11/17/02 - Does God Get Angry?

Pastor Christa von Zychlin

Our Savior’s Lutheran Church

Hartland, WI.  53029

November 17, 2002

Sermon based on Matthew 25:14-30

Does God Get Angry?

The short answer to my sermon title this evening/morning, Does God Get Angry? Is ….. YES.

The slightly longer answer to this question, Does God Get Angry?  is YES, when God has something to get angry about -- and God’s anger is a righteous anger, and God’s anger is because, he loves you, and he loves this world you are part of,  so very very much.

Uh –uh, in that case, you and I both know that we may have something to think about, right?  Do you suppose that God has something to get angry about right now with you???  Can you think of anything whatsoever?  How about with this church?  This community? This country?  This war- threatening world right now.

Do you believe in a God who is actually paying attention enough to get angry?  Oh yeah.  The answer to that is YES as well.

As Jesus tells his parable today about the three slaves, you need to know that  Jesus has had a long day.  As I look through chapters 23, 24, 25 of the Gospel of Matthew which tells about the life of Jesus, I see how he’s argued with the pin head Pharisees over (things that today would translate into) complaining about $35 here and $219 there in the temple budget, about whether church members should tithe before or after taxes, but then these same civic & religious leaders say nothing about the fact that there are children in parts of the world don’t know what a pencil is for because they’ve never been to school, and there’s teenagers who think little of following orders to kill, in Milwaukee, in Washington D.C., lining today up in Iraq, in lots of little lost countries of Africa, as long as they have a warm uniform to wear and a bowl of soup or some mind numbing drugs waiting for them when they get back, they will pull a trigger for hire.    They’ve never had a chance to learn about the 10 commandments, never mind learning about a God who loves them so deeply He sent his Son to die for them.  

Because church & civic leaders spent their time arguing about the finer points of law & theology, about which church had the best music department or preachers, and the religious & civic leaders of the day were so busy planning self congratulatory banquets & awards ceremonies, that they never noticed if hearts were being changed, and individual lives were being cared for. 

Read between the lines, Matthew 23, 24, 25.  Jesus is aching for the world His Father loves so much that he offered his very own child to be born into it.

Jesus is in Jerusalem, here in chapters 24 & 25 of Matthew -  he’s sitting in the Garden of the Mount of Olives and the disciples came to him privately the Bible says.  They were probably embarrassed by the fact that he had just cried outside of the temple because nobody “in power” nobody “with money” – that’s what talents are, pure & simple the word we translate as talents means money and gobs of it, 15 years wages, according to Biblical scholars, so all these people who have all these talents, this money, this power, this know how, they wouldn’t listen as we don’t listen today to what Jesus is saying and how God would have us live our lives on this earth.

We’re struggling over next years budget in this church, and we’re looking at a $400,000 budget for next year which is a $20,000 cut from this year, which is good because that’s more realistic, then last year, but some would say it’s not realistic enough, considering that we are $89,000 short on our giving for last year’s budget. When we talk about church budgets, you know what?   I truly believe that   God doesn’t care all that much about whether we spend  $20 a vase  for flowers and $50 a kid for youth trips and  a whopping amount for staff salaries and over $5,000/ month mortgage.   All of that is to provide a means of structural support for what God DOES care about-- that at Our Savior’s the Gospel is heard, your and my hearts & minds are cleansed renewed, that honest friendships are being formed, & all kinds of new people who are going to be coming through our front doors, that their lives are charged up & renewed, that we together are so awed by the power of God’s individual love for us and every human being in the world, that we will live our lives in his world differently.  We will BE salt & light and that we will leverage our $20 flowers and our & $50 scholarships and our staff salaries & our monthly mortgage payments into power for loving our neighbors and loving the God who loves us enough to get angry when we aren’t using our mind- talents and heart- talents and financial- talents for His kingdom.

Which gets us back  into the 25^th chapter of Matthew,  where Jesus gives us this parable about God getting angry. 

Because God had entrusted three people with three big jobs, three big amounts of money, three big amounts of power – remember, even that one talent guy was given the equivalent of 15 years wages, hey, on a pretty basic salary, that could be  really close to $400,000!  Hmmmm  where have I heard that number before??? Could it be that that one talent guy is like our church????

One of my revelations as to the power of righteous anger came in Ames, IA. when one of my sons, who shall remain unnamed, elected to play 7^th grade football.

Now what they did there is they mercifully divided up the kids into heavy weight & lightweight teams.  Unluckily for him,  my son  was at a stage in his development where he was  picked as the smallest kid on the heavy weight team.

Now you need to know that up to this point in my life I knew absolutely NOTHING about football, --couldn’t see their faces, wasn’t interested --  so as my kid is playing 7^th grade football, wouldn’t you know my  husband is gallivanting about in Tanzania doing something or another ministry related, so it was up to me to single mom it for a couple a months… boy did I learn a lot…  I made it to most of the games and I have to tell you that the single most eye opening experience for me was to see mild mannered and general nice guy Coach  Schneider absolutely bellow at my kid – NIEMEN (that’s not how you pronounce his last name but hey ) WHAT  DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING OUT THERE

And my child, my first born, my sensitive little boy… the littlest kid on the heavy weight team, didn’t blink an eye.  Why? Because he knew the coach was paying attention, he knew his coach expected a lot, he knew the coach didn’t yell at the guys sitting on the bench on the sideline.

Does God get angry? Yes because God is paying attention & he’s got something to get angry about.

My second illustration is also a football illustration,  same kid,   Two years later, now he’s playing on the Arrowhead freshman team.  His mother, me has learned a little bit more about the game, and now Wayne is sitting beside me so I can quietly ask him about a few of the finer points of football – to which he usually responds by looking around and and saying shhh… keep your voice down, I don’t want anyone hearing you asking those kinds of questions. 

So this fall we’re at a game when  all of a sudden one of the coaches starts bellowing at the top of his lungs, and the whole stands quiets down… IF I EVER, SEE ONE OF YOU GUYS PULLING ANYTHING LIKE THAT AGAIN, YOU WILL NEVER PLAY ON THIS TEAM AGAIN AS LONG AS IM COACH.  THIS IS A CLASS ACT AND I WANT YOU KIDS TO SHOW IT.

Turned out one of the kids had given the finger to someone on the opposing team…   most of us parents I think wanted to stand up and cheer, YES.  IF a coach is gonna yell, that’s something to yell about.  Yes, I want the coach to get angry at my kid (It wasn’t my kid!) for something like that, and I want the whole team and stands to see it:

Righteous anger over something you’ve done wrong.

Because this is a coach that cares about each individual and about his whole team community.

***

How much more God loves you, then the greatest football coach loves his star players.

Even a coach wouldn’t /couldn’t /shouldn’t give up his own child for the kids on his team.

But God does that.  And when Jesus gives us parables of God’s righteous anger, like the one today, it’s only so we can know the strength of his all embracing love.

AMEN.

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