The Problem of Anger, Part 1

Tonight we want to discuss with you the problem of anger And I want to begin our time by referencing 1 Corinthians 13, verse Number 4 Because in 1 Corinthians:, it tells us about the love of God It tells us that the love is patient and the love Is kind The definite article is before those two words, love, in 1 Corinthians 13:4 to show us about the kind of love that characterizes God If you want to know about the love of God, you realize that the love, that is God's love, is patient, and God's love is Kind

Paul begins to describe to us the characteristics of the love of God by giving us two positive qualities and then giving us eight negative qualities, what God's love is not But it begins with those two positive ones by telling us that God's love, first of all, is patience, that macroth, that long-suffering kind of love That is, it endures with people Different than the word hupo-mone, which deals with long-suffering in terms of circumstances This one deals with bearing up under pressure, that is, the pressure of people And that is being long fused with people And the love of God is that way

In fact, the love of God is described in such a way that when it has the power to avenge itself, it chooses not to That describes the love of God The flip side of that is the love of God is kind Because it's long fused, it is going to return goodness to you instead of badness To you That is, the flip side of long is the fact that God is going to deal with you in a kind manner In fact, in Matthew chapter 11, when Christ says, Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and gentle, and he says that my yoke is easy It's not harsh It's not bitter, but it's good And that's the way God is

And so when we understand our relationships to one another And we're going to follow the love of God, we must realize that the major characteristics of those love relationships fall into two categories: patience And kind And then what Paul does is talk about the eight negative characteristics And one of those I want to point out to you in terms of our discussion Our topic this evening, and that's down in verse number five when it says that love is not provoked or easily provoked God's love is not easily angered When we say we love someone, it doesn't have that smoldering, bitter resentment

That begins to well up inside, you know, in a marriage relationship Sometimes we let things begin to smolder, we let things begin to take root And that's why the writer of Hebrews says in Hebrews 12: that there is not to let Any root of bitterness well up within you because if it does, it will defile many people And that's the anger that's talked about in 1 Corinthians: That deals with that smoldering resentment In other words, love because of its kindness and because of its patience Is not going to be easily angered with someone else that they wish to demonstrate love to

And yet you'll find that in our marriages, in our families, the people we lash out the most to are the ones that are closest to us Right? The ones we throw pots and pans at are not our neighbors, but our wives, our husbands, and our kids, our dogs, our cats We tend to lash out in anger with those closest to us But yet, if we're going to express the love of God, then that characteristic should not be a part of us because the love of God is patient and the love of God is kind And if we are going to exemplify that love in those relationships, We cannot afford to be easily provoked

Christ would talk about that over in Matthew chapter 5 If you got your Bible, turn there with me, if you would, please, on that Serm on the Mount He said in verse number 21: you have heard That the ancients were told, you shall not commit murder, and whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother Shall be guilty before the court, and whoever shall say to his brother Rak shall be guilty before the Supreme Court, and whoever shall say, You fool, shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell

Christ in his Serm on the Mount talks about the internal righteousness of man The Pharisees were into the externals, and Christ was into the inter And he says in verse number 20 that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, then you can't have any part in the kingdom of God And then he says this, and let me illustrate it this way for you You have heard that it was said by the ancients of old, you shall not murder Well, we know we're not to kill anybody

And all the scribes and Pharisees would realize, of course, we don't go around stabbing our brother, hanging our brother, killing our brother We don't do those kinds of things And Christ says, listen The issue I want to talk to you about is on the inside of you, not the outside of you Because murder begins in the heart And therefore, he says, If you're angry with your brother, you are a murderer You are the one that's going to commit acts of murder Why? Because inside your heart Is what I'm concerned about

And when Christ came, he came to deal with the inner part of man, not the externals of man And so Christ would begin to deal with this from the outside And we would have to admit that there are many times in our lives we become very angry in our hearts towards someone else And Christ says, listen, if you are angry on the inside, that's that smoldering, bitter resentment towards someone That will ultimately manifest itself through what you say verbally to that person, that you might abuse that person with your words And Christ says, You're guilty Because of what's on the ins

Having said all that, I think it's important for us to understand what Solomon has to say in the book of Proverbs concerning our anger and how easily we are provoked And so we want to talk about anger's inducement That is, what causes us to become angry And then we want to look at anger's enlightenment That is, what does the Bible say about anger? When is it right? When is it wrong? And then we want to look at anger management

