- Good evening, everyone.
Thank you for coming to Steadfast Baptist Church.
If you could please find your seats
and grab your song book.
We're gonna start out by singing song 223,
Springs of Living Water.
223, Springs of Living Water.
Song 223, Springs of Living Water.
♪ Bursteth in the bare sin ♪
♪ Satisfy a blessed cross of Christ one day ♪
♪ Springs of living water did abound ♪
♪ The springs of living water ♪
♪ So they satisfied ♪
♪ At the springs of living water ♪
♪ Full supply ♪
♪ Happy all the way ♪
♪ And mark the path I've trod ♪
♪ I'm shouting at the springs of living water ♪
♪ Full supply ♪
- Up in a word of prayer.
Heavenly Father, thank you for this evening
and thank you for Steadfast Baptist Church.
I just pray that you'd bless our pastor this evening,
that you'd fill them with boldness and the Holy Spirit,
and you'd bless this time of singing to you
for your honor and glory in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
All right, for our second song,
we're gonna go to song number 96, "God Leads Us Along."
Song number 96, "God Leads Us Along."
Song 96, "God Leads Us Along."
♪ Shake your soul ♪
- Like one, our issuers can come by.
We have a Bible-ary passage on the inside.
Service, soul-winning times, church stats.
Please continue to make sure,
especially if you went soul-winning this afternoon,
put your maps back in this basket,
or you could ask Brother Oz to help you with that,
organizing them.
Also, please turn in your statistics
to your soul-winning captains and lieutenants.
And if you can gather emails from people
when you go out soul-winning, talk to them and say,
"Hey, would you like to get some of our services?"
We email them out every single service time.
That's a great way to get people's contact information,
and we can send that out.
I try to do that a lot when I go out soul-winning.
And even people that you already got saved,
or didn't necessarily get them saved,
but they're already saved,
you could even ask them as well,
"Hey, would you like us to add you to our sermon list?"
And we would love to send that out to you.
Also, please continue to pray
for our Expecting Ladies, our prayer list.
Sign up for our events, Mighty Men's Conference,
and the Fire-Breathing Baptist Fellowship in October.
That's pretty much all I have
as far as announcements are concerned.
We're gonna sing our third song.
It's a Psalm of the Week, Psalm 15.
If you do have a separate handout,
it makes it a lot easier.
Otherwise, you can just follow along in your Bible, Psalm 15.
- Psalm, chapter number 15.
Psalm 15, spring plates are being passed around.
Please turn in your Bible.
Plesiastes, chapter number seven.
- Plesiastes, chapter seven.
Plesiastes, chapter seven, the Bible reads.
A good name is better than precious anointment
and the day of death than the day of one's birth.
It is better to go to the house of mourning
than to go to the house of feasting,
for that is the end of all men
and the living will lay it to his heart.
Sorrow is better than laughter
for by the sadness of the countenance,
the heart is made better.
The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,
but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth.
It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise
than for a man to hear the song of fools.
For as the crackling of the thorns under a pot,
so is the laughter of the fool.
This also is vanity.
Surely oppression maketh a wise man mad,
and a gift destroyeth the heart.
Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof,
and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.
Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry,
for anger resteth in the bosom of fools.
Say not thou, what is the cause that the former days
were better than these?
For thou does not inquire wisely concerning this.
Wisdom is good with an inheritance,
and by it there is profit to them that see the sun.
For wisdom is defense, and money is a defense,
for the excellency of knowledge is,
that wisdom giveth life to them that have it.
Consider the work of God,
for who can make that straight which he had made crooked?
In the day of prosperity be joyful,
but in the day of adversity consider.
God also has set the one over against the other,
to the end that man should find nothing after him.
All things have I seen in the days of my vanity.
There is a just man that perish in his righteousness,
and there is a wicked man that prolongeth his life
in his wickedness.
Be not righteous over much,
neither make thyself over wise.
Why shouldest thou destroy thyself?
Be not over much wicked, neither be thou foolish.
Why shouldest thou die before thy time?
It is good that thou shouldest take hold of this.
Yea, also from this withdraw not thy hand,
for he that feareth God shall come forth of them all.
Wisdom strengtheneth the wise more than ten mighty men,
which are in the city.
For there is not a just man upon the earth
that doeth good and sinneth not.
Also take no heed unto all words that are spoken,
lest thou hear thy servant curse thee.
For oftentimes also thy own heart knoweth that thou thyself likewise hath cursed others.
All this have I proved by wisdom.
I said I will be wise, but it was far from me.
That which is far off and exceeding deep, who can find it out?
I applied my heart to know, and to search, and to seek out wisdom, and the reason of
things, and to know the wickedness of folly, even of foolishness and madness.
And I find more bitter than death the woman, whose heart is snares and nets, and her hands
as bands.
Whoso pleaseth God shall escape from her, but the sinner shall be taken by her.
Behold, this have I found, saith the preacher, counting one by one, to find out the account.
Which yet my soul seeketh, but I find not.
One man among a thousand have I found, but a woman among all those have I not found.
Lo, this only have I found, that God has made man upright, but they have sought out many
inventions."
Let us pray.
Father, thank you for this chapter of the Bible, and we just thank you for Pastor Shelley
and his family.
We thank you for an opportunity to sing praises to you and your son, and hear your word preached
this evening.
I pray that you would fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit, help him organize the
details, and help him deliver the message that you've prepared for him.
I pray that he would preach with power and authority.
I pray that we would, if our hearts need to be pricked, we would take that correction,
that rebuke, and we would walk away better Christians, and we just thank you so much
for all the souls that were one to Christ this evening, and we just ask these things
in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Plesiastes 7 has a lot of great verses in here, and a lot of different subjects, but
the one I wanted to kind of look back at is kind of at the first part of this chapter.
When it talks about specifically anger, and it tells us in verse 9, it says, "Be not hasty
in thy spirit to be angry, for anger resteth in the bosom of fools."
And really the title of my sermon tonight is just anger, but I'm kind of doing a series
that it's really also going to be about the devil's influence.
So I'm doing a series called The Devil's Influence, and the first sermon I'm going to be approaching
this evening is anger.
And the Bible often attributes anger as coming from the devil or the devil kind of influencing
and inspiring people to be angry.
And the Bible makes it really clear that we should not be quick or hasty to be angry,
and in fact someone that's just constantly angry according to the Bible is a fool.
So we don't want to be people that are just constantly angry, irritated, upset, mad, whatever
synonym you want to use for this.
This is a bad quality, a bad attribute in a person is someone that's just always irritated,
upset, angry, mad, whatever word you want to use.
And anger is a great word for being angry.
And this is mentioned a lot in the Bible.
Even if you just look up the word anger or angry, it's mentioned very often.
But then there's almost every synonym I used is also found in the scripture all over the
place and there's so much we can talk about.
