Pastor Wayne Cordeiro
November 19, 2006 - W0647

God has given us the capacity for every emotion. As followers of Christ, we need to steward these emotions. One particular emotion is anger. This emotion is difficult to steward and if we’re not careful, misusing anger can be destructive to ourselves as well as to others. On the other hand, a certain degree of anger has the ability to motivate us to act, to change ourselves from within, thus making us wiser decision makers.

So what do we do with anger and how do we tame it? First, we should understand why we get angry.  And then, instead of allowing our temper to get out of hand, we can convert it into something good. Or better yet, we can go to Jesus and tell Him what we’re feeling and process our emotion before Him. By doing so, He’ll mentor us.

The Bible tells us this:  “He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules over his spirit, than he who captures a city” (Prov. 16:32). This passage tells us if we can control our anger, we are better than the mighty. It delights the Lord when we’re able to slow our anger and use it correctly.

Let’s take a look at some of the reasons we get angry and remedies to change the way we think. Here are five reasons for our negative anger.

REASONS FOR NEGATIVE ANGER

1.     LACK OF COURAGE

Think about it…when situations go south, whether at home or work, maybe it’s because we don’t have the courage to graciously resolve the problem with the other person. Yet if we took a closer look, maybe it’s just a misunderstanding caused by a lack of communication. Because of our pride, we may lack the courage to graciously resolve the problem or situation. It is important to recognize this lack of courage and allow the Lord to work within us. Pray for courage that we may be the ones who’ll initiate an open conversation to peacefully resolve problems. We may just find that the other person was right and we blew things out of proportion. A second reason for negative anger is…

2.      FEAR OF THE TRUTH

It may be that we are afraid of the truth. Maybe we hold onto our anger because deep down inside we know that we need to change and not the other person. It could be that the other person is right and we are wrong. In this case, pray for courage to face the truth and allow the Lord to work within you. Besides lack of courage and fear of truth, the third reason for our negative anger is…

3.  LACK OF CONTROL

There are and always will be things in the world that we are not be able to control. For instance, we have no control when someone in our family dies or what the weather will be. Yet when things get out of control, we become angry at God. Why? Because deep down inside ourselves, we want control. Yet the truth is…we’re not suppose to control everything. Remember, God is in control. It is to our benefit to trust the Lord knowing that He is always in control.  That leads to our fourth reason for negative anger:

4.      LACK OF TRUST IN GOD.

For instance, we lose our jobs and we become angry yet we understand that the Lord knows what’s best for us; therefore, we need to trust in Him and His plans for our lives. The Lord will work things out in our lives for our good, we just need to trust Him.

So far, the reasons for negative anger have been spiritual, but this fifth and last one is physical:  

5.     LACK OF SLEEP!

Isn’t it true that when we’re fatigued we tend to get angry quickly? For instance, if I don’t get much sleep one night, at the end of the next day when I get home, if I find that dinner is not ready, this triggers my anger and I get upset with my wife. Thank goodness my wife will usually realize that I’m tired and she’ll tell me to get some sleep, and when I wake up I’m not angry anymore.  So if you find yourself angry, maybe you just need to get some sleep because our physical condition affects our psyche.

So you see, our negative anger could be caused by lack of courage, fear of the truth, lack of control, lack of trust in God or even just a lack of sleep.  Now that we understand the reasons, what can we do to avoid the anger destruction zone?

Note, it is important that we understand we are capable of controlling anger. Here’s an example:

We’re at home, angry and yelling at our spouse or kids. The phone then rings and we answer it with a calm, “Hello,” and continue a peaceful conversation with the caller. See! We are able to control our anger, we just have to choose to.

God wants us to steward our angry emotions. To do this, we need to change the way we think. It’s usually the way we perceive a situation, not the situation itself, that determines our reaction.  So we need to change the way we think but how do we do that? Here are three Biblical principles for us to follow to tame anger.

THREE REMEDIES

1.     BRING RESOLUTION QUICKLY.

When you sense an anger in you that is negative, resolve it quickly. Don’t allow things to fester and reach a point of destructive behavior. The Bible tells us, “Be angry yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger” (Eph. 4:26). This passage instructs us to deal with our anger quickly…to address it before the sun goes down. In other words, give yourself a deadline by which you’ll stop being angry.  By doing so, you will control anger and anger will not control you.

