James - Part 3 (Anger)

This is the third episode in our summer sermon series, James: Wisdom from a Little Brother. Pastor Mike teaches from James 1:19-21 to learn what Scripture says about anger.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Reading from the book of Proverbs, fourteen, verse twenty-nine. Whoever is patient and has great understanding, whoever is patient has great understanding, but one who is quick tempered displays folly. An angry person stirs up conflict, and a hot tempered person commits many sins.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

The second reading today is from Matthew 5, 21 through 26. You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, you shall not murder. And anyone who murders will be subject to judgment. But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to their brother or sister, Raka, is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, You fool, will be in danger of the fire of hell. Therefore, if you are an offering a gift at the altar and there you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First, go to be reconciled to them, and then come and offer your gift. Settle matters quickly with your adversary who is talking who is taking you to court. Do it while you are still together on the way, or your adversary may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison. Truly I tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.

SPEAKER_02 1:54

Would you stand one more time as a read from the book of James?

SPEAKER_03 1:59

We're still in chapter one, and I'll begin in verse 19. If you need to, you can grab a Bible in front of you. Uh and I'll be in James today.

SPEAKER_02 2:10

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this. Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.

SPEAKER_03 2:23

Because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent, and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

SPEAKER_02 2:41

You may be seated. Some of us are thinking, oh no, what are we going to talk about today?