But what I want to kind of focus on is the idea that the devil wants to make you angry.
The devil is trying to get you angry and it's a foolish attitude to constantly be angry.
Now go over to Ephesians chapter 4, go to Ephesians.
We're not going to come back here so you don't have to save your place, but go to Ephesians
chapter 4.
I think it's just important to start off with the very clear principle that's laid out in
scripture making it just that you should not be angry on a regular basis.
And human emotion is something that to some degree is uncontrollable.
Laughter is uncontrollable in the sense that if you find something funny you just laugh.
You didn't necessarily try to laugh.
It was an involuntary response.
You could gasp is an involuntary response.
Being happy, sad.
A lot of these things are just your reaction to the situation around you.
But at the same time the Bible is saying that you can have some control of this to where
you're not always just quick to be angry.
Where it's just man something that irritating happens, something bad happens, something
negative happens, something you don't like.
And instead of just being angry right away you can actually control that and not necessarily
feel anger every single time.
Now it's impossible to eliminate anger.
And there is of course a time and a place to have righteous anger.
Jesus Christ was angry at times in the Bible, in His earthly ministry, of course the Lord
rained fire and brimstone down from heaven upon Sodom and Gomorrah because He was angry
with them.
God obviously sends people to hell because He's angry with them.
Think about this, God may sometimes wait 80 years to deal with someone.
That's a long time to wait to then end up showing how angry He truly was with that particular
individual.
He was really long suffering with Pharaoh, but when the crashing waters of the Red Sea
came and destroyed Him, He felt the wrath and the anger of God upon Him.
And so, we want to have the same style of emotional control where, sure, we might have
times when we're angry, but we're not the type of people that are just getting angry
at the drop of a hat, angry at everything, irritated about everything.
And you probably know people that are just, it's just like they're always upset.
Everything upsets them, they're always irritated, they're always in a bad mood, they're just
so easily set off, and you kind of have to walk on eggshells around this individual because
you're just afraid of upsetting them.
Sometimes it could be your boss at work, right?
It could be a parent, it could be a sibling.
I've had people in my personal life, in kind of my family dynamic, that you just had to
kind of walk on eggshells around them because they're very easily angered, and they would
just ruin the whole situation, ruin the family dynamic, and so everybody kind of had to treat
that person with kid gloves, and it's annoying.
It's annoying to be around people that are just always upset about everything.
You're constantly irritated, and look, the devil wants to get you into this frame of
mind.
Now look what it says in verse 26, "Be angry and sin not.
Let not the sun go down upon your wrath, neither give place to the devil."
Notice that.
The Bible is saying that the devil is the one that's wanting to get you angry.
It's the devil that's the one that's trying to influence you and cause you to sin through
anger.
You can technically be angry and not sin.
Of course, as evidenced by the fact, Jesus is very angry.
When Jesus is going into the temple and whipping people and throwing over the tables, He was
angry.
But, you know, He didn't sin.
And He didn't even do it right away.
He took a while to sit there and make a cord of whips, or a whip of cords, sorry if I said
that wrong.
He sat there, don't get angry at me, all right.
He sat there and He worked on it.
And of course, sometimes when our initial response is maybe kind of visceral or we're
kind of agitated or irritated with something, sometimes it's good to just kind of wait before
you react to see how you feel five minutes from now, and to see how you feel maybe 30
minutes from now.
Because there's some things that it's like, hey, someone cut me off in traffic.
But you know, five minutes from now I probably won't care anymore and it's gone, I don't
see them.
And so it wasn't really something to get irritated about, right.
But it's like, hey, a pedophile molested a child.
You know, I'm mad about that now and five minutes from now and 30 minutes from now and
five hours from now and just always angry, okay.
So that's something that's just righteous anger because it wasn't something that's
just like a temporary inconvenience.
This is just evil and wickedness.
And of course, God is the same way that, you know, the little grievances of this life,
God's not just raining fire and brimstone down on us.
And of course, He takes the serious issues, you know, with all gravity, and He makes sure
that evil is punished, okay?
So we want to have kind of the same attitude where when something happens that we don't
like or we're angry, we're not just quick to just sin about it.
A lot of people, they'll get cut off in traffic.
What do they do?
Flip the person off, get really close, try to run them off the road.
Maybe in some cases, they might just shoot and kill them.
Like literally, and I think it was Hurst, if I remember correctly, the city, but recently
in Hurst, there was someone that like cut someone off in traffic, or they were like
riding their bumper and they just kind of, they just, it wasn't even that big a deal,
but just basically just through traffic, they kind of really irritated the other person.
So the guy just pulled out his gun and just started firing at the other car and he shot
and killed the guy's wife who was a passenger.
I mean, can you imagine driving and of course, you know, don't be a jerk on the road because
someone might shoot and kill you, literally.
That's why when someone's a jerk to me on the road, I'm just like, "Fine.
You know, have a good day."
They cut me off.
I'm like, "Hey, good move."
You know, I don't necessarily feel like, "Oh man, I'm going to get them."
You know?
"How dare they?
I'm going to ride their bumper."
It's like, that's a dumb move, okay?
And only fools drive around like this.
Because if you have this attitude, you will get in accidents, you will cause problems,
people will be mad at you, you're going to put your life in danger.
Look, that's a bad attitude.
If you drive in Dallas, Fort Worth, Texas, be prepared to get cut off in just horrible
traffic situations.
The drivers here are terrible.
People drive slow in the fast lane and it irritates the fire out of me, especially when
I'm late, okay?
Because I'm thinking like, "I know I can get there on time, but what's for you?"
Okay?
And there's even certain demographics that you've noticed out driving that might irritate
you even more.
Okay, I'm not naming names, all right?
But I mean, it's just really easy to get irritated.
But you know what?
You just need to realize like, "Hey, I'm going to go out there and drive and it's going to
be crazy, so I'm already okay with it.
I'm already accepting of it."
And frankly, you know, sometimes I make moves like that, you know?
Because I'm about to miss my exit and I'm just like, "Oop," you know, I bop over.
And so you know what that makes me think?
Like, "Hey, when someone does that to me, I'm just like, 'Hey, good move.'"
You know?
"Good job."
I'm not thinking like, "Ah, hey, how dare you?"
It's like, it's just life.
Sometimes we forget or we miss our exit or we're late or we have problems.
I mean, we all are not perfect drivers, so we should give grace to other people when
they're not a perfect driver instead of holding everybody to this idyllic level.
And frankly speaking, when I travel to other parts of the country, I find their drivers
to be worse.
The thing I like about the Dallas-Fort Worth area is everybody, most people drive with
purpose and they drive pretty quickly.
And I like the drivers around here.
When I go to other parts of the country, they're slow and annoying and, you know, they're not
really driving with purpose and it just, it makes me even angrier, okay?
But frankly speaking, you know, I don't really get in a lot of tiffs on the highway because
I don't, I just don't care.
