There's no other way to say it: we live in an outrage culture.
Don't like what's being said on TV? You should probably be mad about it.
Don't like who your neighbor voted for? You should probably be outraged about it.
Don't like current cultural trends of the youngest generation? You should probably be outraged about it.
Don't like someone pointing out that we live in a world where so many of us are sucked into being outraged at everything? ...you should probably be outraged about it.
I have to admit a guilty pleasure: I love a good dumpster fire on social media. A quick view of the comments section on any viral post is comedic gold. No matter how innocent or casual a Facebook post may be, someone will find something worth fighting over. I recently saw a post that showed a picture of peanuts in a glass coke bottle with the caption "This new food trend has people talking!" The comments immediately devolved into tons of angry commenters who found it incredibly important to let everyone know that (1) this wasn't a new trend, (2) people were stupid for thinking this was a new trend, and (3) other commenters who has slight variations of when this trend started were also stupid and needed to hear it. It's not funny watching people be mean to one another, but seeing such widespread chaos in the midst of something so trivial... it's a little funny.
My question is this: why? Why is this worth anyone's time or effort? What is there to be gained? What does it cost to simply let someone think what they want to think? Agreement, civility, and peace is... more often than not... entirely free. Yet, we live in a culture where someone having a different opinion or being factually incorrect simply can not be tolerated. Correcting people is a drug and anger is our favorite way of injecting it into our veins.
The Bible warns many, many times over anger. Proverbs has tons to say about anger, rage, and the like.
A wise person is cautious and turns from evil, but a fool is easily angered and is careless. (Prov 14:16)
Perhaps my favorite contrast in 'human anger' vs 'God's patience' can be found in Exodus and Numbers. The Hebrew people and Moses had a complicated relationship. They got angry at each other a ton. The Hebrew people were mad that they were brought into the desert without food and water. Moses grew angry when the people fashioned themselves false gods. The Hebrew people were mad that the Promised Land were filled with terrifying people. Moses was angry that the Hebrew people showed such little faith. Time and time again, we see the anger of man on display, sometimes righteous and sometimes selfish. Contrast this with God who showed restraint...
The Lord—the Lord is a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth, 7 maintaining faithful love to a thousand generations, forgiving iniquity, rebellion, and sin. But he will not leave the guilty unpunished, bringing the consequences of the fathers’ iniquity on the children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generation. (Exodus 34:6b-7)
Consider this: God has every reason in the world to be mad. His anger could rain down on sinful people across many generations and he would be "just". Yet, he still pursued us. He still sent his son to die for us. He still forgave us. In light of this, I would pose this question: on what basis do we feel we have a greater right to anger than God?
How do we feel more entitled to hold a grudge against our neighbor than our savior did? Are we being crucified? Are we blameless individuals who are being eternally damned by someone on TV? If not, then why do we feel so entitled to feelings of bitterness? Why do we feel so entitled to our uncontrolled anger?
Its easy to just say "don't be angry", but its an entirely different thing to actually do it. Restraining our anger challenges us to face what we truly find important in life. The thing which controls our hearts and minds is the thing we worship as god. If that god is found to be something of this world, I think we'll find ourselves much angrier and less content individuals. If that god is Christ, then we may be shocked how easy it is to forgive and love another another, even when we don't totally agree.
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