If we don’t resolve our issues quickly, we tend to nurse our anger and let it stew within us. By the time you know it, your anger has grown enough to become ballistic. You may wonder why God didn’t just remove our capacity for that kind of negative anger. It may be that God entrusted us with this capacity in order to enable us to develop enough traction to change ourselves, rather than destroy other people with it.

What does it mean to have “enough traction to change ourselves”?  It means to use our anger in a constructive way, to use our anger to motivate ourselves to make a change for the better. For example, you may be in a relationship where there’s a lot of friction and anger. You’ve been beaten and you get angry because you’ve been beaten. If you are angry about being beaten, you may just be angry enough to move out of the relationship, and that is good.  You see God gives us the capacity for all of our emotions but it is how we process our emotions that God cares about.  In this case, God gives us the capacity to be angry but it is really how we handle and convert that anger that matters.

Here’s a tip for married couples. When you find yourself angry, don’t stuff it or hold it in inside you. Remember that you’ve got habits and your spouse has habits too. These habits can make you irritable so if you’ll just talk about it, you can adjust and resolve the issue rather than stuffing it down and allowing anger to grow.  So …

• REPORT FEELINGS ONE BY ONE.

For instance when your husband leaves dirty socks around the house, kindly explain that you’re a little upset because you’ve just cleaned up. Then, courteously ask if he can put his socks where they should be placed. In addition to this…

• FORGIVE ONE BY ONE.

Don’t wait until something is infected before you forgive. By that time, it’ll be too late and you’ll have withheld forgiveness for far too long.  To illustrate this, let’s use a 1-10 scale with 1 as a little inconvenience and 10 for murder. Don’t wait until your level of anger has increased to 10 before you do something about it. Deal with your anger when it is at a low level (2 or 3). Don’t allow your capacity get out of sorts. Instead of getting mad, maybe next time you should laugh about it!  

• KEEP LAUGHTER ALIVE.

Don’t take yourself so seriously. God has a sense of humor, just look in the mirror. Sorry, but we’re not all that we think we are. It’s so important to keep a sense of humor; it could save your relationships. Remember that the Lord is the One who’ll work things out in our lives. Let’s do what’s possible and allow God to do the impossible. Again, just look at one another and laugh because your spouse is not your enemy. So who or what is?

• LOCATE THE REAL ENEMY.

The Bible says we war not against flesh and blood. But against powers and principalities, with spiritual wickedness in high places. The devil is the real enemy here, not your spouse, co-worker or children. This adversary would love to get you and your co-worker upset with one another to ruin your testimony as well as your future.

So in the midst of yelling amongst one another, listen closely because there will be cackling in the shadows. The laughter of a demonic presence that’s glad because we’re doing his work for him. The real enemy is the adversary of your soul. And, his goal is to destroy your life and your relationships. And so instead of yelling at one another…

• PRACTICE SPEAKING WHAT IS RIGHT.

Isn’t true when we’re angry we want to tell the other person what we think is right? Or better yet, give them a piece of our mind. On the contrary, this is not truth. The Bible tells us, “Thy word is truth and the sum there of” (Psm. 119). In other words, the truth is God loves the other person and Jesus died for them. What we say or feel about the other person is not the truth. So even if we’re able to tell the other person off and hurt them with our words, all we’ll be showing them is how rotten we are on the inside. Yet, this would not be the right thing to do because all they’ll see is your flesh speaking. So crucify the flesh and practice speaking what is right.

A lot of times it’s not about how you feel. There’ll be times when you’ll feel like a hypocrite because although angry you’ll be speaking what is right. Remember, it’s easy to tell others how you feel, but it’s not going to help anything. Instead, tell Jesus how you feel. And allow the Lord to edit what you’ll say, or thinking a certain way or to repent of something.