You know, it's just not a big deal.
Yeah, I've had people get mad at me in the Bahamas, okay, specifically, the lady was
really mad at me.
But you know what?
Just don't tell people have a good day, right?
For some reason, that'll set them off.
But you know, I don't, I don't, not trying to make people upset with me and, and you
know, that's a silly way to ruin your life is, is driving.
It's like, hey, here's a faithful guy who loved the Lord and he was a soul winner, but
then he got in a tiff and a car accident and died.
You know, it's like, that would be a bad way to go.
That would be the kind of the foolish way to die.
And you have great men in the Bible who died as a fool, like Abner.
You know, the Bible says he died as a fool, you know, just, just kind of being careless
about his lifestyle, not thinking about the situation and you don't want to get around
the wrong person and allow them to hurt you or harm you.
And so crazy drivers, I don't even want to be around them anyways.
All right.
So just, just try to stay away from them.
Go if you would to John chapter number eight, but again, the devil wants to kind of be that
little guy on your shoulder and just every single time someone does something to you
that you don't like, just be like, get them, punch them, flip them off, you know, attack
them.
Like, you know, just, he's just always there to just basically, he just wants you to just
like lash out, get angry, be mad.
How dare that person.
Oh, it's always that kind of person, isn't it?
Right?
It's always women drivers, or whatever, right?
It's always Asian women drivers.
Oh, I'm just kidding.
Sorry, I'm using some stereotypes, alright?
You laugh because you're racist.
I just said the joke, alright?
It's not the person that gives the joke, it's the person that laughs that has the problem,
so you're obviously the problem.
But look at John chapter 8 verse 44, the Bible says, "Year of your father the devil, and
the lust of your father ye will do.
He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there's no
truth in him.
When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh his own, for he is a liar, and the father of it."
Now of course, the main emphasis here is the fact that the devil is the author of lies,
he's kind of the father of lies.
But notice he's also a murderer, and the Bible has a strong connection to anger and murder.
In fact, just like the Bible says, if you look upon a woman with lust, it's a form
of adultery, the Bible says having anger in your heart, or being angry without a cause
towards your brother, is similar to a form of murder.
Obviously, no one's going to go to jail for being angry with their brother, okay?
That's not what the Bible's trying to say, but what it is saying is there's a connection
to being a murderer, or having murder in your heart, as to having anger.
Because at some level, every murderer started with anger, you know, in the same way.
Every adultery started with the lustful thoughts, so it's kind of like that pathway to a much
darker place, and if the devil's the murderer, what he wants to do is he wants to get you
so angry that you'd be willing to sin in a very grievous way.
Cain started out getting really angry with his brother, that's what led him to murder.
Go to Genesis chapter 4 now, go to Genesis chapter 4, and of course the Bible says that
Cain was of that wicked one.
Cain is related to the devil, and the devil influenced Cain greatly.
What happens?
Cain offers an offering of the Lord, it's not accepted.
This is your Catholic today, okay?
Cain the Catholic tried to get accepted with God with his confessional booth, and with
his merry idolatry, and with his works, and the offerings that he had, but you know what?
God didn't have respect under Cain the Catholic, work salvationist, and you know what?
That made Cain mad.
Now Genesis chapter 4, look at verse number 5, "But Cain," I'm sorry, "But unto Cain,
unto his offering he had not respect, and Cain was very wroth, and his countenance
fell."
Now, here's the thing, Abel did nothing to Cain.
Abel offered unto God, and God was pleased with Abel.
Cain made an offering, and God was not pleased with Cain's offering.
But think about this, Abel has done literally nothing to his brother.
The only person that has done anything to Cain is God.
God was upset with Cain, and God didn't respect his offering, and God is the one that's basically
punishing Cain in some way.
But then Cain just gets angry, and then because he gets angry, you know, here's the problem.
Cain can't do anything to God, because God's in heaven, right, or God's all powerful.
He can't really attack him.
So what ends up happening is that he transfers his anger to an object that he actually can
do something to.
What would be that object?
It would be Abel, his brother.
And this is often how anger works, is that sometimes you'll transfer your anger to someone
else that it literally didn't even do anything to you.
They're not even the true reason for your anger, but you just need to lash out some
way and it's kind of that concept that people talk about.
Your boss is mean to you at work and you come home and you kick the dog.
Now again, if you want to discipline your dog however you want, I don't care.
But was it really the dog's fault that your boss was a jerk at work or are you just transferring
your anger downward?
And sometimes men will do this, they'll be rude to their wife, they'll be rude to their
children.
Look, we've all done it, right?
You're upset about something and you can't really do anything to that person but you
end up treating someone else poorly as a result of your anger.
And of course Cain ends up looking at Abel and thinking like, well he's right with God
and whatever and because he's righteous he ends up hating his brother and that hatred
and that anger fueled together end up causing him to literally slay his brother.
Look at verse 6, "And the Lord said to Cain, 'Why art thou wroth, and why is thy count
as fallen?'
If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted.
And if thou doest not well, sin lies at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire.
And thou shalt rule over him."
So you know, God's saying, hey Cain, your anger is not right.
This is not a good emotion.
And by you being angry, sin's right next door.
Sin's right there on the table.
And you know what?
Sin wants to rule over you, but you're supposed to rule over him.
And instead of just saying, "You know what?
That's right.
I made the mistake.
I'm the problem.
I'm going to actually do the right offering and get right with God."
No, he allowed sin to take over, and he ends up killing his own brother.
What a grievous sin to have the first murderer recorded in scripture and of all humanity
is Cain.
And of course, he's probably one of the first people that went to hell.
Abel's like the first person in heaven by a long shot.
You see that meme of Kermie waiting and Abel waiting for someone else to die as they go
to heaven.
It's just like, man, this is taking a while.
He's just up in heaven, just like, hey, it's kind of cool up here, you know?
What's going on?
I mean, it took a while, right?
But Cain, I mean, he allowed anger to destroy him.
And you know what?
It was the devil's influence.
The devil is influencing these people.
And you say, how do you know that?
Well, the Bible says he was of that wicked one.
Making it clear that Cain was influenced by the devil.
And is it any coincidence that every time we're mentioning anger, it's talking about
how the devil is the one trying to do that, isn't it?
The devil is giving place to the devil.
Cain is of that wicked one.
He was the murderer from the beginning.
Go if you would to Mark chapter number five.
Go to Mark chapter five.
So I'm just kind of proving for you how there's this direct correlation to the devil's influence
in someone's life and their level of anger.
And what that should do is it should motivate you to say, "Wow, I really need to get anger
under control because when I'm not, I'm literally allowing the devil to impact my life.
I'm allowing satanic influences in my life when I'm angry, when I'm irritated, when I'm
upset and I'm allowing that to control me."
And of course, the devil and sin want to control you.
They want to take over you.
They want to cause you to do things that you weren't thinking about.
