out His mercy and grace! I know that none can be saved apart from His drawing. I know that it is by faith that I was saved, but that this faith did not come from my background, my family, or myself; it was a gift of God and not a result of works so that none, least so I, could boast. So, I cry out for God to continue to have mercy and patience and to draw them with His persistent and severe mercy to Himself. I ask for Him to save those who have given up hope and who have become not only participants but the very purveyors of the filth that pollutes our world.

I feel myself torn between compassion and righteous anger. I cannot reconcile these tensions in myself. Sometimes I feel guilty for the anger. I feel that compassion is the way of God, but then I remember Jesus scourging those in the temple and His angry rebukes of the Pharisees and I see that righteous anger is indeed righteous. Certainly the Psalms are full of prayers for God to smite His enemies and I know that this is part of the nature of God. But then, lest I become an angry and judgmental man, I am reminded again of the woundedness that propels men toward wickedness. Men are responsible for their sinful choices regardless of their woundedness, but remembering the woundedness that drives them and relating that to my own woundedness allows me to view them with compassion. I can see the as harassed and helpless, as sheep without a shepherd, I can see them as I once was before the Good Shepherd rescued me.

Only God knows those who will be redeemed and those who will not. I cannot know who will be an object of God’s mercy and grace and who will be an object of His justice and wrath. Both will glorify God by revealing a portion of His nature and confirming that He is both the lion and the lamb, the one who judges and the one who justifies. I cannot resolve the tension, but I can praise God that He has saved me. I can choose to walk with Him each day. Some days, most days, He chooses to use me to communicate His love and compassion to those who are dying all around me without hope, but some days He uses me to warn of His anger and wrath, He will not always be slow to anger. One day He will judge the world. May God have mercy on us all!

Forget to Remember

Why is it so easy to forget and so hard to remember. What is it about the nature of man, that we can learn lessons, but that we have to relearn them so often. As I read the Old Testament accounts of the people of Israel, I am shocked and appalled by how often they have to relearn the same principle or experience the same kind consequences for the same poor choice, or in some cases increasingly difficult consequences, repeatedly until they finally learn their lesson and stop making the poor choice. In their narrative I see something that is true not only for them but for all of us, not only for all of us but for me in particular.

I know that God is the Lord of the Universe, the Lord God almighty. This is an indisputable fact of history and of my own experience; and yet, I forget to remember. If I am really a servant of the King then my life should be marked by humble dependence, and from time to time it is. However, more often than I care to admit, my life is marked by selfish ambition and independence. God is faithful and just. He never leaves me or forsakes me, and so He allows me to experience the consequences of my sinful independence and He points out my skewed perspective and draws me back to Himself.

One of the ways that my skewed perspective manifests itself is through an increasing emphasis on methodology and performance rather than on prayerful submission and dependence. I find myself seeking the right formula to produce the results in my work, marriage, children, or life in general, that I am seeking. Rather than asking my Almighty Father what He would have me do and obeying Him, I try to strike out on my own and to do things that I think will please Him, or at least please me.

It’s not that there are not methodologies that work. It’s the heart that is important. I believe that there are strategies and approaches that will yield results because they line up with the way that He has designed the universe to function and/or they are in accordance with His mysterious will. The issue is one of the heart, what am I seeking? Scripture tells us to seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and that the other things will be added to us. It’s the “seek first” part that is of primary importance. Once I have sought Him and declared my dependence upon Him in word and in deed (most often through time spent in the Word, prayer, and quiet reflection) I have to do something with the rest of my day. I am after all called to serve Him.

I find that when I am disciplined to start my day, or to make it a habit to spend a portion of my day, in specific pursuit of Him, that it changes my perspective and aligns me with His will and work. Often this means that I add or delete things from my to do list during my times with Him. I keep a separate piece of paper with me during my times with Him specifically to jot down these ideas as they come to me. I can’t say that all of these items are from Him specifically. I believe that some of them are, but that some are the result of the peace and stillness in my heart during those times of silence and solitude that allow me to see more clearly. My heart is like a pool in a stream that has been stirred up by a stick or other activity and the silt from the bottom has clouded the water. It takes a time of undisturbed stillness for the dust to settle at the bottom again before you can see clearly through the water to what lies beneath.

It is far too easy for me to forget to remember. I am grateful for the Father’s gentle but persistent reminders to come away with Him and to renew my commitment and help me to remember.