Anger

DEVOTION

THE BOOK OF ACTS

ANGER

Acts 18:14-17

14 Just as Paul was about to speak, Gallio said to the Jews, "If you Jews were making a complaint about some misdemeanor or serious crime, it would be reasonable for me to listen to you. 15 But since it involves questions about words and names and your own law — settle the matter yourselves. I will not be a judge of such things." 16 So he had them ejected from the court. 17 Then they all turned on Sosthenes the synagogue ruler and beat him in front of the court. But Gallio showed no concern whatever.

NIV

A strange situation is at hand here and it seems to make little sense as to why the Jews would beat their own synagogue ruler because the Roman governor would not rule over their complaint. However it does make sense that he would not rule over such a complaint as Rome gave both Jews and Greeks religious freedom and did not meddle in their faiths. Now we just saw a man named Crispus who was the synagogue ruler become a believer, so this Sosthesnes must have been his replacement. We know nothing else about him other than he was beaten in angry rage by the Jews. Did he too become a believer? Was it because he presented such a weak case before Gallio that it was thrown out? We really do not know, but we know is that the Jews were so angry because they did not get their way, they had to beat someone. Here is where we could get our life lesson. If we are so concerned with getting our own way that we end up beating someone because we did not get our way we are in deep trouble spiritually. Now of course we do not physically beat people because they hamper us from getting our way, but we certainly can beat them verbally, emotionally or even spiritually. When things are not going the way we think they should or according to how we would want them to, we can have two responses. One is to adjust and the other is to lash out. We can lash out verbally, openly opposing what is happening we do not like, or we can withdraw emotionally or spiritually from the situation, becoming distant, not getting involved because we are not getting our way, things are not going the way we think they should. Either case we are in some sense beating on them in anger. What those Jews , who professed to live by the law, did not realize was they were sinner in their anger, thus breaking the very law they were professing. We must make sure we do not allow anger to cause us to sin. We must make sure we are not so self-centered that we become upset or angry about things that do not go the way we want them to. We need to be able to adjust, remain objective, see the spiritual truths and move forward for the kingdom of God.