Again the prophet Micah reminds us, as all the prophets do, that God is merciful.
Even though we can't seem to get it right, even though we continue to disappoint, God's love never fails. God steadfastly shows compassion and forgiveness to God's people.
Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of your possession? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in showing clemency.
I don't know about you, but I have a habit of holding onto anger. Not only my anger toward others, but also my anger toward myself. There is something about anger that we humans seem to enjoy.....how strange.
We do think of it as a negative emotion---and it is a "darkness" rather than a "light" because it destroys rather than gives life. But, if we are honest with ourselves, we tend to feed it instead of squelch it. I wonder if it has something to do with the need to be right, and our anger is usually toward someone we feel has "wronged" us, so to hold our anger is to continue to lift ourselves up as the one who is right....or at least "in the right."
Prayer opens up the window for God's grace to pour in. And when we are angry, grace is exactly what is needed. Letting go of anger is not about someone deserving it. Letting go of anger is about releasing ourselves from the prison that anger puts us in----the destructive cycle of being the victim in order to justify our behavior and reactions to the one who has hurt us.
What might change in our lives if we asked the Holy Spirit to transform our hearts so that we delight in clemency rather than "being in the right?"
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