Good & Angry by David Powlison

Good & Angry by David Powlison ISBN-13: 9781942572978 Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: New Growth Press Released: Sept. 12, 2016

Source: Review copy from the publisher.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Anger is our complex human response to things we perceive as wrong in a complex world, thus we must learn how to fruitfully and honestly deal with it. Powlison undertakes an in-depth exploration of the roots of anger, moral judgment, and righteous response by looking in a surprising place: God’s own anger.

Powlison reminds us that God gets angry too. He sees things in this world that aren’t right and he wants justice too. But God’s anger doesn’t devolve into manipulation or trying to control others to get his own way. Instead his anger is good and redemptive. It causes him to step into our world to make wrongs right, sending his own Son to die so that we can be reconciled. He is both our model for change and our power to change.

Good and Angry sets readers on a path toward a faithful and fruitful expression of anger, in which we return good for evil and redeem wrongs. Powlison offers practical help for people who struggle with irritation, complaining, or bitterness and gives guidance for how to respond constructively when life goes wrong.


My Review:
Good & Angry provides an in-depth look at anger and what the Bible says about it. The author described what anger is at its core and how anger can so easily go wrong. He also looks at good anger--anger which leads to righting of true wrongs and injustice. He did an excellent job of examining how to do "good anger" with God as our perfect example and by looking at what Scripture says.

The author also looked at how we can deal with anger gone wrong by asking ourselves several questions about the situation. He gave example situations and showed how to work through the questions. He looked at both serious causes and small annoyances that provoke anger as well as anger at yourself and anger against God. Overall, I'd recommend this book to every Christian, but especially those in positions of leadership.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.