And of course, hopefully, God willing, none of you drink alcohol, at least anymore.
That's a wicked sin.
And of course, being a drunkard will get you thrown out of church, literally.
You say, "What do you mean by that?"
I will literally throw you out of church, physically.
I might need assistance, but I'll do the job.
And what does alcohol do?
Alcohol takes over your actions, your mind.
It will do things that you would have never done under the influence of alcohol.
You know what?
Anger is the same way.
Anger has the same blinding effect and the same effect where it can take over your good
judgment and you can end up doing really dumb things, really foolish things that you would
have never done, just as a result of being angry.
Now, what's another picture of this?
How about demon possession?
Look at Mark chapter 5 verse 2.
"And when he was come out of the ship," talking about Jesus, "immediately there met him out
of the tombs, a man with an unclean spirit."
This sounds like he's going to Steadfast Baptist Church.
You know what I mean?
Immediately when he shows up there's all these unclean spirits meeting him at the door.
Verse 3.
"Who had his dwelling among the tombs and no man could bind him, no not with chains,
because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been
plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces, neither could any man tame him.
And always night and day he was in the mountains and in the tombs, crying and cutting himself
with stones."
Now, this guy has a lot of issues as a result of his demon possession, but I think one phrase
that kind of sticks out to me in this context that we're talking about is how it says that
no man or any man could tame him, meaning this guy is uncontrollable.
And it's similar to the concept or the idea of someone having uncontrollable anger or
uncontrollable just rage or wrath, where you can't really tame this particular individual.
And it's the same kind of quality in someone that's demon, literally demon possessed.
And this guy had a legion of demons as the Bible describes him.
So he had a legion of demons and it's just causing him to be uncontrollable.
And you know what?
That's similar to how anger can come on people and they can become uncontrollable, where
they are in so enraged, so wrathful, so wrath that no one can appease them.
No one can satiate them.
And so it's a very dangerous emotion that we need to make sure that we're very careful
with.
Go to Proverbs chapter 16.
So it's going to a lot of different verses here, and I'll make a few applications to
finish our sermon, but anger is often not a good emotion.
I did say, and I'll caveat, there are a few times to be angry, and I get that, and it's
justified.
We're probably 90 some percent of the time when we get angry, it's not really a legitimate
anger, it's not a really legitimate emotion, and we have to be really careful that we don't
allow it to consume us, take us over, or lead us down a pathway of sin.
We need to make sure that we're dealing with anger appropriately, and this would be controlling
yourself.
Look what it says in Proverbs chapter 16 verse 32, "He that is slow to anger is better than
the mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh the city."
Notice the Bible is saying that it's actually difficult to do as well.
It's not something that's super easy, and of course it doesn't say he that is never angry.
It says he that's slow to anger, meaning that it's very difficult to make this person angry.
And you know what?
A godly attribute is someone that's very hard to make angry, very hard to be offended, very
hard to be irritated.
This is the exact opposite of Democrats and the left.
Everyone on the left and everyone on the Democrats and all these people, they are the easiest
people to trigger, okay?
And you can just trigger, and it could be anything.
Just you accidentally mispronoun them, and they're just so triggered, bam, and it's
just like, what's wrong with you?
You know, why are you so enraged?
It's just they're so quick to be angry.
Well, they're under the devil's influence, folks, many of them.
And they're not someone that's of noteworthy strength, because someone of noteworthy strength
is someone that can control that emotion.
You know, being angry is not cool.
It's not like you're amazing or you're some brave or tough guy.
The Bible is saying someone that's really tough is someone that can withstand, you know,
irritation.
They're not just like, ah, I'm so triggered.
You know what?
It's someone that it's basically it's impossible to upset this person.
It's impossible to anger this person.
It's impossible to get this person over the edge because they're very slow to anger.
They're very gracious.
They have a lot of long suffering.
They're they're very charitable by nature.
And notice it takes ruling your own spirit.
And it says that the person that's ruling his spirit is better than someone that could
literally take an entire city by force.
Think about how difficult it would be for you by yourself, an army of one, to just take
captive all of the all of Dallas.
He's like, "You know what, I'm going to conquer Dallas.
I'm going to take out all the cops and the SWAT and the FBI."
I mean, that takes a lot of strength, doesn't it?
And it's saying someone that's stronger than that guy is someone that can just control
their own emotions, control their own spirit.
And so this is something that we should strive for and work on and try to achieve.
Look at Proverbs 27, Proverbs chapter 27, and we looked at a lot of Proverbs today and
I think that that's good, gives us a lot of wisdom.
And this is the hard part for me when I read the book of Proverbs, especially if you read
multiple Proverbs in a single sitting, is it gave you like 50 great tips on 50 different
subjects that it's really hard to walk away with a lot.
And so it's kind of good to get a lot of this in a sermon context or a topical context where
you kind of compare a lot of Proverbs that are of the same subject matter to really resonate
a little bit stronger.
And so I like to use them a lot in sermons.
And it says in Proverbs 27 verse 4, "Wrath is cruel and anger is outrageous."
But who is able to stand for envy?
Of course, the emphasis of this is about how envy is so much worse than wrath and anger.
But notice it does clearly say that anger is outrageous.
That's an interesting word.
I probably, if someone says the word outrageous in the Bible, and I would have thought like,
I don't even think it is, but you know, it's right here in the Bible.
And it's saying like, anger is outrageous.
You know, it's basically saying it's like, it doesn't make sense.
And it's something that's uncontrollable.
You know, it's something that you don't want to really mess with.
Anger is a dangerous thing.
We want to keep it subdued, keep it in check, control it, make sure that we're not allowing
anger to really be something that's resting in our bosom.
Because here's the thing, when you allow anger to just fester in your heart, fester in your
mind, you're going to just make really bad decisions.
It'll ruin your relationships, it'll ruin your life, it'll cause you to make really
bad decisions.
Anger is something that must be dealt with immediately.
It's kind of like cancer in the sense that you don't want to just let cancer just run
free in your body.
You want to control that and get rid of it as soon as possible, because it's very dangerous.
It's a very dangerous, toxic thing.
And so when it comes to anger, we want to deal with it appropriately and get rid of
it quickly.
If you have anger towards your children, you want to get rid of that quickly.
If you have anger towards your spouse, you need to deal with that immediately.
If you have anger towards the relationships in your life, you need to get rid of that
anger as soon as possible, so you don't go down the road of pain to where you literally
want to kill the person.
And you know, it's very easy when you're angry to think about how terrible that person
is that you're mad at.
I mean, when you're angry, that person can become a reprobate to you.
Even the most saved, godly person, you could just turn them into a reprobate in your mind
if you want to.
And look, people can dream up all kinds of crazy things.
They're like, "Well, you know, they were rude this one time, and they didn't agree with
me on this one thing."
