"Dear God: Are you angry with me today?"

This question greeted me in bold permanent ink as I closed the outhouse door on the jobsite.  As a rule, I never respond to questions written on bathroom walls - especially when God is involved!  It is a bad witness to damage property in God's name, and more horrible still to degrade His holy name with the depictions of racism, hatred, and sexual perversion found inside some construction site outhouses.  "Jesus loves you" written among that filth is a fitting example of the bright light Jesus brought to this earth.  But the grandeur and glory is lost when His name becomes graffiti.  He deserves people who live out that truth rather than writing it in hiding.

The temptation to respond on the bathroom door with pen and ink was over before it began, yet the question begs to be answered just the same.  Is God an angry God?  How can I know what angers Him?  Psalm 7:11 says, "God is a just judge, and God is angry with the wicked every day."  The word in the Hebrew translated "angry" means "to foam at the mouth, to be enraged."  Sin is rebellion against God and His perfect statutes, and He detests sin passionately.  It is a perversion of righteousness.  It corrupts, destroys, and brings death.  As much as God hates sin, He hates how it destroys men.  Sin is a cruel dictator that enslaves men and ushers them into hell.  God is righteous, and it is right for Him to be angry.  The psalmist writes in Psalm 76:7, "You, Yourself, are to be feared; and who may stand in Your presence when once You are angry?"   

We have been told that God is a loving God, and this is true.  While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  God is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.  But love and anger are not opposed to one another.  You can love your husband, wife, or children dearly, but they can still make you angry!  When you read of children being kidnapped and prostituted, or a father shooting his kids one by one and piling their bodies in a heap, or the elderly being swindled by crooks, what kind of person has no response?  A person who does not care.  God cares.  He cares more about you and me than we care about ourselves, and that is saying a lot!

God appeared to Moses in a burning bush and instructed him to return to Egypt.  God heard the cries of His people and sought to deliver them from the oppression of the Egyptians.  Moses began to make excuses:  what if they don't believe me, what if they refuse to listen,  I'm not good at public speaking.  Exodus 4:14 says the anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses.  Did God's love for Moses or His people evaporate?  No.  But the unbelief of Moses and his reluctance to obey angered God.  How about King Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived?  1 Kings 11:9-10 reads, "So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice, [10] and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods; but he did not keep what the Lord had commanded."  Man's anger is often mood related, but God is not moody.  It is sin that infuriates Him.  Man is often angry without just cause, but God is just.

I will answer the question on the bathroom door with a question:  my friend, have you stirred up the anger of God today?  Have you chosen a path of disobedience?  After God revealed Himself to you have you walked in opposition to Him?  There are two ways to abate the anger of God:  repentance or judgment.  If we will repent and humble ourselves before God, His anger towards our sin is satisfied.  He will abundantly pardon and hold no grudge.  Or we can be as Achan who disobeyed God and stole plunder from Jericho.  God's anger will burn until justice is satisfied and it was only after the execution and burial of Achan that God's wrath subsided (Joshua 7:26).  Your life will decide if God is angry with you or not.  God is angry with the wicked every day, but He has provided the way of righteousness through the sacrifice of His precious only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.  Psalm 2:12 affirms, "Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish in the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little.  Blessed are all those who put their trust in Him."