Tag: Anger

Digging in Deeper: Ephesians 4:26-27

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“‘Be angry and do not sin.’ Don’t let the sun go down on your anger, and don’t give the devil an opportunity.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Anger is a challenging emotion. It is also a masking emotion. Anger can serve as an easy emotional substitute for whatever it is we are actually feeling. Often we don’t or can’t put word to what our actual emotional state is, and because anger is easier to both understand and express, we just let that take over. Sometimes anger is the right emotional response to a particular situation. More often it probably is not. But in spite of the good that can come from righteous and proper anger – anger over injustice, for instance – when anger gets in the driver’s seat of our lives, it can cause all sorts of chaos. I’m thinking about anger this morning because that complicated emotion lies at the heart of the newest Marvel offering. Let’s talk about Captain America: Brave New World.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 32:19-20

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“As he approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses became enraged and threw the tablets out of his hands, smashing them at the base of the mountain. He took the calf they had made, burned it up, and ground it to powder. He scattered the powder over the surface of the water and forced the Israelites to drink the water.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

What makes you angry? Are they mostly righteous things or selfish ones? We all have our list. The items on that list are the result of all kinds of different experiences. Ultimately, the things that make us angry say a lot about us. If we get angry about the wrong things, that’s a sign that we believe the wrong things. If we get angry about the right things, we are much more likely to be on the right track…even angry. When Moses discovered what the Israelites were doing, he got angry. Let’s talk about what happened here and what should make us angry.

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One Is the Loneliest Number

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This past Sunday we covered one more load we carry when we try to do life apart from Jesus as we draw near the end of our series, A Heavy Load. This week we talked about the load of loneliness. Life was not meant to be lived alone. We were made for relationships. When we do life without Jesus, though, maintaining those relationships because entirely more difficult than it should be. Read on to find out why and how we can fix this.

One Is the Loneliest Number

Have you ever spent a significant amount of time alone? I don’t mean simply hanging out at home when nobody else is around for a couple of hours. I’m talking about a time when you didn’t have anybody around for an extended period of time. Honestly, Covid subjected a lot of folks to that in ways and times they were neither expecting nor for which they were prepared. And maybe you’re sitting there thinking how much you would like to have an extended amount of time by yourself because you can’t think of the last time you weren’t being constantly bombarded by people, but it’s a different animal wanting something like that because you can’t have it and being stuck alone because you can’t be around people like you want to be. Being alone…isn’t good for us. 

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All Fired Up

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This week we kick off a brand-new teaching series called, A Heavy Load. So often, as we go through this life, we seek to do it on our own. We try and solve our own problems. We overcome our own challenges. We bear our own burdens. And at least in this culture, we’re taught to do just that. If you can’t manage your own stuff, what good are you anyway? But doing life on our own gets heavy after all. The weight of it all can begin to drag on our lives in all kinds of ways that add up and have an impact over time. The better approach is to quit trying to do life on our own and start doing it with Jesus. Over the next five weeks we are going to look at four specific loads we try and bear on our own, why that doesn’t work, and why doing life with Jesus is better. Then, in the final part, we’ll explore just why exactly life is so much better with Jesus. You won’t want to miss a single part of this conversation. Thanks for reading and sharing.

All Fired Up

I want you to do some remembering with me for just a minute this morning. I want you to think back to the last time you were genuinely angry about something that did not impact you directly and over which you had no control. If that seems oddly specific, there’s a reason for it which we’ll get to in a little bit. I’m not thinking about that time you saw something that was mildly irritating on one social media platform or another. I’m talking about the time you were angry – really and truly angry – but the object of your ire was not something that was having any sort of a direct impact on your life, and you weren’t really able to meaningfully do anything about it anyway. 

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Digging in Deeper: James 1:19-20

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“My dear brothers and sisters, understand this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger, for human anger does not accomplish God’s righteousness.”
— ‭‭James‬ ‭1:19-20‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

I don’t usually come back to the same passage quite so soon after talking about it on a given day, but I just couldn’t think of any more relevant a word for what I am seeing happen in my little corner of the world right now than what James wrote here. A couple of weeks ago, we talked about anger and why people seem so angry all the time these days. Then, this past week, I’ve watched people be angry and stay angry and my mind went back to James’ wisdom. What are they angry about? On the surface, a bit of cloth, thread, and elastic that can’t cost more than about fifty cents. Let’s talk this morning about masks.

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