Outrageous.

If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention. Or so the saying goes. In a season in which our country, our churches, even family gatherings are marked by division, a common experience binds us together. Outrage.

It’s all the rage, reaching from our most powerful politicians to daily interactions at a traffic stop. I’m wrestling with my own delight in righteous indignation, feeling somewhat powerless over my reactions when I read the news or hear what other folks have to say or see offending bumper stickers. Are others having the same struggle?

I find myself wondering what kind of outrage the author of Psalm 37 was feeling. We heard a portion of that psalm yesterday in church (reprinted above). As preachers often preach to themselves, I find myself thinking about what made the psalmist warn against fretting over evildoers. What led him to say: Leave rage alone. It leads only to evil?

As violence begets violence, the human condition is such that outrage often begets outrage. How do we break that cycle? It’s what Dr. Martin Luther King learned from Mahatma Gandhi about the power of non-violence. Neither of them retreated from the pursuit of justice. But when faced with outrageous acts of violence, they did not respond in kind. They found another way.

A favorite read is The Book of Joy, which describes a week long visit between Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama. Both men knew the cruelty of political systems. They each had plenty of reason for outrage. But that did not stop them from living life with irrepressible joy. John Lewis, who had his skull bashed in during the Civil Rights Movement, spent his whole life pursuing those rights. But those efforts never seemed hateful. He said: “Never give up. Never give in. Never get hostile. Hate is too big a burden to bear.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer, well within his rights to be outraged, said that discipleship is joy. He said: “The joy of God has gone through the poverty of the manger and the agony of the cross. That is why it is invincible and irrefutable.” As Jesus said to his disciples in an extensive teaching on the night before his torture and execution: ^“I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”(John 15.11)

No doubt about it. Righteous outrage, righteous indignation is delicious. It can be addictive. But as the psalmist notes, we are called in the mystery of our faith to leave rage alone. To be still and trust God. To do good. To commit our way to God, who promises to give the desires of our hearts.

That does not mean that we approach injustices of our world with indifference or complacency. There is good work to be done, good trouble to get into. The folks I’ve cited this morning showed us how to respond for the good of neighbors. They showed us how to make a difference. But they never gave up on love in their hearts. That is a particular challenge for the Christian community, for those who seek to be Jesus followers. Rowan Williams said it this way: “The one thing you know for certain about your tiresome, annoying, disobedient, disedifying fellow Christians is that God has welcomed them. That becomes your challenge.”

I’m pretty certain that if I’d been asked to write Psalm 37, it would have come out differently. I probably would have given sanction to lots of outrage, as long as it aligned with my opinions. Thanks be to God, I never got that request. Instead, I join anyone who reads this psalm in the challenge of breaking the cycle of outrage, which may mean breaking the cycle of violence. Jesus helps us do that. Jesus showed us the way to do that. It is the way of love. “Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 7)

So if you’re feeling outrage this week (and there’s all kinds of reasons to feel that way), hear, read, learn, and inwardly digest Psalm 37. See what it has to say to you.

-Jay Sidebotham

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