Anger

So the number one goal of every Christ follower must be producing fruit.

But there are things just waiting to derail you, to ruin your fruit .

Matthew 3:10"The axe is already laid at the root of the trees; therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

You will know them by their fruit,

Imagine working your whole life for the Lord and you end up with rotten fruit and sour grapes . Not everyone who says LOR LORD will enter

Sometimes we need a refresher course on watching out for things that will ruin your work and steal your fruit

Chapter 5 of Matthew is so full of blessings .

In fact that is the title of the Chapter, the beatitudes which means blessings.

I don’t want you to think that blessings are only gifts, because some of the best blessings are those that keep you from danger.

Think of a blessing as if someone pushed you out of the way of a oncoming truck racing right at you. You would get up from the ground dust yourself off and say wow that was God , that was a blessing .

Well today some of you will have to pick yourselves up , dust yourselves off and think wow I did get a blessings .

Matthew 5:21“You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.’ 22“But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.

So Jesus starts this verse with I say unto you,

In plain English, I need to tell you something and you need to hear this because you are in danger

This is something so important, so overlooked and so deadly that your very souls weigh in the balance , and everyone is guilty of it …Anger .

Jesus places Anger is on the same level as the 6th commandment

thou shall not kill .

This is so exciting , it’s like getting the answers to a test and who would know better what’s on that test more than the teacher and judge of heaven and earth Jesus Christ .

In this passage there are 3 levels of anger that escalate and of course there are three punishments that follow along with them

The first one is harboring anger towards another.

The fact that we don’t act upon our anger, that anger itself is not offensive that we don’t owe anyone, you never thought that anger just itself is sin.

The problem is that anger is an herbicide , in other words it kills the fruit

You won’t produce fruit with anger in your heart .

And there are some of you that are pros at hiding your anger but are blind to its effects.

1John2:11But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

Put 22 up again

Matthew 5:22“But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.

Raca , we have all heard of this word ,

This is when that quiet inside anger builds and builds and then you say

I just need to vent

The word Raca comes from the root word of spit, spewing and spreading

This is when the anger overwhelms us, and takes control of our mouths.

The word Raca its actually spelled rhaka and it means empty headed , brainless good for nothing.

But what has happened here is that the anger has now spilled out and now you are vocalizing , spewing and spreading anger .

This is both ridiculous and embarrassing at the same time , because the same mouth that praises God could be the same mouth that curses your brother?

James 3:10from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way. 11Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water?

Matthew 5:22“But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.