And you know, it's just like they start turning everything into just like the worst ever.
And married couples do this a lot, especially when they're on the brink of divorce or whatever.
They're just always looking at their spouse through the lens of anger, and it's just really
easy to be mad at them if you want to.
You can be mad at anybody.
I mean, think about it.
You've never even seen this person.
They've got you off in traffic, and they're the worst scum of the earth.
You could already tell me 20 things you hate about them in five seconds.
I mean, just the way they look, the dress, their car, it's dirty.
You don't like their ethnicity.
You don't like, I mean, you could tell me a bunch of things you don't like about them
like that.
You've never even met this person, and you already hate them.
That is how easy it is to allow anger to control you.
That's why it's important to really control that particular emotion and not allow it to
fester in your heart.
Go to Proverbs chapter 19, go to Proverbs chapter 19.
I mean, what if the person that cut you off is running late to the hospital trying to
meet their dying father on his deathbed before he dies?
Wouldn't that maybe change your perspective on them cutting you off all of a sudden?
And look, I'm not saying that's always the case, okay, but we don't even know the context
or the situation or what's going on, and it's a foolish attitude to just always instantly
just put this person in interpretation of just like, well, they're obviously a Democrat
and they probably voted for Biden and like, you know, now they have all the stickers on
the back of the car, okay, right, and they got purple hair, okay, and they're showing
up to protest the church, then you can start making some judgments about that person, right?
But you know, we don't want to be the type of people, that's, that's your, your slowed
anger, you're thinking like, okay, that's bad, that's even worse, this is even worse.
And then eventually get to a place where you're like, well, I have some righteous anger towards
this person, or this individual, okay.
We don't want to just start there day one, moment one, we want to give people grace.
Look at Proverbs chapter 19 verse 11, the Bible says, "The discretion of a man deferreth
his anger, and it is his glory to pass over a transgression."
So according to the Bible, what's really good is just to put, take your anger that you have,
and just put it on hold, put on pause, just defer it, just be like, you know what, I'm
just not going to be angry about this right now, I'm just going to kind of put it over
here and we'll just see what happens.
And then it's like, most of the time, it just, you get over it and you're just like,
okay great, and then you just live your life, right?
Obviously if you have the same problem with the same person over and over, and, or you're
dealing with the same evil, the same wickedness over and over, it can get to a point where
yeah, now you're righteously angry, you got to deal with it, we got to, you know, talk
to this person or handle it appropriately, but you know, we don't want to just let anger
just define our lives, and allow us to just always just live every day just being angry,
because there's a lot to be angry about. There's so much. I mean, what's going on in our world,
our politicians, our leadership, our government, inflation, dude, it's hot outside. I don't
know, I'm like, I just been wondering, like, is God just really mad at this area for how
they treated our church or something? And he's just like, I'm going to burn you all,
you know, like, I don't know, because it's been hot the last few years. And I'm just
thinking like, man, what is going on? But, you know, I could be really angry about that
and just be like, ah, why is it so hot all the time? And you know, when it's hot, that
sometimes even makes you angry. Just the fact that you're hot. Because, you know, when you
get angry, you get hot. Like it's a direct response or whatever. Just think about how
angry that people are going to be in hell. Oh man, really angry. But, you know, I can
just say like, hey, but I get to come inside and it's cool, you know. And look, I would
way rather have it be 100 or 110 degrees outside right now than it to be negative 10 and snow
on the ground. I'm just telling you, my personal opinion. You say, well, I don't agree with
that. Well, you're wrong, number one, okay. But number two, I guarantee there's some weather
that you would still prefer this over. And so you can just say like, well, at least it's
not that bad, right? Like, at least it's not Phoenix, okay? You're like, well, it's a dry
heat, I like it better. Okay, well, at least it's not the sun, all right? How about that?
You're like, I don't know, the sun sounds kind of nice. Look, you can, it can always
have it worse, folks, okay? And, you know, at least you still have good food. There's
a lot of still, there's a lot of things to appreciate. You know, you're like, I don't
like driving in Texas. Yeah, but if you drive other places, you notice that their roads
are small and narrow and annoying. You know, I love about Texas is they're giant and we
have so much grace. Have you seen how big our medians are? Like we have just this giant
section of road that's still on the side. So when you mess up, you don't die. And then
even beyond that, you have grass. Like there's so many people that have not died as a result
of how gracious our roads are. You go to other places, it's literally just concrete along
the side. Like if you kind of go off a little bit, I mean, it's just wreck, death, destruction
and everything like that. And so, you know what? That's what I love about Texas roads.
They're big, and everything's bigger in Texas, okay? But you can always find a way to be
angry about the situation, and you can always find a way to be content with the situation.
And what does the righteous, godly person do? They're just always, you know what? It's
fine. It's like that meme of the dog, everything's on fire, and he's just like, this is fine.
Now again, we don't want to take that out of context. I'm not saying be apathetic to
our world. Look, we're going to try and change the culture. We're not fine with people dying
going to hell. We're going to preach them the gospel. We're not fine with wickedness.
We're going to preach the truth. But you know what? Whatever evil happens, and whatever
our life brings us, we should just be content with the situation we find ourselves in. And
not just allowing ourselves to be angry at every single thing. Ah, they slammed the door
in my face. Who cares? Laugh about it. Just take life. Just enjoy life. People that are
angry are just not enjoying life. You only get one life to try and enjoy. Stop wasting
it by being upset about everything. Ah, my kids. You only get to raise them that day
one time. You're only going to get them at that age for that day this one time. Enjoy
it because pretty soon your kids will be old and you won't have anything to enjoy about
them. You know, as far as that age is considered. You know, because a lot of people, they really
love the little years. They're like, man, they loved me and they kissed me and they
They gave me hugs and it was so much fun.
Now they're just these annoying teenagers and they're just moody and they're ungrateful
and they're unthankful and they're not helpful and you're just like, what's wrong with you?
I used to like you a lot, you know, and they're stinky.
They get really stinky when they're teenagers, right?
They eat tons of food and you're just thinking like, man, get a job and get out of here.
And I understand my mom's opinion of me.
She's like, man, when I was like 19 or something, she's like, she's like, I'm willing to just
pay for you to leave.
It's like, what's wrong with me, you know?
But at the end of the day, you know, you can get mad at all the life situations you have
or you can just try to enjoy them the best that you have.
And frankly speaking, all of us really have almost no excuse to be angry because our lives
are amazing.
I mean, we have, we live in America, which again, yeah, it's getting bad, but it's still,
I mean, we've got so much freedom.
We can go to a great church.
We can read the greatest book that's ever been written, the King James Bible.
I mean, we get to all sleep in beds that are nice.
I mean, most of us are not sleeping on the floor, and if you are, it's by your own choice,
okay?
That's your fault.
That's not the world's fault, right?
And you know, we have air conditioning if you want it.
