The Quickest to Anger Are Often the Slowest to Forgive
Understanding Forgiveness
The biblical concept of forgiveness is so rich and multifaceted that there are a million aspects of the doctrine we could spend years pondering and trying to fully understand. Likewise, if we are talking about forgiveness as it relates to one person forgiving another person, the spectrum on which the need for forgiveness falls is vast. Some of us are struggling to forgive something harsh said to us—others of us have suffered horrific abuse and are trying to figure out what forgiveness even looks like and where to begin.
What we'll reflect on here relates primarily to the former: those of us who are having a hard time forgiving someone who has misunderstood or misrepresented us, who holds a different view theologically or politically than we do—or who frankly just gets on our nerves. Psalm 103 helps us navigate such situations by revealing key attributes that characterize God, and that by extension, should be true of those who bear his name. These characteristics help us by putting our frustrations and disappointments—our need to forgive— in perspective.
ESV Prayer Journal
Erika Allen
ESV Prayer Journals guide your study of forgiveness over 6 weeks and create space for writing and prayer—turning your quiet time into a meditation on God’s Word.
Psalm 103:8 uses a refrain found throughout the Old Testament to teach us what God is like:
The Lord is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
Throughout the Bible we are told that the Lord is “slow to anger.” We sin and rebel and disobey like petulant children, and yet God’s steadfast love holds us tight. He isn’t perpetually angry with or irritated by us, even though he has every reason and right to be.
But if there is any phrase that does not describe the world we live in—or our own natural, response to offenses—“slow to anger” is it. Left by ourselves, every minor slight is more offensive than it truly is. We get mad fast and our anger lingers. When someone upsets us, we want an apology, and we want it yesterday.
Forgiveness and being “slow to anger” are closely related. The truth is, we would have less to forgive if we weren’t so quick to get irritated. Anger clouds our thoughts and makes us believe that things are true even when they aren’t. Ecclesiastes 7:9 warns us to:
Be not quick in your spirit to become angry,
for anger lodges in the heart of fools.
Misplaced or Unjustified Anger
Misplaced or unjustified anger makes us think and act irrationally. In fact, sin is so devious it can even trick us into thinking we are due forgiveness, when in reality we should be seeking it.
People who are quick to get angry tend to also be people who are slow to forgive. This is one reason the Bible emphasizes the link between anger and forgiveness. God’s word exhorts us not to cling to offenses, but rather to overlook them in love:
Good sense makes one slow to anger,
and it is his glory to overlook an offense. (Prov. 19:11)Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. (1 Pet. 4:8)
Nehemiah 9:17 also connects the dots for us concerning the relationship between forgiveness and anger:
They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them.
If you go back and read the Old Testament, you’ll notice quickly that Israel found some really creative ways to be utterly disobedient and wildly rebellious. Our jaws drop at their actions, but in truth, the people of God today are exactly like Israel: prone to wander. And today, just like back then, God remains “a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” He will not forsake us any more than he would them. Indeed, how much less likely is that the case, now that he has sent his Son, Jesus, to pay the penalty for our sin!
Dependent on God’s Grace
Turning back to Psalm 103, verses 13–14 tell us that:
As a father shows compassion to his children,
so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.
For he knows our frame;
he remembers that we are dust.
What a gift it is that God actively keeps in mind our frailty. He doesn’t hold it over our heads or get exasperated with us. Rather, the fact that he understands our brokenness compels him to show us kindness and compassion. We would all be in big trouble if that weren’t the case, because none of us can go very long without blowing it in one way or another.
Praying Scripture back to God is an excellent, Christ-centered way to guide our prayers.
It is the realization that we are all utterly dependent on God’s grace, or the fact that “he does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities” (Ps. 103:10), that should motivate us to extend grace, mercy, compassion, and forgiveness to others. It should motivate us to be slow to get angry at one another, because we recognize we are all in the same boat. Such an understanding helps us be slow to anger because it enables us to know that whatever mistake the other person made, we ourselves might easily make it an hour from now. Humility and empathy aid us greatly in our quest to be characterized by forgiveness and grace rather than anger.
Forgiveness is a difficult doctrine, both to understand and to practice. There will, unfortunately, be situations in all our lives that will require us to extend extraordinary forgiveness to another person. And when those times come, the Lord will be near to help us process our pain and grief, and his Spirit will gently and faithfully get us to a place where we can forgive. But there will also be many instances where forgiveness shouldn’t be an issue, because we shouldn’t have been offended in the first place. The problem will be on our end, not theirs.
As you pray for God to help you grow in the area of forgiveness, also pray that he will increasingly transform you into someone who, like him, is slow to anger. Praying Scripture back to God is an excellent, Christ-centered way to guide our prayers—especially when we feel like we don’t know what to say! Two verses that are particularly helpful as we talk to God about forgiveness are found in the books of Luke and James:
But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:35–36)
Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. (James 1:19–20)
May God help all of us, his people, be transformed so that we are slow to anger and quick to forgive.
Erika Allen is the author of ESV Prayer Journal: 30 Days on Forgiveness.
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