SPEAKER_03 2:51

The smell of a cafeteria, um, elementary cafeteria room uh is nostalgic for me. I uh I actually like it. I loved school. And as a kid going into lunchroom, I was introduced to lots of new foods that end up being some of my favorite childhood foods. Uh as an adult, not so much. Um and uh do you remember as a kid, we we were talking with the Anthonies about this this week. Uh when we got milk for school, you got like a little milk carton that you couldn't ever open up. It always just kind of just kept folding. And uh uh Molly was saying she got pouches where you stuck a uh a um a straw into. That probably was a little bit easier. And when I was a kid, there were a couple flavors of milk. We had regular milk, and of course, the favorite chocolate milk. Uh, but at that time we also had strawberry milk and banana flavored milk. Yes, that didn't last. Um and so as a kid, I just love I love going to the lunchroom. Like all of us, recess is probably some of our favorite time. And if you didn't bring a sack lunch, you would get in line and you would end up grabbing a tray. And these trays were ingenious. Like somebody somewhere, an engineer somewhere, remembered what it was like to be a kid at the lunch line, and he created or she created this tray that compartmentalized everything so that food didn't touch, so that that slimy green spinach water didn't get over into your tater tots, right? Like you had these nice little compartmentalized. Some of you as adults still like your food not touching, right? Anybody? Some of you turn everything into a casserole, you just throw it all on, right? Like just it doesn't matter, it's all going the same place. Um I I'm a little bit in between. Like I like compartments. I like this, I like the organization of it too. Uh huh. Some of us adults would prefer that parts of our lives also stay compartmentalized. Like we like these little parts where maybe our home life is over here and our work life is down over here. Some of us maybe like our political life up here, but then our church life down in this corner. And James, we're studying a letter that he wrote, and he's gonna push back on this idea of compartmentalizing our faith, where we try to resist, we're tempted to let our faith kind of spill over and to pour on and saturate some of the other parts of our life. James is gonna push back and resist that. In fact, some of the other writers, or many, all the other writers in scripture, but many of the followers of Jesus in the first century wouldn't resist this idea that following Jesus is a Sunday morning activity and then hands off the rest of the week. James is gonna talk about this a little bit throughout this book. He's gonna resist how we can compartmentalize and section off, and he's gonna say, the Holy Spirit should have an all-access pass to me. Like full on, everywhere, every day. James is gonna say, there is no country club Christianity where we can just go to something and experience something for a short time, and it has no impact on the rest of our life. And he's gonna do it by addressing some difficult topics. It's gonna sting a little bit. Uh we're gonna sit down with our little brother James today, and hear his wisdom on anger. It's interesting that James puts in the same conversation about anger our use and how we use our ears and how we use our mouths. Uh, because that's where we get in trouble a lot. Victoria is going to teach in a couple weeks on how we use our mouth in chapter three. Uh but here James acknowledges how anger can influence how we listen, our listening skills. Philosopher Dallas Willard believed that anger is the most fundamental problem in a human life. That's a huge statement. To say that anger would be this fundamental issue that gets poured out into, like, and can impact all of our daily lives. So let's look at James 4. Let's jump ahead a little bit. We're gonna look at James 4. If you have your Bible, you can go to verse 1, and I'll have it on the screen. James is gonna say, hey, there are things that happen externally that all begin internally. What causes fights and quarrels among you, he asks? Well, don't they come from your desires that battle inside you? Doesn't it like all start inside? You desire, but you don't have, so you kill. You covet, but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. If we go all the way back to the very beginning in Genesis, we find these first humans, we find a conversation between God and this really angry brother, and it's interesting. He's so angry all about worship. The first, like real huge fight has to do with worship and who God is and how we engage with him. Look at Genesis 4. Then the Lord said to Cain, Why are you so angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what's right, will you not be accepted? If you'll read the yellow with me. But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you, but you must rule over it. God's warning Cain, he's saying, Listen, if you let anger have full control, then destructive behavior is waiting to be unleashed. It's like over in the corner and it's about to take over your life. And then in a few short verses, we have a law and order scene. Two brothers go at it, and one doesn't make it out. The Apostle Paul encourages us to embrace kindness over anger in Ephesians chapter 4. If you'll read the yellow, get rid of all bitterness and rage and anger and brawling and slander among, along with every form of malice. So I have a I have a professor whose name is, I had a professor, his name is James Bryan Smith, and he calls that kind of anger a meditative anger. An anger that we kind of think about and stew on and allow it to ruminate over and over again, an anger that eventually rules over us. It's the slow progression of simply getting angry to becoming an angry person. How many of you know a chronic angry person? Or a little hesitant. Even raise their hand. Victoria, you're a little hesitant there. Oh, is it me? Yeah. Um yeah, like we become the little things that we allow to happen every day. And so there's this propensity to become an angry person. Another type of anger that my professor talks about is a visceral anger. And this one is not necessarily like thinking upon and stewing on. This one's more instinctive. It just happens. Like it's this, it's our knee-jerk reaction. It's the anger that comes up in us when something happens. Like a parent, when you're sitting at the table and your child just bumps over and spills the milk. What comes up? When you're driving and a car pulls out in front of you, what comes out? Or or when someone gives you constructive feedback that you did not ask for, how do you respond? Philosophers believe that anger is fueled by two ingredients unmet expectations, and fear. If the scenario around me is not meeting my expectations, anger rises up. If I'm afraid that I can't control what you think and do and say, anger will rise up. There are a lot of idioms uh that representing uh anger um blowing a fuse, hot under the collar, seeing red.

SPEAKER_02 11:23

Can you think of any else? I couldn't think of other any other? What'd you say?

SPEAKER_03 11:31

A bit of oh I like that because that almost diffuses the anger. A bit of a wobbly, he said, is a British term. I like that one. The heat what'd you say, Evie? Hot headed, hot-headed, right? Yeah, don't you? I love this film, uh, Inside Out. Yeah, yes. Uh hot headed. Yeah. So a Hebrew, I I kind of referenced this a few weeks ago with Jonah. A Hebrew idiom for slow to anger is long of nose. Because there in the Hebrew psychology, ancient Hebrew psychology, the seat of anger was your nose. Kind of like in English, where our the seat of our of love is our heart. So the seat of anger in Hebrew culture would be your nose. And the same word that's translated anger can be translated as nostrils, like your nostrils flaring because you're so angry. And there are varying degrees of anger. So I use a uh a feeling wheel uh sometimes when I'm doing pastoral counseling or I'm doing spiritual direction, because I think it's really important that we name exactly what we're feeling uh or what the emotion is. Sometimes our limited vocabulary kind of goes against us. And so this wheel, it also is overlaid by color, and so that helps us see a contrasting emotion. So from anger, the contrasting emotion would be peaceful on the opposite side of it. And so there, let me just say a few words that represent anger. So on the lighter side, it's frustrated or let down or mad. And then we get into the more deeper words like humiliated, infuriated, resentful, bitter, betrayed, annoyed, violated, disrespected, and furious.

