Lectionary: 386My heart is overwhelmed,
my pity is stirred.
I will not give vent to my blazing anger,
I will not destroy Ephraim again;
For I am God and not man,
the Holy One present among you;
I will not let the flames consume you.
The angrier passages of the Bible have often been explained as the Divine Author's anthropomorphizing God; that is, projecting human emotions onto our image of God. Cartoonists do the same with pets (Garfield and Odie), mice (Mickey and Minnie), and every other creature under the sun, plus aliens from outer space (who don't exist, but never mind.)
History gives us beaucoup images of violence in human affairs and on our dynamic planet; it's easy to suppose an angry god uses that violence to punish his human creatures, and his beloved people in particular. He needn't take action; he only has to withdraw the saving influence of his blessings to let things fall where they will -- usually with a crash.
Be that is as it may be; it's easy to suppose that Hosea projected his jealous wrath at his unfaithful Gomer onto the God who had betrothed Israel.
And then the bewildered prophet remembered God's grace. The memory helped him get a better handle on himself:
My heart is overwhelmed,
my pity is stirred.
I will not give vent to my blazing anger....
As a preacher reads the headlines before entering the pulpit, I identify with Hosea. I know something about his struggle with his vocation.
Perhaps the husband saw the pathetic helplessness of the wife who had been neglected and abused as a child and misread violence as a form of love. She seemed happy only when he beat her, despite her crying, screaming, and attempts to escape. Perhaps she blamed herself for his loss of control, as she had been taught by her abusers. They too had acted as if she were the evil person who gave them no choice but to beat her. Abusers have always insisted they don't want to abuse, but they have "No Choice!"
And abusers believe that because they are equally helpless with their anger, jealousy, and contempt. I'm sure Mr. Trump feels justified in his anger with the vandals who took pieces of blue paint for souvenirs from his reflecting pool. They gave him no choice but to have them arrested and prosecuted! When he learns that some of them voted for him, he'll remember the clemency of his better nature.
The Sacrament of Marriage, and faithful husbands and wives, teach us to how to let our human affection, animated and lifted on the wings of the Holy Spirit, rise above the passing emotions of disappointment, anger, and irritability. We choose to to treat one another gently despite our feelings. Not only do we learn to set aside those feelings, with the passage of time we wonder why we got so upset in the first place.
An elderly man told me of how, many years before, he and his wife had taken their young daughter to an ice cream parlor. They had dressed her up in a pretty white dress to show her off, and then became furious when she smeared chocolate ice cream all over her pretty white dress and herself. He felt such remorse over his daughter's long forgotten incident. I am sure she loved him tenderly; I knew him only as a very kind man.
Whether God is angry at us for our misdeeds and deeply entrenched sinfulness, we certainly feel remorse. And even that remorse can turn violent until we remember who we are: God's beloved sinners. He has looked at us through the eyes of Jesus and declared, "With you I am well pleased."
As we regain control of our emotions, whether they be anger, greed, lust, or pride, we hear the Lord remembering who He is. He shows us how to be his image and likeness despite the dirt from which we were made:
My heart is overwhelmed,
my pity is stirred.
I will not give vent to my blazing anger,
For I am God and not man,
the Holy One present among you;
I will not let the flames consume you.