That is, how do I get this anger of mine under cont? A very practical lesson, a very important lesson for all of us, because none of us can say that we have cleansed ourselves from our sin None of us can say that we are not an angry person You ever talk to somebody and say, man, you're an angry person And they say, no, I'm not Why did ever give you that idea? And they begin to fly off the handle And we need to understand what the word of the Lord says So let me be just a little vulnerable with you this morning We just experienced the birth of our eighth child

All right? Before my wife conceived our eighth child, she came to me and said, Honey, I think it would be good for us to have one more child. I thought she was kidding with me because we thought A was the last child At least I thought A was the last child And we had had this discussion that he would be the last one And so I'm getting up in years You know, I'm not as young as I used to be And so I'm getting a little older And now that I've gotten out of diapers and things are a little bit free and easy in the house

Feeling a little bit better about where we're going with the kids and their growing up stage is a good thing She comes along and says, Hey, how about we have one more? I say, well, wait a minute. I'm done with the change and diaper thing. I'm done with the baby carriages. I'm done with all those things. I want to move on in life And I want to let you know, just to be completely honest with you, it wasn't a very pretty scene In our home that day And so this conversation between my wife and I would carry on for about a week

She'd come to me and say, You know, honey, what do you think about having another one? I said, I thought we talked about this four years ago We were done four years ago. I'm not having any more kids We're done, you know? And then she wouldn't say anything else And the next day, she'd say, you know, honey Have you ever thought a little bit more about another one? Thought? No, I haven't thought about another one We had this discussion four years ago It's over, it's done We're not talking about it anymore, you know? And then she said to me, she goes, just Just do me a favor

Just pray about it. I said, I don't have to pray about it. I know God's will for my life. I'm done She says, honey, just pray about it. I, okay, you not that one to, I'll pray about it. I didn class you like that. I said, okay, I'll pray about it That's really how I said it And So we begin to pray And say, you know, because I didn't want another child Let's be honest here Now, Avery can't understand what I'm saying tonight, so that's a good thing She'll listen to the tape one day, but I wanted no more But let me tell you something: I only wanted two children

Two, that's it. I grew up in a small family There was my sister, myself It seemed to work okay for us So when Lori and I got married, two kids, I thought, man, this is going to be great When we had Drew, it was over We had Alan We had Drew It done We're moving on, baby Now, eight, six more later, you know, I'm thinking, gee, what happened to me? But the bottom line is that I only wanted two We had more. I said, honey, I've given above and beyond what I wanted to do. I wanted two

We have seven. I've gone above and beyond five times over. I've given a little bit. I've sacrificed a little bit here. I'm done sacrificing And yet she said, just do me a favor and just ask the Lord what we should do And whatever you believe the Lord's telling you, that's what we'll do. I can't argue with that. I'm the pastor. I can't argue with that So I began to pray, ask the Lord for wisdom Lord, what does it you want me to do? I said, Lord, if you want me to have another child, you've got to change my heart Mean, change my heart

You need to work in my life to help me realize that this is something that is something you want us to do And you know what? Over the next week or so, God began to soften my heart He really did And all the time in our conversation, my wife never got angry with me My wife loves babies My wife loves children She loves our children Her life is committed to our children She doesn't do much in the church because she's committed to our children And she knows that that's her ministry And that she knows that she has to be committed to those kids 24- And that's her life That 's what she wants to do

And I began to realize that our children are what they are today, not because of my leadership, but because of her commitment to the Lord and her commitment to them And so the Lord began to do a work in my life, and I realized that if she has one more, that probably will be it because she's reaching that age that, you know The big 4-0, you know, she's getting close to that And so she realizes that this would be the last one And so the Lord changed my heart But the whole time, she never raised her voice She never got angry with me. I was the one getting angry. I was the one raising my voice

And I can be kind of intimidating every once in a while when I raise my voice And I can be a little boisterous every once in a while when I raise my voice And Can get people's attention every once in a while when I raise my voice Do you get the point? But the Lord began to work on my heart And of course, you know the end of the story Avery Shea was born yesterday, but the Lord did a great change

In terms of my relationship to my children, how I saw them, and what I should be doing as a father. I say all that because the interchange between Lor and I during this time taught me a lot about anger management Taught me a lot about anger's inducement as well as anger's enlightenment in terms of what God's word has to say about it So let me tell you some of the things that God has shown me, and hopefully they'll be a benefit to you, your family, your marriage, the relationships you encounter What causes us to get angry? Two things Let's look at it externally as well as internally

