Impotent anger

What makes you angry? Getting cut off in traffic? Ordering blueberry pie at a café famous for blueberry pie, only to be told they ran out? Hearing that your congressman backed off voting for a bill that bans abortions after 20 weeks, even though he promised his support?

Or how about this: Last January, President Obama agreed to a personal meeting with Naghmeh Abedini, wife of Iranian-born pastor Saeed Abedini who has been imprisoned in Iran for nearly three years, even though he is a naturalized American citizen. Obama met with Naghmeh and her children for about 10 minutes, and to them he appeared warm, caring, and sincere. Securing Saeed’s release, the president said, was a “top priority” for him and his secretary of state. Naghmeh reported that she was much encouraged by the meeting, and everyone who read of it was touched by 7-year-old Jacob Abedini’s request that the president “bring Daddy home for my birthday,” which was March 17. Obama promised to “try very hard.”

Early last week, though, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told the press the president would veto any bill giving Congress a say in a nuclear deal with Iran, if the release of imprisoned U.S. citizens is made a condition in the agreement. Obama later backed off the veto threat, but apparently the freedom of American prisoners is not and has never been on the table in negotiations with Iran. This doesn’t look like an attempt to “try very hard.”

If you’re not a particular fan of the president to begin with, this news might make you angry. And there’s a place for anger. Last month, for instance, the U.S. State Department denied an entrance visa to Sister Diana Momeka, an Iraqi nun forced to flee her hometown when ISIS took over. She was invited to come to the United States and be a witness to the persecution she has experienced, in hopes of stirring up some action in Washington. The State Department granted other Iraqi ethnic and Muslim minorities a visa, but denied it to the only Christian. Once the story got a hearing in conservative news outlets, the hue and cry pressured the State Department to reverse itself and give Sister Diana her visa. Outrage lit the fuse, without which there would have been no reversal.

So far, though, outrage has not helped Saeed Abedini. After sharing news of the veto threat on Facebook back on April 29, Naghmeh Abedini wrote, “At first I was heartbroken over this news, but immediately I remembered that God is in control and that I have been praying that no one except GOD would get the credit for Saeed’s release.”

I’ll bet she was angry as well as heartbroken. Who wouldn’t be? And yet, “the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God” (James 1:20, ESV). Even in a righteous cause, anger is too quickly diverted to personal animosity. I don’t know what’s going on with the president, or why he seems indifferent to the plight of many Christians. My duty is not to rage at him but pray for everyone involved: the Abedini family, Saeed Abedini’s judges and guards, the president of the United States and those who have his ear. Pray first, then sign petitions and call congressmen. God is in control means that much more is going on here than meets the eye. If I have the energy to seethe, but not to pray, my outrage counts for nothing.