Imitating God

Ephesians 4:25-5:2

Some friends invited me over for dinner Friday night. I brought an appetizer of scallops in a white wine and mushroom cream sauce and my friend threw some steaks and salmon on the grill. It was delicious. As I was leaving, they offered me the leftover salmon to take home. I obliged. I set the container in my passenger seat and put it in my fridge when I got home. The next morning when I opened my car. Woof! I noticed a congealed puddle in the passenger seat where some of the juices and oils from the leftover fish must’ve spilled out of the dish in which I took it home. My car stinks. As I was driving to work this morning it struck me that this might be a good introduction for today’s Scripture lesson to help us understand why Paul talks about a ”sacrificial offering that smells sweet to God.”

You see, sin stinks. Literally. Or so the ancient Israelites believed. They believed that when they sinned against God or one another, those actions actually spilled over into the “passenger seat” of their community: which, for the community of the people of God, is God’s seat. Sin makes God angry. Interestingly enough, in the Hebrew language the phrase which means, “to be angry” or “to let one’s wrath burn” literally translates: “to let one’s nose burn.” Anger and the nose are closely linked. And sin upsets God’s nose. So to appease God’s anger against their sins, the people would send pleasant aromas up to God. In order to atone for their sins, the Israelites practiced sacrifices in which the blood was used to cleanse the interior of the temple, and the meat and fat of the animal was burned on an altar outside so that the smoke would rise up to God and be a pleasant odor in God’s nose. If you’ve ever been to a barbecue, you know the pleasant odor we’re talking about here.

So to say that Jesus was “a sacrificial offering that smelled sweet to God,” is coming from an understanding of sacrifice as a means of combatting the stench of sin and the anger it produces. God does not want to be angry with us, God does not want to smell our sin. We are to imitate God, to follow the example of Christ, to live sweet smelling lives, and to stop acting in such stinky ways.

“Therefore, imitate God.” Anytime you see the word “therefore,” you’ve got to go back and look at what came before it. In this case it’s a whole paragraph on telling the truth, managing anger, working for good, and speaking with kindness so that we build up our neighbors and our communities. One of the phrases in this paragraph has become proverbial, “Be angry but do not sin; never let the sun set on your anger.”

This translation misses a nuance of the Greek language. We’re not being commanded to be angry, we’re being told how to condition our anger, should it arise. A better translation requires a few more words: “You might get angry, sometimes you can’t help it; but don’t let that be an excuse to sin.” What this means, says Ralph Martin, is that “anger should not become an obsession and nursed to the point of resulting in a fixation.”[1]

I feel like that’s all that anger is these days, however, an excuse to speak and behave in ugly and atrocious ways against others. The way we manage our anger and frustration is largely displayed by our words; and how we speak to one another conditions how we behave towards one another. Allowing the “sun to set on our anger” is another way of saying, “letting your anger fester and boil.” If we allow the “sun to set on our anger,” if we turn a blind eye to the anger we feel, we are allowing it free range of our subconscious minds, the dark place where thoughts build words, and make plans, and plot revenge. The same focusing practices of breathing, prayer, and meditation that we talked about being helpful for calming stress and anxiety also help us to be mindful of our anger as it rises within us and can enable us to catch words and actions as they form in our thoughts rather than allowing the words of our mouths and the works of our hands to imitate the deep seeded anger we have allowed to fester and grow in the dark, sunless corners of our minds.

“Imitating God” means the Word of God governs our thought, speech, and action. This might require bringing our darkest thoughts into the light: it’s hard to “put aside bitterness, anger, and every other evil” if we don’t acknowledge their existence. Which leads me to ask the question, why wouldn’t we want to put these things aside, why does it seem like so many people relish being angry, and bitter, and cruel? Alex Lickerman, M.D., suggests these four main reasons for why people get angry:

1. To harm oneself. Being depressed often results in anger directed at oneself for feeling and being powerless, and represents a wish for self-destruction.