There are some externals that cause us to become angry Now, note this: it's because of what's on the inside That which is on the outside affects us as it does But let's talk about the externals first Over in Proverbs chapter 25, verse number 23, it says these words The North Wind brings forth rain and a back bit tongue and angry count What is it that causes me externally to become angry? That is, when someone slanders me, when someone criticizes me, when someone speaks against me That sometimes causes me to become angry, according to Proverbs chapter 25, verse number 23

Someone says something about me, and all of a sudden I say, Well, wait a minute, that's not true That's not right. I got to set it straight And isn't it true that when someone says something about you that's not right, you tend to make a B line to set it straight? That happens so many times, doesn't it? We got to make it right This is the false rumor It's not true It's not correct And I don't want people thinking wrongly of me when I didn't say that or I didn't do that Now, God condemns both the slanderer and the one who becomes angry because they were slandered

And we'll talk about slander in weeks ahead In fact, Psalm 101, verse number 5 says, That God will destroy the one who secretly slanders his brother And so we know that God is against that because the Diab, Satan, is the ultimate slanderer But a lot of times, when we are criticized, what happens is that we've been treated unjustly Someone says something about us that isn't right, and that develops in us an angry countenance We become infuriated because somebody said something about me that isn't true Now, think of Joseph in the Bible and all the things that were said of him that were not true

But you never read of Joseph becoming angry He becomes the perfect type of Christ in the Old Testament So you read 1 Peter chapter 2 What do you have? You have Christ that when he was reviled, he did not revile in return, but instead he committed himself to him who judges righteously The Lord Jesus kept committing himself to his father above who judges righteously And Peter then goes on to say in the fourth chapter of 1 Peter, 19th verse That when we suffer according to the will of God, we are to commit ourselves to our Creator by doing what is right

Peter says, We will do the same thing Jesus did When we suffer for what is right, when we are treated wrongly by those around us because of our stand for Christ We just need to commit ourselves to the one who judges righteously Instead of trying to set all the wrongs right, I mean, can you imagine if we had to set all the wrongs right about what people said about us? We'd never get anything done But if we commit ourselves to the one who judges righteously, let him handle it, then we can continue doing what God's called us to do

So, one of the externals is that people criticize us or condemn us or slander us And it develops an angry countenance Another one is this: Proverbs 3:11 Turn to Proverbs 3. 11 for a second. A verse that you know very well It's quoted in Hebrews chapter 12 My son, do not reject the discipline of the Lord Verse 11, chapter 3 Or loathe his reproof, or detest his reproof When you loathe something, when you detest something, you become very angry with it, you become very incensed against it And Solomon says, Do not reject the discipline of the Lord or hate his reproof

Become angry at the fact that God is reproving you For whom the Lord loves he reproves, even as a father, the son in whom he delights There are times where God chastises us, where God disciplines his children And Solomon's very clear: don't become angry at God because you're going through the discipline process But have you noticed that there are so many times we go through that discipline process that we become angry with God? That somehow God is not dealing with me properly That things are not happening in my life as I think they need to be happening

And I tend to reject and despise what God is doing to me And God is trying to conform me to His image God wants me to understand Him and to follow Him Now note, location, location, location Where a verse is found and how it's used is very important Because if you read the two verses preceding that, it says what? Honor the Lord from your wealth and from the first Of all your produce, so your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine Now, this is next week's sermon, but I want you to notice something

The Bible says you're to honor God with the first fruits of your possessions You honor God, He will honor you Your vats will overflow And then He goes right to verse 11 and says, By the way, Don't despise the discipline of the Lord Do you know that there are many people who are disciplined in their walk with the Lord because they are unwilling to give of the first fruits of their increase? And they don't even know it And one of the ways that God disciplines us is He keeps us in financial hardship And we don't understand why

And we just treat working more hours, trying to make more money, and we stop giving money to the Lord, and we stop honoring Him with the firstfruits of our increase Because we got to put milk on the table, we to put bread on the table, we got to pay the gas bill, the electric bill, the phone bill, we got to pay them all And there are so many expenses that we can't do anything except pay those expenses, and so God gets written off Because after all, he'll forgive us He's the God of grace He'll understand my financial predicament

Yet the Bible says you honor God with the firstfruits of your increase And then it says, right on the heels of that, listen Don't despise the discipline of the Lord Why? Because there are so many times that God decides to discipline his children because they won't follow the commands of God We become angry at him We don't have enough money Things aren't working We're in financial distress And the answer to that is Give more money to God The answer to your financial distress is always give more money to God The answer to your financial distress is not A second mortgage

