26 June 2009

Righteous Anger

I was doing my bible study today and Kay Aurthur was talking about righteous anger(appropriate) and unrighteous anger(sin) and I loved how she described it. She basically defined righteous anger as anger toward a sin or injustice and unrighteous anger as anger toward a sinner or person who has acted unjustly. She used the example of Jesus turning the tables in the temple to support the idea of righteous anger, Jesus was angry at the defiling of God's house, yet he didn't harbor anger against the people doing the defiling. The bible study I am doing is all about the Sermon on the Mount and this lesson was about how if you harbor anger in your heart it is the same as murder. It got me thinking because I have had a really hard time with a few religions out here that are not teaching the truth. I feel very passionately angry that they are leading people astray and I feel like I have had to check myself to make sure that I am still loving God's creations and only hating the sins they are committing by false teachings and not the people themselves. It's a fine line because I feel myself wanting to just slap the leaders upside the head for what they are doing, but I have to remember that God is just and He will hold them accountable for their sins much better than I could ever do. I want to be love and lead people to Christ through my pure heart but it is very frustrating to know that just a handful of people are responsible for leading 1000's away from God's truth. I am so thankful that the bible says "if you seek Me you will find Me, if you seek with all of your heart" because I feel like a lot of the people here in UT are seeking Jesus but are being duped by the LDS church and here's the kicker, Catholicism too. I have had a few conversations recently that have just blown me away with what the Catholics here are missing out on. I say "here" because I do know Catholics that are Christians around the world, but I am speaking of one church in particular here that seems to be leading people away with a false sense of what salvation really is, terrible. Maybe that's what all catholics learn and I am just now hearing about it but I am angry about it. I pray that I have a righteous anger that just wants these lost souls to find Christ and that I am able to create friendships that cause them to question what it is that is different about my faith than theirs. Let's turn some tables, bring it on!

1 comment:

Sara said...

how interesting to be dealing with the catholic church out there--you would have never thought I'm sure, moving there. But how frustrating, knowing that they are scooping up people who at least know that something's not right with Mormonism, only to be still led astray! It sounds like you had a wake-up call, though--God's so interesting with His timing....