ANGER
EPHESIANS 4:26
Be Angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger. [NASB]
INTRODUCTION
Who this week has been angry? Just out and out mad at someone or something?
▪ You have been stuck in a long traffic jam or you have got behind the slowest driver in the whole world and as usual you are in a hurry.
▪ You were waited on by the world’s rudest store clerk.
▪ Your boss or perhaps a family member has just made life miserable for you within your little kingdom.
** When these things happen, or something similar [you name it], we get angry! This feeling of anger just seems to be so natural for all of us. “Anger’ is something that we ALL identify with. At one time or another, we have All gotten angry at someone or something to one degree or another.” - [Ray Scott, Pastor of Priscilla Baptist Church, The Danger of Anger, a sermon on Ephesians 4:26, SermonCentral.com]
I. DEFINITION OF ANGER
A. World’s Definition
Many see anger only as a bad trait:
▪ Bad temper – often our fury gets the best of us and we loose our temper
▪ Rage – exasperation overtakes all emotions and we lash out to those closest
▪ Seething – indignation over some incident which will often just constantly churn away our insides
B. Academia
Funk & Wagnall Standard Desk Dictionary, Vol. 1, 1979: Anger – “a feeling of sudden and strong displeasure and antagonism directed against the cause of an assumed wrong or injury; wrath; ire.”
Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Ed., 2000: Anger – “a strong feeling of displeasure and usually of antagonism [opposition of a conflicting force, tendency, or principle].”
C. Bible
Greek meanings “within our text” seem to indicate that it is not a bad trait – instead anger is seen as a passion of nature that needs to be controlled and used properly:
▪ (1st usage) – Greek verb, orgizesthe, means: [you] to be angry, wroth (exasperated – [Strong]; filled with anger, furious, incensed – [F & W Dict.]), provoke to arouse to anger. - [Vine’s Expository Dictionary]
▪ (2nd usage) – Greek noun, parorgismo, means: provocation – carries with it a just occasion for the initial feeling. – [Vine’s]
II. PURPOSE OF ANGER
A. Physically
Anger is a natural instinct which prepares our body for survival.
▪ Perhaps a good example of this would be a soldier in battle. He is watching his comrades dying due to the enemy’s favorable position over them. This soldier’s anger begins building up to a boiling point as to where he will then react to destroy that which has threatened his and his fellow soldiers’ lives.
▪ “What happens if you see a stranger fighting with your child or grandchild. Maybe they are trying to force them into their car. You get MAD … you get Angry!
What happens? Your heart beats faster … the adrenaline begins to flow … more sugar is released into your body … your blood pressure rises … the pupils of your eyes open wide … you become highly alert. [Your] body is prepared for action … power becomes available for you to assert yourself.” - [Ray Scott. The Danger of Anger. SermonCentral.com]
** Anger is beneficial when put to proper use. It is a preservative of our well being. Unfortunately, due to our fallen nature and being left to our flesh anger becomes more destructive than productive in our lives.
B. Scripturally
Anger is righteous indignation – this we see illustrated by Christ.
▪ Jesus was angry at the Pharisee’s hard hearts
Mark 3:1-5
He entered again into a synagogue; and a man was there whose had was withered. They [Pharisees] were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. He said to the man with the withered hand, “Get up and come forward!” And He said to them [Pharisees] “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to kill?” But they kept silent. After looking around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored.
▪ Jesus was angry with the money changers at the cleansing of the Temple
John 2:13-17
The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who were selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. And He made a scourge of cords, and drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen; and He poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables; and to those who were selling the doves He said, “Take these things away; stop making My Father’s house a place of business.” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for Your house will consume me.”
Matthew Henry wrote:
“If we would be angry … we must be angry at nothing but sin; and we should be jealous for the glory of God than for any interest or reputation of our own.” – [Matthew Henry, Acts to Revelation, Vol. 6 of A Commentary on the Whole Bible, 707]
** May we Christians once again become ANGRY over the sinfulness that is so prevalent today in our culture!
TEXT
“Be Angry …”
A. Be Angry –
I think Paul here is stressing that we can be angry, but it needs to be for the right reasons (for in vs. 31, he tells us to put away all bitterness and wrath and anger – those fleshly passions which destroy everything associated with them).