The answer to your financial distress is not a bigger bank account, is not a pay raise, it's not more money The answer to your financial distress is always to give more money to God because of Proverbs 3, verses 9 and 10 And a lot of times God keeps us there We begin to despise the discipline of the Lord We become angry at God because financially we're not well off We become angry at God because we can't buy what we think we need and we're upset with God It causes us to become angry, doesn't it? God chastises us God disciplines us We have a hard time with that

Another external, over in Ephesians 6, verse number 12, you read about How we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities and powers of this air We wrestle with spiritual wickedness in dark places. I want to let you know something, that externally Satan baits you and he tempts you And the Bible says in the book of James, the third chapter, verse number 13, who among you is wise in understanding? Let him show by his good behavior. his deeds in the gentleness of wisdom

But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but it's earthly, natural, and demonic. I want to let you know something: that externally, Satan The ultimate slanderer That's what the Bible says Listen, Ephesians 4:2 Let not the sun go down upon your anger, lest you give opportunity to the devil When you go to bed tonight and you're angry with your spouse or you're angry with your kids, you've given opportunity to the devil in your family The Bible is very clear about this

Don't go to bed angry, deal with it before you go to bed Make sure you handle the problem before you go to sleep If you don't, the devil, the diab, the slanderer, has an opportunity in your life to make you become a slanderer, to make you become like him And so we need to realize the severity of not dealing with our anger See, we think that we can just sleep on it for a while If we sleep on it long enough, it'll go away. I got news for you It doesn't go away, it settles right here And as it settles right here, it becomes that root of bitterness

And Hebrews 12:15 speaks about the fact that it will defile many people once it becomes a bitter root in your life So, you need to deal with it because you give opportunity to the devil You see, Satan wants to tempt you, he wants to bait you He wants you to fly off the handle He wants you to blow your stack He wants you to just go bonkers See? And so we need to realize the external ways which cause us to become angry But internally, that's point number two, the fact that there are things happening on the inside of me

Mark 7 talks about it's not that which is on the outside that defiles a man, but that which is on the inside which defiles a man, right? Over in James chapter 4, verse number 1, James says, This: What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Why do you fight with one another? Why are you angry with one another? Is not the source? Your pleasures that wage war in your members You lust and do not have, so you commit murder And you're envious and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel You do not have because you do not ask

You see, James says, what's the problem? The problem is on the inside What's being caused by all these quarrels and fights among you is what's going on on the inside of your life It's not necessarily what's on the outside Because that which is on the outside only triggers what's already going on on the inside And so you've got to know what's going on on the inside in your heart to make sure you're able to handle the anger that you face day in and day out And the Bible says over in Proverbs chapter 14, verse number 21, these words: A wise man is cautious and turns away from evil

But a fool is arrogant and careless Verse 2, He who is slow to anger has great understand, but he who is quick-tempered exalts folly The reason we are quick to anger is because we lack wisdom and understanding Inside our hearts, we are foolish people We are not people of wisdom, and we need to be And therefore, we are quick to become angry But the man of understanding is slow to anger The man of understanding understands the fact that God is at work and that God is doing certain things And to realize that when I went to prayer about

The simple thing about having one more child to realize that God's in control and God can change my wife's heart And I want to let you know something When I went to prayer, I went to prayer saying, God changed the heart of my wife. I didn't go, Lord, change my heart because I didn't want my heart changed And that prayer didn't work God didn't change your heart See? When we are people of understanding, we are saying, Lord, you're sovereign You're in charge You've got a plan Help me to walk in the light of that plan Help me to follow you, Lord, and to serve you with my whole heart

And so he realized that when we lack God's wisdom, when we lack God's understanding in our hearts, we become angry people We need to be God-confident, not self-confident But listen to Proverbs 16, verse number 32 He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty He who rules a spirit, then he who captures a city Proverbs 25, verse number 28: like a city that is broken into without walls Is a man who has no control over his spirit The point is that when we can't rule our own spirit, It causes us to become angry

And the Bible says that a man who can control his anger is better than the mighty man because you see, you can control something that is so difficult to master And may that be our commitment Let's pray together Father, we thank you for the truth of your word and the joy that it gives And we pray, Lord, that our words will be pleasing to you So go before us, Lord Give us wisdom And may we live in the light of your glorious word We pray in Jesus' name Am.