SPEAKER_02 13:24

So what makes you angry? Like if you think back on the last week, did anything make you angry? You don't have to call it out.

SPEAKER_03 13:39

Uh that might cause some people to be angry. Uh I was angry this week. I can think of a couple times where I became angry. Um it could have been a small pet peeve. Some of us have some really interesting pet peeves, could have been hurt by somebody, uh, could have had this and another injustice come up in the news and you get upset. So I grew up uh with a family member who is emotionally unstable. Uh and that person's anger would just explode and he would become violent. And as a kid, if you're experiencing that your whole life, we pick up stories and narratives that we hold on to all through our lives, right? So we pick up these narratives and then we carry them into our adult life, and our poor partners or spouses have to deal with some of the stuff. Uh, and so for some of that narrative for me as a kid was avoid anger at all costs. Attempt to make sure that everybody's happy at all times. Try to diffuse anger as much as you can so nothing terrible happens. And so as an adult, anger could never be, I was never comfortable with anger being in the room. And to think that all anger would be unhealthy anger, which is not the truth. I'll tell you that. Oh, we'll talk about that in a second. But sometimes each of us have these different relationships with anger. A lot of times it's because of how we experienced it as a kid. In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus speaks about the destructiveness of anger. Uh, Sarah read it earlier. And in this part of the Sermon on the Mount, which takes place in several chapters, this is the part that he keeps saying, You've heard this, but I'm going to tell you this. He's going to say, You've heard about this, but but let me talk about it a little more deeply. So back at Matthew chapter 5, he says in verse 21, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, you shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment. And so he's referencing the Hebrew law. Like, this is what's going to happen if you murder. But he's going to say, You've heard that, but let me tell you what I think. I tell you that anyone who's angry, now, this kind of anger is this like rage anger, which we are in a culture right now that's addicted to rage. Would you agree with me? All right. So, yeah, what'd you say? Yes, that's right. Like, people are even setting things out for us to be angry. And so, so he says, Listen, there's this kind of anger. I tell you that whoever's angry, your brother or sister will be subject to judgment. That word judgment means like a local tribune that will come and deal with the anger that you have. But then he's gonna go deeper in one sense and he's gonna go lighter in another sense. Again, anyone who simply says this word raca is answerable to the court. He uses the word court means supreme court, like you're going before the greatest court in the land because you said this word. This word basically means you are worthless. You have no value. I am both the judge and the executor, and I don't think you belong in this room anymore. In fact, I probably don't think you belong in this world anymore. Then he's gonna go one more deeper and lighter in the same sense. He's gonna go from that kind of language to you fool. It's almost like Jesus got lighter. We went from murder to simply saying you fool. This would be a word we don't often use fool, so it'd be like, you idiot. Sometimes we don't even say you idiot. Sometimes we just our tone and our voice can say you're an idiot without me actually saying it. Have you ever experienced that? So, yes, Evie, you're with me. Thank you. So, so he and this level, it's like he went lighter on the things that you're doing, but he went heavier on the judgment. In this judgment, he's saying, but your judgment is gonna be the danger of hell, of fire. It's like Jesus is saying to us, listen, I know where this leads. If you begin calling people idiots, then you're gonna step into you are worthless. And if you begin saying that you are worthless and you don't value human life, then you will actually not value human life. So Jesus wants to get right at the front of it so that we don't become something we shouldn't be. That he didn't intend for us to be. So when Jesus says these things, does he mean that we can't ever get angry? When James says we're to be slow to anger, is he telling us there's no justification for anger ever?

