Being tested is pretty much part of life. We all know about life`s formal tests which start in earnest when we begin school. I will always remember, as a student at university, the charged atmosphere -charged with anticipation and apprehension- as several hundred students nervously awaited the doors to open into the huge university gymnasium where we would sit for final a exam.

We also know of the other kind of tests in life. Tests which aren`t over in a couple of hours but rather tests which go on day after day, year in and year out: our place with a family, our workplace performance, the trials of ill health, and the increasing demands upon us as we enter adult life.

As Christian believers we face tests all the time. Since we no longer have the inquisition or can be prosecuted, as in former ages, for failing some state or church imposed religious conformity, the tests of faith are largely self-imposed. In our attempts to be faithful to what we believe and to walk the Way of Christ with integrity, we are constantly testing ourselves. This is normal and usually appropriate.

But sometimes the testing is just too much. Today`s bible readings are about this kind of testing and about the anger which we often feel about such testing. They are about testing that seems unreasonable, testing in which the odds are stacked against us and we are certain to fail.

For Christians, the classic examples of testing are especially focussed on three people: Abraham, Job, and Jesus.

Abraham`s loyalty to God is tested when he hears God asking him to murder his own son, Isaac. Abraham hears God saying to him, "The ultimate test of your love for me, Abraham, is whether or not you will sacrifice the one thing that is most important to you". This test is really asking Abraham to answer this question, "Abraham do you truly ( love, fear, trust, obey) God?". Furthermore, in the Abraham and Sarah saga, the survival of Isaac is also the survival of God`s promise to make of their descendants a great nation which will be a light to the nations. If Isaac dies, how will God fulfil the promise?

This question is picked up in later biblical literature in the Book of Job.

"Job will you still love God when everything you have is taken from you? Will you still love God when you lose your family, your wealth, your reputation, and your health?"

Or, one might say God is asking the question "Job, do you love me just for me, or do you love me for some kind of reward?"

And, of course, this question is also put to Jesus during his temptations in the desert and at the time of his crucifixion, "Jesus, do you really love God?" "Jesus, do you trust God enough to offer up your own life for a purpose that you do not really understand?"

The stories of these three biblical figures fascinate us as believers, because we know that this question is the ultimate test of our own faith as well. We recognize that the struggle of their lives is the paradigm of the human-divine relationship, the very crux of the matter faced by every believer. And, in fact, it is the question at the heart of every loving relationship when we ask, "Does he love me , does she love me, just for me, or am I just a means to some other more important end?"

Do I really love God or am I here this morning for some other reasons? Is there even one among us who can truthfully say this morning, "Yes, I love God and I am not here for some other reason" In truth, would we not all say, "Yes, I am here for all sorts of good reasons and one of them is because I love God." Would we not like to say, "I am here this morning to love you, and my neighbour and to be loved back?" Sounds like a perfectly respectable answer.

Most of us probably cannot even separate out love of God from our own self-interest. Most of us are never tested in such as way as to have to answer this great question.

Abraham, Job and Jesus were tested in this way as were most of the great heroes, saints and martyrs of our faith.

In fact, this kind of testing makes us mad. Well, it makes me mad, in any case. In my heart I rebel and say to God or anyone else, "How dare you ask me such a question" or I say, "What do you take me for, some kind of religious fanatic- and what good has ever come of religious fanaticism?"

We say, "After all God is a reasonable sort, God is my friend, God is merciful and compassionate, God doesn`t require this of me. Furthermore, God is just and would never require of me more than I can handle."

The fact is, God is all of these things. But God, according to the bible, is also the God of Abraham, and Job and Jesus. God is demanding and uncompromising and harsh. Quite frankly, this aspect of God I don`t much like. I prefer a God who does not ask too much. I prefer a God who comes rushing to my side immediately when I call in distress, like a mother to her whining child, with comfort, with an answer to a vexing question.

