Angry? You wouldn’t like me when I am angry…
Preacher: Revd Samantha Ferguson, Assistant Chaplain
Readings: 1 Corinthians 1:18-25; John 2:13-22
Angry? You wouldn’t like me when I am angry…
If you could have a superpower what would it be?
Become invisible and watch as your tutor types your exam questions?
See through walls to be able to find out who is breaking quarantine rules?
Be the strongest in the world so as to be invincible from covid?
What would your superpower be?
I would like to fly which would be rather cool, but I do in fact have a superpower – it is the ability to fall asleep anytime anyplace anywhere.
And I mean, literally, anywhere.
This superpower was particularly handy when I was a student.
Having to write an essay overnight before a 9am deadline and then being able to catch up on sleep at 9.01am was very helpful!
However, superpowers have their problems. My husband finds it particularly annoying that the moment we pull out of the driveway in our car, I fall asleep.
Not when I am driving said car, obviously.
Superpowers.
This morning, on this third Sunday in lent, during the most interesting of times in which we live, we hear about one of Jesus’s superpowers.
But, I hear you cry over the digital airwaves, Jesus is God so he basically is THE super power.
But, today, we learn about God using one of his superpowers by losing his temper. Being angry.
‘Don’t make me angry, you wouldn’t like me when I am angry’ said the Incredible Hulk, my favourite Avenger Superhero from the Marvel comics books and films. And yes Disney+ has featured in the Ferguson Household during lockdown!
And, you may well question whether Anger is a superpower? Friends let me explain. Do you have a temper, are you quick to anger? I don’t have a temper unlike my sister and my mother. And I learnt to duck at an early age, as a fight erupting between those two could be painful with plates and saucepans flying.
No I don’t have a temper, but I can get angry. And when I get angry, well you really wouldn’t like me when I am angry. It is that cold, hard, concrete anger where I see white and I am very controlled but brutal.
And what makes me angry? Injustice, when people are not heard, when those in need are ignored, when life quite simply is not fair and I can do something about it.
Was this the same for Jesus? Who, as we hear in our gospel this morning, gets tired of people using his sacred place as a den of thieves and decides to do something about it? According to John, this story happens very early on in Jesus’ ministry. The miraculous wine had barely been drunk at his friend’s wedding, when the next ‘to do’ in his bullet journal was to ‘Cleanse the Temple’. Because for Jesus, the temple was his refuge, his safety and his stay.
A place he ran away to as a boy and held court in as a man. It was his sanctuary. And they tainted it with their greed, their lies, their deceit, and their infectious selfishness. They had transformed the Temple from a place where people came to pray, give offerings and to be given back hope, into a place where they were taken for fools, bullied in to accepting poor quality offerings and short-changed by those out to make a fast buck.
It was wrong. And Jesus was done. No more.
Can you imagine what the atmosphere in that temple must have been like the moment the tables stopped tumbling and Jesus took a breath. Jesus’ anger was quick, violent and explosive, but it had come after burning long and hard, and it was righteous.
This is what I mean when I suggest that anger is in fact a superpower. One that, like the Hulk’s strength, can be used for good and not ill.
The righteous man came out of the core of the human god and physically exploded.
However, Jesus didn’t need to become the angry green giant. He simply revealed to us that there are some things even the God of love and forgiveness isn’t willing to tolerate. There was a line. And this line was to herald what was to come, as Christ’s disciples were to remember after the events of good Friday and beyond.
Do you have a line that shall not be crossed in your life? Has there been a moment when you have chosen to take a stand, to act, rather than simply watch, as that line is crossed. A line of ethics, of morality, of theology, of faith, of every day human decency, is crossed right in front of your very eyes?
When it happened, did you allow it to play out before you? Or step in, step up and do something about it? No? Hasn’t happened to you yet? Well, my friends you are fortunate, but there will come a time and a place when all of us are asked to stand for our beliefs, our moral code, our sense of what is right and what is wrong, for good or for evil.
And when the time comes, will you as Jesus be willing to as we are asked to do this lent? To deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow the way of love? For this is what lies at the core of our Christian faith. It is who Jesus is.
A man willing to step forward, to say what needs to be said, do what needs to be done even if it ends in death.
How many of us would be willing to do the same?
I found myself facing this dilemma when I my own personal safety was threatened after coming out publicly in support of a new mosque being built in my Parish when I was Priest-in-Charge in Aberdeen, 300meters from the front door of my church.
Deciding that I would not be bullied into keeping quiet, took me to Westminster and the Houses of Parliament to answer questions about the situation to a panel of MPs along with speaking with the press and the police.
There was a line and I was angry that it had been crossed. So I personally really identify with the angry Christ we hear of this morning. A man of love and peace but a man none the less. And we are all walking his path with him during these long days of lent. We are re-living his journey and re-feeling the emotions it creates within our God. We, like Jesus, must decide what side we are on and how we use our superpowers for good and not ill.
Now, not all of you will be able to fall asleep instantly but you do all have a superpower.
The ability to be kind when others are not,
the ability to shine as a light for others when the world is a dark place,
the ability to speak out against injustice
the ability to be a friend to the friendless,
the ability to love the unlovable.
All of us have the capacity for goodness and all of us will be given the opportunity one day to use it in the big and the little moments that make up our lives. And if you place love at the heart of all your decisions, have faith that you will do the right thing at the right time.
Jesus wasn’t merely angry that day, he was stirred up in love for all he could see before him, the past the present and the future of humanity he loves so very much.
And love never fails love. The greatest superpower of them all.
Remember, whatever you offer, whenever you offer, however you offer, Jesus receives it in love, because you are from everlasting love and to everlasting love you shall return.
So, whatever your superpower is, remember this lent to deny yourselves, take up your cross, follow Christ, and to always use your superpower for love.
AMEN