By doing so you will not spout your feelings quickly. But instead, processed your feelings before the Lord. This is called coaching, counseling and mentored by the Lord. Isn’t true that we have coaches that helps us to do a speech or a job interview? Yet when it comes to real life situations we think we can just fly things un-edited. Another principle to live by so we can avoid our anger from going into the red zone is…

2.     SLOW ANGER TO A STANDSTILL.

Which means when anger is starting to escalate, slow it to a standstill. Don’t allow your anger to build. Address it before you start to hurt others or self-destruct. “Everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger, for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God” (Jam. 1:19-29). Anything you think you can accomplish while being angry is false. “A man’s discretion makes him slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook a transgression” (Prov. 19:11).  The highest trophies are yours if you are able to slow down anger and convert it to making good changes within yourself. And finally, when you come to a point of anger, the remedy is to stop and…

3.     ALWAYS LOOK INWARD FIRST !

You may find that when you’re angry it’s an imaturity within ourselves. For example, someone cuts you off on the freeway and you get upset. Yet, if you think about it maybe you were as selfish as the other driver and you both wanted to go first. What you could have done was over look the transgression.

At times, we look outside for a person that causes us anger. Rather than looking inside ourselves. A lot of times the seeds are inside ourselves. An example of this is when the Pharisees were upset because the disciples did not do a ceremonial washing of hands before a meal. (Mat. 15:1-2) “Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat! Then in (Mat.15:10) Jesus replies, “Listen and understand. What goes into a man’s mouth does not make him unclean, but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him unclean. And, “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders…false witness, slanders. These are the things which defile the man” (Matt. 15:19-20). This tells us that it’s not what goes into our mouths that defile us, but what comes out of our mouths.

Often it is the seeds of slander, murder, anger, hate, bitterness that lay as seedlings in the soil of our hearts which hasn’t sprouted yet. But when someone’s action surfaces, it causes one of these bad seeds to surface from within us. Our reaction is anger and we blame the other person for making us angry. Suffice to say, the disposition of angriness to everything around you was already in you. It was a seed or a tendency to get angry.

On the other hand, our reaction could would be feeling sorry for him. And to if there was something we could do to help or even avoid him. So look inward first, because it makes a difference.

Holy Communion is a good time to come before the cross to see if there are any unrighteous seedlings within our hearts. So how do we get rid of those seeds of lust, anger etc.? Repent and let the blood of Christ wash those things away.

When Aaron was about 7 or 8 years old, we’d given the kids about $4 each to buy some candy while on a trip. As we stopped at a store, Aaron came out and said, dad I bought you a present. I thought it was cool. Aaron continued by saying, I spent $4 for it. I thought wow, that’s a lot of money. With this, I asked what he’d bought. I then opened up the package and found a shot glass. Astounded, I asked my son why he had gotten it for me knowing daddy didn’t drink hard liquor. Aaron said, I thought you’d like that. This is crazy, I replied! Why did you get me a shot glass, what am I going to use this for? I looked at my wife Anna and she just shrugged her shoulders.

As we drove in the car, I looked in the rear view mirror and saw Aaron with tears coming down his face. Then I thought, not only you’re dumb but now you’re hyper sensitive. So I told Aaron to knock it off. I then asked my son again why he bought me a shot glass. And he said, dad you’re a Pastor. And quickly I replied, yes I know. Aaron then continued, I’ve seen you take communion. And whenever we take communion everybody uses a plastic cup. And you’re the Pastor, you should have your own communion cup. And so I bought it for you for communion.

Now by this time, I’m crying too!

Seeds of anger inside us can be triggered by anything we don’t understand. We’ll just react with anger which will destroy relationships and potential. So instead, allow anger to compel you to change. Be angry at your anger. This is the point of conversion.   

We can change the way we think! And by doing so, we’ll grow into wise decision makers. For “He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules over his spirit, than he who captures a city”(Prov. 16:32).  And this delights the Lord!

DISCUSSION ITEMS

Q1) Recall the last time you got angry. What were you angry about?  What was the real reason for your anger?  (E.g., a lack of courage, truth, control, trust or sleep)

Q2) Which of the following three remedies would have helped you deal with your anger?

• Bring resolution quickly.
• Slow anger to a standstill.
• Always look inward first!

Q3) Are there any negative seeds in your character or spirit that the Lord is bringing to your attention?  How is He bringing it to your attention?

Q4)  In what ways can you allow anger to motivate you to a positive action or change?

"All scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong with our lives. It straightens us out and teaches us to do what is right. It is God’s way of preparing us in every way, fully equipped for every good thing God wants us to do.” (2 Tim. 3:16-17 NLT)

 Sermon Notes Ministry: Debbie Chang, Doreen Rabaino, Leighton Loo,

                                                Jay Tsukayama & Rhonda Pang