I mean, think about, think about before air conditioning, no one got it.
Some people get mad, they'll go to a building and it'll be kind of warm and they'll be
upset.
It's like, hey, back in the day, you wouldn't even gotten this temperature.
You know, it's like, ah, the Red Hot Preaching Conference is hot.
Think how hot it would have been before AC.
You know, think about how hot, I mean, everybody just had to live in super hot temperatures.
That's why a lot of people didn't live in the South back then.
You know, people weren't living in Phoenix because they would have died, literally.
But now we have the opportunity to live in all kinds of places in the world.
Life has expanded for us because of technology, because of modern advancements in health and
all kinds of things, in water and electricity.
People have all kinds of opportunities to have fun and play all kinds of sports.
I mean, a hundred years ago, there wasn't all these sports.
There wasn't all the different, there wasn't pickleball, you know.
Forgive me if that somehow existed, I'd never heard of it, you know.
A hundred years ago, there wasn't all of the different sport events in a professional capacity.
There wasn't the NFL, there wasn't the NHL.
I don't know the age on the MLB, but I would venture to bet it probably wasn't even around
over a hundred years ago.
And so, you know, we have all kinds of great things that are going for us, yet some people
are just mad about everything.
They're mad because, you know, the pumpkin spice latte's not in season.
It's like, it'll be in season again, okay?
Get over it.
Right?
I mean, people get mad about not having one specific item in their life or one specific
thing or something gets taken away from them or whatever, and they're just mad.
Or how about when we went through COVID literally and people were having to wear masks and everything,
some people were just angry the whole time.
You know, that was the wrong attitude.
And again, look, I was upset with what's going on.
Our government was wicked.
I hate the mask.
It's not that I like love any of those things, but you know what?
It's just wrong to have this attitude of being angry all the time.
And who knows what's going to happen in the future.
We could have even worse things happen.
But let me tell you something.
The fool will be angry about it, and the righteous person will still be content with the life
that he has.
Go to Titus, chapter number one, go to Titus, chapter number one.
You say, okay, this sounds good.
How do I do this?
Right?
Because frankly speaking, it's easy to just say, don't get angry.
It's hard to just not be angry, right?
So how does someone work on their anger?
How does someone control their anger?
Well, I want to look at a few more verses and then I'm going to give you a few tips
on this.
But look at Titus, chapter one, verse seven, the Bible says, "For a bishop must be blameless
as the steward of God, not self-willed, not soon angry."
Now, if this is a requirement for a man to even become a pastor, it sounds like it's
possible.
It's not like something that's unattainable.
It's something that you can literally be, otherwise God wouldn't have put this requirement
here.
He put the requirement here because people truly can be a person that's just not soon
angry.
It's hard to upset them.
It's hard to offend them.
Okay?
Look at 1 Corinthians.
Go to chapter, 1 Corinthians chapter 13, the famous chapter on charity, which charity
is just really at its root core a sincere and true love.
That's what charity is, a sincere and a true love.
Love and charity are synonyms in a sense, but charity is kind of more specific.
Love could be broader.
Charity is like a true and sincere love, but it is love at the core.
1 Corinthians chapter 13, look at verse 4.
Charity suffereth long and is kind.
Charity envieth not.
Charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, does not behave itself unseemly, seeketh
not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil.
Boy I just, I just love this phrase and I think about it all the time, not easily provoked.
And let me ask you a question, if someone else was going to describe you, would they
use that phrase?
Is someone, the people that you work with, your family members, your friends, if they
thought of you, would they say, wow, this person is not easily provoked?
Or would they think, wow, it's easy to set this person off?
Well this is just a litmus test of how much charity you have.
Because the person that has a lot of charity is just not easily provoked.
It's just so difficult to set them off or to get them super irritated with you or to
treat you differently.
And that's something we should all work on.
We need to work on having more charity and being someone that is just not on a hair trigger
to get upset with people.
I think it's just all those stupid memes of people being triggered and it's like these
people have no charity.
The left has no charity.
The demon crats, they just are so easily provoked by everything and you know what, God's people
should be the exact opposite where we can take, we can take it.
You know, sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me, never.
You know, if someone calls me a name, you know how much that hurts me?
Zero.
You know, we don't want to be easily triggered and of course, you know who wants to do that
to you?
The devil's minions want to try and provoke you, don't they?
Especially when you come in through the door, but you know, don't give place to the devil.
Don't let them trigger you, because if they trigger you, you know what, you're showing
that you're weak, you're showing that you don't have control over your own spirit, you're
showing that you're not temperate, and you're showing that you lack charity because you're
just so easily provoked.
Who cares what a bunch of dogs think?
You know, just let it be the same as a chihuahua barking when you're out in the neighborhood.
I feel no need to flip off the chihuahua, you know, I feel no need, I don't care, it's
like yip, yip, yip, yip, yip, yip, yip, yip, yip, yip. I'm not thinking like, come on,
I can take you. I don't need to exert my authority over some chihuahua and tell it how much stronger
I am than it or go kick it or something. Just ignore it. And look, it's hard to get a stupid
annoying dog to leave you alone, but the only thing that works is just ignoring it. It might
take a while and sometimes you have to kind of get far away from its house, but boy, looking
at it, barking back at it, giving it attention, it'll bark louder. It'll get even more animated
won't it? And it's the same with the spiritual dogs and you know, we just want to ignore
them and why is it that you would allow them to provoke you, pride? What does it say? It
says very clearly in this passage, it says, "Not puffed up." What is puffed up? Pride.
So I have three points that'll help you. Number one, if you don't want to allow the devil's
influence in your life and this anger, you need to eliminate pride. You must eliminate
pride. Pride is your issue if you're angry. Pride is a huge issue and that will destroy
you. Go, if you would, to Proverbs chapter 13 for a moment. Go to Proverbs chapter 13.
Why are people constantly getting angry? Because they're prideful people. The most humble people
are very hard to upset, irritate, get provoked. People that are very prideful, it's very easy
to trigger them. It's very easy to cause them to go over the edge. And pride is often the
main arbiter or cause as to why someone is getting angry. So you have to realize that
if you want to stop being angry, you need to reduce your pride levels. You need to become
more humble. You need to lower yourself. Proverbs chapter 13, look at verse 10. "Only by pride
cometh contention, but with the well advised is wisdom." You know, if I walk into a restaurant
and maybe I don't get good service, but I'm thinking like, you know, how dare you not
give me good service? That can cause me to get really angry, right? If I have a really
high and lofty view of myself, wherever I find myself, how dare you treat me like that?
How dare you say that to me? What is that? It's pride, you're puffed up, and then it
causes you to be angry based on the situation. How dare you cut me off in traffic? It's
like who cares? I remember one time, it was like one of the first times I ever got pulled
over by a cop, I was 16 driving, and the area I lived in, Canyon, Texas, it has a town
square, and so you have like normal streets, but then you have these little side like areas
where cars can come in and out of, but it's awkward because it doesn't look normal, and
there was someone waiting to like come out. Well, the light turned, I'm turning left,
and someone was coming out of that more awkward part of the parking lot, so I just didn't
really see them, and I kind of came out but stopped, but then I'm blocking the roadway.