** WHAT ARE WE ANGRY ABOUT TODAY?
. Open Theism – Who cares if God’s Word is irrelevant! (There is no standard for truth anymore)-
. Homosexual Agenda – Who cares if the Christian concept of marriage is destroyed!
. Abortion – Who cares if innocent children are murdered on demand!
. Cloning – Who cares if life is valueless! (Just making body parts to harvest)
. Christian Apathy – Who cares if these mentioned here and all others who do not know of Christ as their Savior are lost - eternally damned!
** OR ARE WE JUST ANGRY ABOUT:
. The slow driver!
. The rude clerk!
. The arrogant boss!
. The bad-mood relative!
. The take advantage friend!
. The annoying Christian!
“Be Angry, and yet do not sin …”
B. Do not sin –
“Anger must be carefully guarded so as not to pass into sin. Anger that is selfish, undisciplined, and uncontrolled is always sinful; and even that which starts out as righteous indignation all too easily degenerates to this level.” - [Curtis Vaughan, Ephesians, 103]
Psalms 4:5
Be angry [Lit. “Tremble” – margin notes], and do not sin. Meditate within your heart on your bed, and be still. [NKJV]
When was the last time you trembled before God concerning the abounding iniquity so prevalent today. When was the last time you cried out to God for Him to be merciful to those who reproach Him? When was the last time you cried out to God – “Oh Lord be merciful to me a sinner (!) – For I too have used my anger against others for my own benefit and not your glory.
** May God have mercy on our souls for failing to do so!
“Be Angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger”
C. Do not let the sun go down on your anger –
“Anger must never be cherished: … That is to say, anger must not be carried over from one day into the next. Anger that is not speedily deposed soon takes deep root in the heart.” [Curtis Vaughan, 103]
Matthew 5:21-22
You have heard that it was said to those of old, “You shall not murder,” and “Whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment. But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, “Raca!” [Margin note, Lit. in Aramaic – ‘Empty Head’] shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, “You fool!” shall be in danger of hell fire. [NKJV]
Romans 12:9-21
Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. … Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. … Repay no one evil for evil. … live peaceably with all men. Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. “Therefore if your enemy hungers, feed him; if he thirsts, give him a drink; for in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. [NKJV]
** Righteous indignation will get the attention of those who are around listening and perhaps may cause some of them to agree and join forces with you. However, continuous bitter hateful anger will do just the opposite and move everyone away from you and your cause.
CONCLUSION
▪ Believers –
It behooves us to understand what the Scriptures say about anger and then incorporate that understanding into our daily lives. We must learn how to yield this aspect to the Holy Spirit’s control so that we will not react in the flesh and thus fall into sin because of our anger.
Galatians 5:16-17
Walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you so please.
▪ Non-believers –
You should learn to control your anger. However, that is nothing compared to the Anger of God that you are facing at this very moment.
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) in his sermon at Enfield, Connecticut on July 8, 1741, “Sinners in the Hands of An Angry God,” based on Deuteronomy 32:35 – “Their foot shall slide in due time” wrote:
"The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you was suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning, but that God’s hand has held you up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not gone to hell, since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell.
O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath, that you are held over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and incensed as much against you, as against many of the damned in hell. You hang by a slender thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it, and ready every moment to singe it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest in any Mediator, and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep off the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have done, nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment."
** My sinner friend – Do you believe this to be true? --- Then why do you continue to flirt with eternity facing the wrath of God?
Oh, that you may see the urgency facing you today and escape God’s anger and flee as fast as you can to Jesus Christ, He who is “full of grace and truth.”
Bruce Allen
Pleasant Ridge Baptist Church
bea0210@hotmail.com
August 24, 2003