SPEAKER_02 18:35

I mean, isn't anger a human emotion that God created us for? Jump to chapter five of James.

SPEAKER_03 18:47

Let me read this and then you tell me what kind of emotion is in this letter. Now listen, you rich people. Weep and wail because of the misery that's coming to you. Your wealth has rotted and mouth m moths have eaten your clothes. Doesn't that sound like anger? Would you would you think this is anger? If you ever got a letter like this. Now listen, so and so. Uh what's nice, what we discovered here, is like he doesn't say it till the end of his letter. And then he goes right back to, he gets out of the anger and goes back into some some uh better words, easier to hear words. It's almost like you see James practicing being slow to anger as he writes this letter, but he is angry. As we'll learn in the next couple, in the upcoming months, he's going to address some injustices that he is really upset about. And so so we're learning, okay, slow to angry doesn't mean that we can't ever be angry. And what he's angry about is an injustice or a form of oppression. But it does lead us to questions like, well, doesn't God get angry? I mean, when we read Old Testament, isn't he angry sometimes? And didn't Jesus get angry? What I love about the Gospel of Mark that we studied last year is Mark, he reveals Jesus' emotions better than the other gospel writers. And in one passage we come across in Mark chapter 3, we find them on a Sabbath day, and there's a man that's got a uh he needs healing, and Jesus is gonna heal him, but then all the religious leaders step up and they're like, What are you about to do? And Jesus knows their hearts, and look at this. Jesus looks at them in what? In anger, and he's deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts. And he says to the man, stretch out your hand. He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. And then what do the Pharisees, the religious leaders, do? They went out and they begin to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 20:50

What's interesting is that Jesus' anger leads to what? Restoration. What were some other words? Healing. Yeah. That's the result of Jesus' anger was to restore a person and heal them. What what were the church the church leaders' anger leading them towards in this passage?

SPEAKER_03 21:18

Killing Jesus. They were plotting, they were pre-meditating Jesus' death. So you have these contrasting experiences with anger. Many of us have heard the Apostle Paul's statement about anger. Maybe you grew up in the King James uh, be angry and sin not. So be angry and sin not. Don't let the sun go upon your down on your wrath. Like, so here's the NIV version. In your anger, do not sin. Don't let the sun go down while you're still angry. It's that's almost like what Sarah read, where Jesus was like, hey, if you do know something's happening, you know somebody's upset with you, go deal with it.

SPEAKER_02 22:04

And he's saying here, don't let the sun go down while you're still angry.

SPEAKER_03 22:09

I believe there is a type of anger, we see it. It's a righteous anger that scripture describes in the context of injustice. Like the example with Jesus. It was injust for those religious leaders to hold them back to heal that man. But the response of action or action to this kind of anger is not the same as Cain's. It's not the same as the religious leaders. Jesse Nichol does a great job in a revolutionary Jesus book. He says this those who seek first the kingdom and its righteousness respond to an evil act, not by ensuring an equal amount of harm is repaid to the perpetrator. But in a way that reflects the character of the kingdom. This means neither passively ignoring the evil, we're not supposed to ignore evil. We see that through scripture, nor repaying it with an e with evil in hand. Don't respond in the same way. But our job is to expose evil for what it is and the harm that it does. So we find cries for justice all throughout the Old Testament in prayers and in prophecies. We see prayers written by King David that contain just deep anger. God, would you take care of this? Asking God, would you make this new? Would you, would you bring reconciliation? Would you bring justice in this case? We see many prayers like that. The prophet Amos calls the nation of Israel out. He is calling out Israel and saying, Israel, and he's he's Jewish, he's of the nation of Israel. Israel, you're treating people poorly. And then he goes on in a poetic way and says what his prayer is. Let justice roll on like a river, like a river that keeps on flowing. And let righteousness just like never fail. Let it be a stream that just keeps pouring out. Do you think of anybody else who would call themselves the living water? This water that never fails, this water that we would never thirst again, that that kind of like this justice that would not stop. That's what Amos is calling Israel to. Righteous anger in Scripture is motivated by love with a desire for wrongs to be made right, a desire for humans to be treated with dignity and given opportunity to flourish.