So then I just kind of went on, I kind of went, so I cut them off a little bit, right?
Wasn't a big deal, no accident, nobody honked, whatever. I immediately get pulled over, and
then the cop like walks up to the door and he's like, "Do you know who you cut off in
traffic?" I'm like, "No." He's like, "That was a judge." I'm thinking like, I wasn't
sitting here like, "Man, I can't wait to cut off a judge." And he's all mad and gives
me a ticket for it, and I'm just thinking like, you know, that's weird. Like, I don't
care that you're a judge, right? And it sounds like, "How dare you cut off a judge
in traffic?" Like, it shouldn't matter. It shouldn't matter who's cut off in traffic.
It's all the same, isn't it? But the prideful person thinks like, "How dare you do that
to me? You know, you shouldn't talk to me or act to me like that." You know what? You
have a prideful attitude. Stop being so puffed up and thinking so highly of yourself. Why
don't you go ahead and lower yourself so that you're not angry when something negative
happens to you in your life? You know, people shouldn't necessarily just treat you more
special than other people and if you have that particular idea, you know what? Eliminate
the pride that you have in your heart. Look what it says in Proverbs 19, just flip over
the page, because notice the only reason that there's even contention, which is fighting,
striving, in fact in one definition it says violent effort to achieve your goal is contention,
right? It's saying the only reason this happens is because of pride. How, you know, you're
at someone's at the bar and they're they talk smack on the other guy like hey I'm better
than you how do you say that to me right I'm gonna you know I can't use their language
you know but they're basically just taunting each other and threatening each other because
I'm I'm the tough guy no I'm the tough guy right no I you know you would eat my lunch
right whatever it is and so then they end up fighting they hit each other why because
they they couldn't handle the fact that someone talked negatively about them or talked down
to them or acted like they were better than them so because of their pride they get into
a fight okay look at Proverbs chapter 19 look at verse number 13 a foolish son is the
calamity of his father and the contentions of a wife are a continual dropping so according
to the Bible one of the worst things that can ever happen to a man is having a contentious
wife now let's connect a few dots here why is someone contentious the Bible said the
only reason someone's contentious is pride I didn't say that the Bible said that so
the only reason a wife is ever contentious with her husband is because she's prideful
now what is that pride meaning I'm smarter than you I'm better than you I know more than
you whatever the situation is and then they cause fights in the relationship they say
like oh well if you were if you're a better person if you're as good a person as me then
we wouldn't have this problem you know if you're as smart as me if you just listen to
me if you just do it it's like that's pride it's pride every single time and you know
what it causes fights in the relationship and you know what it causes a lot of anger
when you're prideful oh well my husband didn't do what I want and she's just getting angry
and then you know when she's angry you know everything changes right the face changes
you know then all of a sudden she starts cleaning dishes and it's like hey is everything good
it's fine it's really fine everything's good you're like whoa right what did the dishes
do to you nothing but you know what they're transferring their anger to the dishes aren't
they the trash they're transferring the dishes to your objects right maybe guys have had
objects broken by their spouse because they're angry right something was trashed as a result
of anger and I'm telling you you know what it's a bad place to be in you don't want
to let anger take over your relationship take over your life and allow it to affect your
behavior and notice it's coming from pride how do I get rid of this pastor Shelley stop
being prideful stop thinking that you're smarter than your husband better than your husband
that he's a worse person than you and then you won't be angry at his failures you won't
be as upset when he makes a decision that you don't agree with you know what if you
just always are thinking well I always know better than him I'm always smarter than him
I always I'm just a better person than him the more you think about that the more angry
you're going to be in your life because if you've already convinced yourself you're better
then he can only fail I'm telling you you want to eliminate anger you have to decide
to become humble and you can't think more highly of yourself you guys at work same deal
you think you're better than your boss if you think you're smarter than your boss if
you think everything your boss does is wrong you're just going to be angry at the job every
day just all day just like man my boss is just stupid and he's just lazy and he doesn't
even know how to manage and it's just then you're just every day you're just upset it's
like you don't work for Laban you don't work for Pharaoh look I guarantee there's worse
bosses out there you know why don't you just lower yourself a little bit humble yourself
a little bit and just say yes sir who cares if your boss sucks you thought you worked
for him so what does that say about you it says if a ruler harken to lies all his servants
are wicked so what does that say about you why don't you start talking positive about
your boss so it'll make you sound better okay instead of talking trash on everybody that
is over you and authority go if you would to Psalm chapter 19 1 19 number one you need
to eliminate pride and that's probably the most important point here's another tip of
how you can eliminate this is eliminate expectations and of course this goes coincides with what
I just said because if you if you think like I deserve special treatment then you're mad
when you don't get it right but if you lower yourself humble yourself and you say I have
no expectations of special treatment then you're not upset when you don't get special
treatment just already have really really really low expectations and you know I try
to teach this to my staff and I kind of have a crass way of saying it but I just say everybody
sucks now what I mean by that is that basically everyone's gonna probably disappoint you not
come through make promises and not deliver things are not gonna go according to plan
people are gonna be late people are gonna sign up and not show up people are gonna not
sign up and then show up people are gonna show up and complain I mean it's just this
is life and I'm like if you go into work and you say you know what I think everybody's
gonna show up on time they're gonna do what they said there's gonna be no problems no
complaining then you're just basically gonna live your whole life just being upset you're
like oh they're late again they lied again they said this again and it's just like you
just get angry so what do you have to do eliminate expectations eliminate having this false idea
of just like everything's gonna be perfect and go right and there's gonna be no mistakes
because when you when you do this it helps you to not be angry every time there's a problem
what it says in 165 Psalm 119 165 great peace have they which love thy law and nothing shall
offend them now keep this in mind go to John 16 real quick go to John chapter 16 I want
to show you something but this is a principle that Jesus employed himself eliminating expectations
look at John chapter 16 verse 1 these things have I spoken unto you that you should not
be offended Jesus was telling his disciples hey this is how bad it's going to be in the
future why so they would not be offended so they would not get what angry at the situation
so sometimes you need to just prepare yourself and prepare others look things aren't going
to always work out things aren't always going to be good bad stuff's going to happen and
anticipate problems anticipate issues so then you're not angry when they happen you know
let me tell you all you moms in here that have little kids let me tell you something
Your kids are going to disobey you tomorrow, and they're probably going to make messes,
and they're probably going to do dumb things, and they're probably going to be selfish.
And if you know what, you're going to bed tonight thinking, you know what, I can't take
another day if my kids aren't perfect.
You're setting yourself up for failure.