And so I can join my voice with that of the author of psalm 13 who is heard to cry down through the ages, "How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?"

Anger, slow smouldering anger or seething erupting anger, often results when we are tested in ways we dislike and especially in ways that we do not understand. The cry of lament to God, the cry of anger against God is found often in the bible, especially in the Book of Psalms and in the books of the prophets. Jesus himself, just before he dies, cries out in anguish, quoting from the psalms when he cries, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

We can hear in that cry that of our own angry children who have been heard to say, "Mommy, I hate you" or "Daddy, I wish you were dead". If the truth be told, the only people who have never been angry at God are atheists. Anyone who has any level of trust in God must experience anger against God. "God, how could you permit this? God why don`t you prevent this? God, what possible sense can there be in the death of my spouse, or child, or parent? Guilt too, is often tied up with our anger, "God, why didn`t you take me instead, I deserve to be punished or put to death more than they."

So then, is anger against god wrong? For a believer, anger against God when we are hurt and questioning is not only to be expected but quite possibly as it should be. After all, any relationship of importance is bound to produce moments of anger. They produce anger because we have expectations of such relationships. The deeper our relationship the greater our expectations. The more intimate our relationship the more intense are our feelings of betrayal. When our expectations are not met in such relationships we get angry. Surely anger against God is only if we allow it to become destructive of ourselves or others.

One of the programs offered these days to prisoners in Canadian jails is called anger management. As many of you know we have developed a ministry here at St John`s called Circles of Support and Accountability ( or COSA) by which trained volunteers work with prisoners released from prison. In most cases, such persons have a lot of anger issues. Their anger issues may very well be at the root of what caused them to offend, but if not, spending time in jail will surely give them anger issues.

Several of the men who participate in these Circles of Support and Accountability have spoken to circle members about the importance of the anger management program they worked out for themselves. Often, uncontrolled anger is at the heart of the prisoners offense cycle, or at the root of self-destructive behaviours like drug addiction which often leads to run ins with the law.

Denying anger is never a solution. Acknowledging anger is the place to start. For the believer, acknowledging one`s anger to God and against God is the first step. St Paul counsels us this morning when he says, "Do not let sin exercise dominion over your mortal bodies" (Roman 6:12). Without distorting St Paul's meaning we could just as easily read this phrase as "do not let anger exercise dominion over your mortal bodies."Anger which we allow to become destructive is precisely one of the forms of sin of which St Paul speaks in this text.

St Paul warns us against allowing ourselves to becomes slaves. Are you a slave to your anger? Are others enslaved by your anger? Paul concludes, "For the wages of sin (destructive anger) is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23)

One of the reasons why we are often so angry at God is because God, for most of us, represents the way things should be. God represents peace, harmony, justice, and mercy and when any of these elements is threatened in our lives we want God to tells us why. But anger plays an important role in God's providence. St Augustine once said, "Hope has two beautiful daughters-anger and courage." Creative anger if of God. Creative anger works for amendment of life and for justice. Without it would things ever change?

So I believe that every Christian should have an anger management program in place. And turning to God should be the first step in your anger management program. Depending on your issues, there may be several other steps which you will need to take, but the first step for a Christian is to acknowledge to God that you are struggling with anger.

Let us be like our forebears in the faith and allow ourselves to be creatively angry. Express your anger toward God when you are in the midst of some kind of testing that you find intolerable or incomprehensible. Express it in the privacy of your prayers or in the presence of another person. It may very well help you to clarify just why it is you feel so angry. I cannot guarantee you that your anger will get any immediate results. We well know, as parents, that it is unwise to rush to placate a child having a tantrum. What we want immediately is not necessarily what we should have. We may first need to learn patience and to reach a certain level of responsibility before it is appropriate that we receive some things.

Some day you may even be able to see the blessing in your anger. Some day you may see that anger as the catalyst which opened to you a period of personal growth and creative inter-action with others. May it be so!