Rooted in the Wrong Place
“But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment” - Matthew 5:22
Jesus had a way of taking the obvious and flipping it. Everyone knew murder was wrong. Nobody argued that. But when He said, “You have heard it said… but I tell you,” He shifted the conversation from what we do with our hands to what we allow in our hearts. He was not just raising the standard. He was uncovering the root. And the root of murder, He said, is anger.
Now, to be clear, not all anger is sinful. Paul wrote, “Be angry and do not sin,” which tells us that righteous anger is a real thing. We see it in Jesus when He overturned tables in the temple. That kind of anger comes from a holy place. It aligns with God's heart and responds to real injustice. If something makes God angry, it should probably bother us, too. Things like abuse, injustice, or the exploitation of the weak.
But righteous anger is not the problem Jesus is warning us about here. He’s talking about the kind of anger that gets rooted in pride and offense. The kind that simmers, spreads, and grows toxic over time. You know the kind. It holds grudges, stirs up division, and eventually turns into malice, slander, or hate. That is when anger moves from something you feel to something that shapes how you live.
When that happens, we no longer control our anger; it controls us. And before we even realize it, our attitude starts writing checks our actions were never supposed to cash. The danger isn't just the visible outburst. It's the silent build-up. That’s where Jesus wants to deal with it. Not just at the surface, but at the root.
The point is not that all anger is wrong. The point is that all anger needs to be checked. If you feel it rising, take it to God before it takes you somewhere you never meant to go. Because, according to Jesus, the real threat of murder doesn’t start in the moment. It starts in the heart.
Jesus had a way of taking the obvious and flipping it. Everyone knew murder was wrong. Nobody argued that. But when He said, “You have heard it said… but I tell you,” He shifted the conversation from what we do with our hands to what we allow in our hearts. He was not just raising the standard. He was uncovering the root. And the root of murder, He said, is anger.
Now, to be clear, not all anger is sinful. Paul wrote, “Be angry and do not sin,” which tells us that righteous anger is a real thing. We see it in Jesus when He overturned tables in the temple. That kind of anger comes from a holy place. It aligns with God's heart and responds to real injustice. If something makes God angry, it should probably bother us, too. Things like abuse, injustice, or the exploitation of the weak.
But righteous anger is not the problem Jesus is warning us about here. He’s talking about the kind of anger that gets rooted in pride and offense. The kind that simmers, spreads, and grows toxic over time. You know the kind. It holds grudges, stirs up division, and eventually turns into malice, slander, or hate. That is when anger moves from something you feel to something that shapes how you live.
When that happens, we no longer control our anger; it controls us. And before we even realize it, our attitude starts writing checks our actions were never supposed to cash. The danger isn't just the visible outburst. It's the silent build-up. That’s where Jesus wants to deal with it. Not just at the surface, but at the root.
The point is not that all anger is wrong. The point is that all anger needs to be checked. If you feel it rising, take it to God before it takes you somewhere you never meant to go. Because, according to Jesus, the real threat of murder doesn’t start in the moment. It starts in the heart.
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