Opener Story: Wrong Order!
How do you respond when a mistake has been made with your fast-food order?
If you’re 6’3” and weigh 270 pounds, people don’t recommend crawling through the drive-through window.
But that’s exactly what happened when a University of Kansas football player realized a chalupa was left out of his Taco Bell order.
He got so angry that he tried to climb through the 14” x 46” inch drive-through window and got stuck.
The frightened manager and employees locked themselves in an office and called the police.
The police pulled up to the drive through and laughed hysterically as they discovered the legs and butt of the football player kicking in midair.
Police Sergeant George Wheelers said, “When you take a big guy and put him through a small space, something’s got to give.”
Main Point of Discussion: Can we redirect anger into something good to get us in the game?
----DVD The Waterboy” The Movie Clip: Tackling Fuel
In this movie the weakling water boy becomes the star of the football team, popular, and gets the girl in the end, all as a result of tapping into the anger within him and living it out on and off the field. It is a comedy but has a bunch of questionable things such as language that you should be aware of, but there is a great clip for talking about anger.
Introducing the Clip:
Today we are going to talk about anger. There are a lot of examples out that have to do with anger, but one in particular really captures the heart behind anger, and allows us to see the good and bad side of anger. Let’s watch this clip from The Waterboy.
BEGIN CLIP AT Chapter 7 “Bobby’s First Practice” Bobby (the water boy) comes out onto the field dressed to play for the first time.
BEGIN with the black guy saying “Hey where’s your helmet?” Please edit the sound as the coach sends off the special teams to run laps because of a curse word.
STOP after Bobby agrees to tackle for Coach like that every game.
------------------------
Transitional Statement after the clip:
Some of us might wonder about anger. Is anger in itself bad? As you can see, Bobby can react pretty bad when he’s angered. I’m sure some of us can relate to that. But once Bobby redirected his anger toward something good, his anger wasn’t a bad thing.
Divide into Small Groups (optional - depending on your audience size):
Let’s go ahead and split up into our discussion groups and examine anger a little closer, and then afterward we’ll come back together for a final word.
Discussion Questions:
AROUND THE CIRCLE: Say your name and your greatest pet peeve.
AROUND THE CIRCLE: Rather than an annoying pet peeve, this time what’s
something that really angers you? How do you usually react to that?
ASK A FEW: Is it ever good to be angry? Why or why not?
Read the following two passages:
Eph. 4:26-27 (NLT)
[26] And don’t sin by letting anger gain control over you." Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, [27] for anger gives a mighty foothold to the Devil.
John 2:13-16 (NLT)
[13] It was time for the annual Passover celebration, and Jesus went to Jerusalem. [14] In the Temple area he saw merchants selling cattle, sheep, and doves for sacrifices; and he saw money changers behind their counters. [15] Jesus made a whip from some ropes and chased them all out of the Temple. He drove out the sheep and oxen, scattered the money changers’ coins over the floor, and turned over their tables. [16] Then, going over to the people who sold doves, he told them, "Get these things out of here. Don’t turn my Father’s house into a marketplace!"
ASK ONE OR TWO: In the two above passages, is anger in itself wrong? (Answer: No. We just shouldn’t let it gain control over us. Heck, Jesus even got angry. It wasn’t wrong, but our response can be wrong.)
ASK A FEW: In the video clip, Bobby redirected his anger to be used as "tackling fuel." Can you think of an example where anger can be used to fuel something good?
Read this introduction to your group:
"In the book of Nehemiah, Nehemiah has been dealing with a lot of tragedy. He’s trying to rebuild the walls that were destroyed, his enemies have been attacking, and now . . . his own people are attacking from within. They are ripping off their own people who are in dire need. So Nehemiah gets ticked-off!"
Read the following passage:
Neh. 5:6-7 (NLT)
[6] When I heard their complaints, I was very angry. [7] After thinking about the situation, I spoke out against these nobles and officials. I told them, "You are oppressing your own relatives by charging them interest when they borrow money!" Then I called a public meeting to deal with the problem.
ASK A FEW: In verse 6 Nehemiah gets angry? Is it wrong to be angry with someone who rips someone else off?
ASK SOMEONE: What is the first thing Nehemiah does when he’s angry?
(Look at the beginning of verse 7)
yep, he thought it over. He didn’t just react- he gave himself time to cool down.
ASK ONE OR TWO: Then what did he do to deal with the situation? Did he charge in there and cut off heads?
(He came up with a rational way to deal with it. He called a meeting to confront the truth.)
AROUND THE CIRCLE: Nehemiah admitted he was angry, he stopped and thought it over, then he came up with a rational way to fix the situation. How can you apply this to how you deal with frustrating situations this week?
Back To the Big Group Wrap Up:
(This is a good place to share a personal story where you turned/redirected your anger into something good.)
We can learn from Nehemiah. When we face frustrating situations, we can:
1.) Admit that we’re angry
2.) Stop and think
3.) Communicate a well thought out solution.
-------CLOSING CLIP:
“The Waterboy” The Movie Clip: Tackling Fuel
BEGIN CLIP AT Chapter 11 “First Win”
BEGIN with the sports announcer saying “We’re deadlocked at three…”
STOP after everyone starts shouting
“Par-ty” “Par-ty” “Par-ty”.
Closing Story: The Power of an Angry Attitude
You may say, "I am allowed to do anything." But I reply, "Not everything is good for you." And even though ‘I am allowed to do anything,’ I must not become a slave to anything. — 1 Corinthians 6:12 (NLT)
An athletic young man stood before his peers. An ordinary piece of sewing thread was cut from a spool and wrapped once around his torso and arms and tied.
He was asked to break free from the thread. Like a young Samson in training, he easily broke the thread that bound him.
The young man’s peers teased him, “Oooooohhhhhhh,” they chided, in chorus.
A longer piece of thread was wrapped around the young man. This time the thread was wrapped around his body three times.
The young man, again, was asked to break free from his bonds. This time, it took real effort on the young man’s behalf, but he broke free of the threads.
Again, his friends mockingly cheered, “Woohoo!” The young man struck a body-builders’ pose in response.
One last, long piece of thread was cut from the spool and wrapped around the young man.
This time, the thread was wrapped a dozen times around his body. But this time, as he tried to break free, he struggled and struggled. His friends cheered him on. Soon, the cheers turned to laughter.
This young man could not break the thread and finally gave up.
This story can serve as a good warning to us about the power of an angry attitude.
Angry attitudes are formed by repetition. Like a body wrapped in a single thread, negative or destructive behaviors are not that difficult to stop.
Yet, just as multiple threads are increasingly more difficult to break free of, as behaviors are repeated, angry attitudes become more and more difficult to stop – and have more and more power over our desires and choices.
Don’t be misled that a negative or destructive behavior isn’t a big deal.
If you aren’t careful, anger just may wrap you up in such a way that makes it very difficult to break free and takes the game out of you, or keeps you from being in the game.
Closing:
If you’re ready to realize to you anger issues, whether it’s problems with coaches or teachers (authority), to make making the practices (commitments), or reacting to situations that get you out of your normal world around you (lifes issues), then God is ready to take it from you and give you a jersey to play on the team.
Perhaps you need to find out how to get on the team. (Salvation)
Perhaps you need to come back to practicing with the team. That’s called (Rededication in your commitment to Christ)
Perhaps you need to sign a contract saying you’ll play no matter what. That’s what believers do called (Baptism)