You should go into tomorrow thinking, my kids are probably going to make mistakes, they're
probably going to have issues, I'm probably going to have to discipline them, I'm probably
going to have to spank them, I'm probably going to have to deal with them, I'm going
to have to make them lunch, I'm going to have to make them dinner, I'm going to probably
have to cut the cusks off, I'm going to have to clean up messes, hey if I make them chocolate
milk, one of them is going to probably spill it, right?
Like you have to go into life just saying like wow, I'm going to have issues because
I have children, they're children, they're not perfect, but you know if you go into the
day thinking like well I hope my kids are perfect today, you're just going to be mad,
and then you're just going to be mad every single time they screw up, every time they
mess up, you know one of the best things we do in this context is anytime we have spaghetti,
babies eat without any clothes, okay, why?
Because we already know what's going to happen, I've never had a baby eat spaghetti and wasn't
just filthy afterwards right, and you know what we would have been mad if we put them
in their best outfit and then fed them spaghetti, why?
Because they would have ruined it, it's like hey here's a perfect beautiful white dress,
let's put our baby in that and then feed it spaghetti, like you're just putting yourself
in a bad situation and you're going to cause all kinds of issues because you have the wrong
expectations. And what you're supposed to do is eliminate expectations. Expect them
to be messy and then when they're not, be pleasantly surprised. But you know what, don't
go into it thinking like well I guarantee you they're going to be perfect because then
when they're super messy it just makes you angry and upset and you have lots of problems.
Go if you would to Philippians chapter 3 last place I'll have you turn. So point one
is this, if you want to eliminate anger, if you don't want to let the devil influence
you, you need to be humble. Stop being so prideful. And to piggyback off of that, number
two, eliminate expectations. Don't have all these just lofty, high expectations. People
even do this in their relationships where they watch some romantic movie, where some
guy just takes his wife to Italy and they just travel around and eat food and they don't
have any kids and they're like, why is our relationship this romantic? Because you have
five kids. Because you know what, he has to actually pay for stuff. Because it's real,
okay? And it's not a movie. There's a big reason why. And it's like women dream up this
idea of like, well I thought this was what marriage was going to be like. Wrong! That
is not like marriage, okay? And so they build up all these expectations that their husband
can't deliver and then they're mad at their husband when he didn't even do anything wrong.
Men could do the same thing with their wives. They could have some kind of idealistic thought
about their wives that's not reality, not going to happen. Like I guarantee when I come
home it's going to be like the house is in perfect shape, everything's put up, dinner's
hot on the table, and it's just like, "Yes sir, master sir, what would you like now sir?
Can I rub your feet and back? I never have headaches. I never am pregnant. I'm never
having a bad day. I'm never crying. What can I do to serve you?" That wife doesn't
exist folks. Look, my wife is as close to perfect as you can get, but you know what?
Even I don't have that every day. It's just most every day. I'm just kidding. But seriously,
let's be realistic about our relationships and our lives and our jobs and our church
and not just getting angry about every single setback, every single problem, every single
issue.
Here's my third tip on how to reduce anger is to realize that you can't change the past.
Realize you can't change the past. You can't. I don't care what happened, you still can't
change it.
"Well, this really bad thing happened."
Can you change it? And here's the answer every time. No. It already happened. The past is
literally the past. And so it's silly to get mad about something you can't even change.
You know what you need to get really good at is just forgetting the past. Look at Philippians
chapter 3 verse 13.
"Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do, forgetting those
things which are behind and reaching forth into those things which are before, I press
toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."
Now in this context, the Apostle Paul had to forget a lot of things. He had to forget
that he dedicated his whole life to work salvation. And how that was dung is how he describes
it. And what he had to do is he had to change his entire religion, change his entire life,
drop all of his friends. And you know what Paul could have done? He could have just spent
the rest of his life being angry about the fact that he was raised in false religion.
He could have been angry about the Pharisee relationships he had. He could be angry that
God had him do all these things of his past. But you know what he said? "I just went ahead
and forgot about it." Who cares? Nuts do that. You know you can just be angry about all the
past that you have, past mistakes, past issues, and you know sometimes people are just mad
at themselves even. It's not even necessarily another person. They're just mad at themselves
like, "I wish I had been spending more of my life dedicated to church or reading the
Bible or I wish I was healthier." You know? And a lot of times health, you can't fix that.
Like you damaged yourself or you hurt yourself or you made a mistake and now you can't
necessarily fix that. Instead of just sitting and being angry with yourself all the time,
forget it and just control what you can today. Stop being so angry about all the decisions
and the bad decisions you've made in the past and just say, "You know what? I'm gonna make
a good decision today. Right now, I can choose to make a good decision right now." And you
know what? Well, but you don't understand what this person did to you. But that was
in the past. Why do I just continue being angry about something that you can't even
change now? Right? You know, relationships again. If someone trespasses against me, but
they can't fix it because it's already happened, why don't I just say, "You know what? Nuts
to it. Let's move on. Let's just keep going with life." You know, all relationships would
be fixed if we just all did that right now. If every relationship you have a problem with
and every person has a problem with you, just hit this button that says, "I'm going to forget
everything that I'm mad at you for right now." Your relationship should be fixed instantly.
But why is it that people have problems in their relationships? It's because they're
holding on to some past grievance, and they just won't let it go. But here's the fact,
you can't change the past. You know, and if Hosea can allow himself to buy his own wife
to continue being his wife, you know what? That's a pretty tall task. I think you can
forgive the people in your life. If Jesus Christ can die on the cross for all of your
sins and forgive you of all your sins, I think you can forgive other people. And I think
forgiveness is a pretty big issue in the Bible, isn't it? But why is it that people
get angry? Because they won't forgive. And you know what? When you don't forgive, you're
giving place to the devil. And what does that do? It generates anger in your relationship,
anger in your bosom, and that will cause you to sin in all kinds of ways. You know, we
as God's people need to eliminate anger. We need to control the anger that we experience
on a daily basis. And frankly speaking, we need to get to the place where that type of
person where it says, you know, he's slow to anger. He's not soon angry. He's not easily
offended. He's not easily provoked. We want to be that person. How do you do that? Eliminate
pride. Eliminate your expectations. And realize you just can't change the past. Close the
prayer. Thank you, Father, for giving us such great wisdom. And we understand that we're
human. We're flesh. We're going to have bad emotions at times. We're going to be tempted
to be upset or be angry. But I pray that you would help us to realize it's not good to
be quick to be angry or hasty to be angry. It's better to just be humble, have the right
kind of expectations, and to just not allow ourselves to dwell on the past, but rather
forget the things of the past. And just look to the future. Look to the things that we
can change. I pray that you would help to humble all of us. You would help us to be
a group of people that are not easily offended or provoked, but rather we have a lot of love
and charity in our hearts towards others, just as you give us a lot of love and charity.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.