“And they were bringing children to Him that He might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, He was indignant and said to them, ‘Let the children come to me; do not hinder them…’” – Mark 10:14

The first thing that comes to people’s minds when asked, “On what occasion did Jesus get angry?”, some generally refer to Him overturning the tables of the money-changers in the temple; others will mention His anger at the Pharisees, but seldom do you find many who mention the fact that Jesus became indignant with His disciples – not the money changers or the Pharisees this time, but His very own disciples. Only John, the ‘disciple of love’, records Jesus making and using a whip of cords to drive out those who sold in the temple.

How does this measure up to the Jesus who is notorious for being ‘gentle, meek and mild’? Of course He is gentle and lowly of heart. He is the epitome of self control; He never lost His temper but it became hot. Was He really angry and if so, was that an attribute of the Spirit or of the flesh? He was consistently, moment by moment, without measure, filled with the Holy Spirit, but He displayed – under the Spirit – fiery displeasure, yet without sin.

The Lord Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world but there is also another side to His gentle attribute: the wrath of the Lamb that will soon be revealed to everyone who defies God; God is love, but the background of such love is His holiness; “Wrath and love are both eternal; they are, so to speak, the obverse sides of the revelation of Almighty God” – Oswald Chambers.

Many who are irreligious have a soothing and calming disposition, who are known to be gentle, loving, kind, charitable and generous, which oftentimes serves as an inspirational example to many, but that is not the fruit of the Holy Spirit; it may appear to resemble such, but at its heart is the motivation of self-love and self-glory.

‘Nice’ is not the Jesus of the New Testament as many are mistaken into believing today. Because such and such a person are non-confrontational they are deemed wonderful Christians. In fact, the Pharisees were publicly honoured for being ‘nice’ people and for their many good works; they were highly esteemed by man until Jesus exposed the devil in them. Weakness is now confused with meekness; people can have weak, overly-sensitive personalities, but that isn’t humility and meekness; meekness is power under control, having authority without wrongly asserting it to one’s own advantage and gain.

The apostle Paul wrote, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil” (Ephesians 4:26). This is directly after he exhorted the believers of Ephesus to put off their old self and put on the new, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness (verse 22-24) and in verse 20 he states, “But this is not the way you learned Christ – assuming that you have heard about Him and were taught in Him, as the truth is in Jesus…” A rather odd place to say that anger is okay without sinning, especially to many Christians who believe any lively emotion is off limits! It is anger with bitterness and without self-control that is the danger, and many who justify their anger are justifying their sin – “Be angry and do not sin…” 

It is deplorable how the Great Master Artists have depicted Jesus as some weak, frail, anorexic and anaemic deity, and who died a martyr’s death. Being a carpenter – as Jesus’ trade was – inevitably develops a good and healthy physique. Of course our Messiah was the ‘suffering Servant’, but He came to gladly do the will of His Father; He didn’t walk around somber, feeling ‘hard-done-by’ Who had a nervous tremour in His voice; He spoke with power and authority, gripped and changed the hearts of His listeners and blew apart the hypocritical-religiosity of the times, which was not a tranquil moment by far.

We have a sentimental Jesus today still wearing a white robe, hugging troops, embracing celebrities that have passed on, rejoicing in same sex marriage, who winks at sin, passes the ‘bill’ of multi-faiths under one God, and says, “I understand and that’s why I died, so that you could ‘carry on’ with your sin – which is really a weakness you can’t help – and enjoy God at the same time…that’s how much I love you” – not the biblical fact that Christ came to die so that we would no longer live in sin but live unto God in His righteousness! Jesus Christ came as God veiled in flesh; He is the express image and the “exact imprint of God‘s nature”, as the author to the Hebrews wrote; It wasn’t a case of abolishing the law of God and ‘eclipsing’ an angry God; Christ came to perfectly fulfil the law of God – Who detests sin – and through Whose death appeased the wrath of God that we may walk with Him: “…heaven’s peace and perfect justice kissed a guilty world in love.” Walking with God is nothing less than to please Him by obedience.

The world has dictated too long to how Jesus should look and the church has been buying it and has adopted successful measures in selling it. The social gospel now supersedes the ministry of the Word where the physical needs of man are elevated above the real need of being spiritually birthed into the kingdom of God – “Seek first the kingdom of God…” out of which the necessities of our physical welfare are met, but we have been cleverly outwitted by the subtle satanic temptation that appears right in our own eyes. Liberalism – which in essence is lawlessness – has played more havoc in the church than any other religion or cult; it never contends for the faith of the New Testament but promotes the unity of all religions – ‘There are many ways to God, so let’s be all nice and get along’ mentality – accommodates immorality, winks at and condones a God-defying lifestyle; “Jesus would never refuse a gay or lesbian couple getting married” the liberals state, “they love each other, and isn’t that what Christianity is all about?” It is the desire for a unity at the expense of truth – that cancels all division (opposition to sin) but seriously lacks the foundation of a biblical unity. The God of love is elected while the God of wrath is ‘impeached’. The real reason for the need and cause of the death of Christ is despised nowadays; of course it is! – it is an offence naturally to those who love their sin. H. Richard Niebuhr commented on how the process of liberal theology in America gradually divorced itself from its roots in the Reformation tradition and resulted in a system of belief that “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.” Oswald Chambers, almost a century ago, addressed dangers within the church: “Beware of an escape of mind that is not true Bible revelation. The destruction and terrors of God’s punishment are as much God’s decree as the peace and joy and prosperity of God are.”

We have a stereo-typed Christianity where hardly anyone thinks for themselves; they don’t search the Scriptures to know that what the preachers say is the truth. Because it feels good and, somehow, does not put a ‘death sentence’ on their sin, therefore it must be right. Hardly anyone will commit time to read and study in the ‘Berean’ way because they haven’t the time, they have more important things to do like reading and posting junk and smut on social networking sites. We are a graphic-image orientated generation; artists are now used to do their work for them rather than use their own brain to think for themselves; they want everything in picture form with ‘fast-food’ blurbs, rather than spend more time reading to really grasp the essence of truth. Successful reading doesn’t do your thinking; it makes you think originally; it makes you question and puts you on a quest to know truth.

How do we study the gospels? Does our over-familiarity by what we were taught in Sunday-school settle Who Jesus is in our own minds, or do we seek revelation of Him through the frequent study of the Scriptures aided by the Holy Spirit? Most can recite many gospel passages, but how many can say that in comparison to last year we see more facets of the beauty of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ? Do we expect to see more by this time next year? Do we want to see more or are we satisfied with a Jesus that keeps us living a mediocre Christianity?

Jesus Christ is gentle, meek and mild – He is the Lamb of God but He is also the Lamb of God’s wrath to those who despise the love and justice of God demonstrated through the penal death and resurrection of the Way, the Truth and the Life – the only way and approach to God the Father.