2. To achieve control. Whether arising from paralyzing fear or merely irritation that things are going differently than we want, anger is often used to intimidate in order to manipulate.

3. To feel powerful. If we feel small, getting others to feel smaller makes us feel in comparison big.

4. To fight injustice. Righteous indignation coming from a person's moral center, outrage at an inequity being committed against oneself or others.[2]

I’m struck by those middle two: we allow ourselves to express anger as a way of intimidating and manipulating others so that we can get our way, and feel powerful and important. Do I need to give an example of this? I feel like there are too many to list. Anger and intimidation and manipulation seems to be the “popular” way of doing diplomacy, practicing politics, proving our points. It reminds me of a line from the Dr. Seuss-style sermon I preached a few months ago: “We live in a world that views power and might/ As grounds for deciding who’s wrong and who’s right./ We use volume to shout what we think loud and clear./ But all of this volume makes truth hard to hear.” There is very little civil discourse any more, and very little listening. It stinks.

...Just like my car. I stopped by the store to grab a foaming upholstery cleaner, because I had to do something about that smell. I wiped the mess off the seat, but I needed something that would penetrate the fabric and pull the smell out of the foam underneath. Our world has to do something about the root cause of our “smell”, too.

Dr. Lickerman offers these suggestions for getting at the root causes of anger:

1. Anger aimed at harming oneself. Depression is almost certainly the cause and should be identified and treated.

2. Anger aimed at achieving control. Ask yourself why you feel out of control. Fear is a common reason. Actually lacking control is another. Anger is, fortunately or unfortunately, often a good strategy to regain control in the short-term, and easier to feel than many of the emotions that trigger it. But as it ultimately remains an expression of our unfulfilled need to control (if we actually had control, we wouldn't get angry), far better to identify a means to actually provide us real control rather than the illusion of it. When such control isn't possible, a next best option is to fully recognize what feelings being out of control leads to first, before anger: fear and uncertainty. If we can identify these feelings each time they arise, we at least have a chance to deal more constructively with them—or at least more consciously.

3. Anger aimed to make us feel powerful. Control isn't exactly the issue here. It's more that we feel small and insecure and have stumbled upon anger as an effective means to feel bigger than those around us. Recognizing this is what's going on empowers us again to interrupt the generation of anger and instead to deal with the feelings of insecurity. Anger that arises from insecurity is particularly efficient at destroying intimate relationships.

4. Anger at injustice. How best to discharge this anger? Take action to correct the injustice, whether committed against yourself or someone else.[3]

Paul offers this suggestion for dealing with the root causes of anger: “Imitate God.”

I am reminded of CBS news anchor, Dan Rather, who once conducted an interview with Mother Theresa in which he asked her what she said to God when she prayed. She answered, “Nothing, I listen.” So Dan turned the question and asked, “So what does God say, then?” Mother Theresa smiled with confidence and answered, “Nothing, he listens, too.”

I won’t name names, but there was another news anchor who was famous for bringing guests on his show only to interrupt them mid-thought to shout at, and belittle, and berate, and insult them on live television. He was well known for his raging temper and his ability to shut down and intimidate his opposition. He used anger to manipulate and intimidate and he was well-liked for it by his viewers. No one lauded him for his ability to listen.

People take delight in watching those who shout to shut down conversations. We celebrate those who imitate anger. But we are called to “imitate God.” How might Mother Theresa’s insight help us do this? What would it take to make listening a laudable characteristic? What if rather than letting the sun set on our anger, we let God’s light shine on it? Friends, may you live your life with love, following the example of Christ, who loved us and gave his life for us. May you smell sweet to God. Amen.

[1] Martin, Ralph. “Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon” from Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching. 1991, John Knox Press. Louisville, KY. P 61

[2] Lickerman, Alex. “Dealing with Anger.” From Psychology Today. (Online, accessed Aug 18, 2018) <https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/happiness-in-world/201311/dealing-anger>

[3] Ibid.