SPEAKER_02 24:37

Righteous anger clings to the truth that one day God will make all things right. And I'm gonna have to release my control of that.

SPEAKER_03 24:48

One psychology professor says, good anger encourages us to air our grievances, to say what needs to be said, and find solutions. Like with the purpose to find solutions, with the purpose of reconciliation or bring healing. He goes on to say, for anger to be productive at some point, it must stop.

SPEAKER_02 25:12

There has to be a stopping point to it. Have you been on any social media threads lately?

SPEAKER_03 25:22

Have you experienced the never-ending fight? Like it's just this and then jab and jab and jab and jab and jab. And the anger just doesn't, it doesn't de-escalate, it escalates, right? So social media gives us this idea, it kind of is a mirror. Like this is what we all want to do if we could, if we were like brave enough in front of each other. So we're not, so we're gonna all just keep on writing it, you know, and caught and then there's some trolls that just keep on throwing stuff in there. But but here's what the goal is: goal the goal of anger is not to be perpetuated, but to come to a point of stopping where healing can happen and reconciliation can happen. So here's the question that we as followers of Jesus in the room must ask ourselves what difference does Jesus make when it comes to how I'm angry, how often I'm angry, and what I'm angry about. If I call myself a Jesus follower, does Jesus make a difference in the way that I'm angry? Does he transform, does he have full and all access paths to me when it comes to anger? And what I actually get angry about. Because James will say, my dear brothers and sisters, take note of this. Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to become angry. Why? Because human anger does very little to produce the righteousness that God does. Augustine, way back several centuries ago, said, No one who is angry considers his anger to be unjust. We all think our anger is is righteous, right? I mean, I yes. Like we hold that oh the I'm just I'm justified by why I'm angry. Um and he's gonna push back on that. Dallas Willard says in Divine Conspiracy, nothing can be done with anger that cannot be done better without it.

SPEAKER_02 27:31

So as I close, how do we open ourselves up for the Spirit of God to work in this area of anger?

SPEAKER_03 27:39

I mean, I'm guessing uh in a room this size with this amount of people, some of us have an issue with anger.

SPEAKER_02 27:50

I think every one of us do to some degree. So how do we open ourselves up to the spirit of God? Like, God, work on this. I don't I don't want you to I'm gonna offer this to you too. And and I don't want it to be a pet of mine anymore.

SPEAKER_03 28:10

Uh there are a lot of practices. I think there are a couple, I'll just kind of name a few. Silence is a good practice for anger to learn how to just speak silent, especially in the times I want to say a lot. Um, another practice is Sabbath rest. Sabbath teaches me that I'm not in control and that I have a limited body and I have limited things. And and so, therefore, Sabbath kind of teaches me that I'm not, I don't have to say all the things I need to say, and I can't do all the things I need to uh do, and I'm gonna let God be in control, and I need to let God be in control of some things that I get angry about. So, those aren't the ones I want to highlight.

SPEAKER_02 28:48

There are two I want to highlight practicing confession and inviting feedback. That is almost like a fire hose on anger. Because very few of us who get angry want to be told that we are angry.

SPEAKER_03 29:07

I mean, that might that makes us more angry when we're told that we're angry. Uh but to confess, I mean, uh honestly, if you ever want to just ask your friends and family, those who are closest to you, hey, have you found me to be more angry lately? Like, am I more irritable?

SPEAKER_02 29:27

Am I calling more people names while I'm driving than I should be?

SPEAKER_03 29:31

Um the uh um confession is a good practice, it's the practice of the faith to confess regularly. And part of that, as we'll see with James, part of it is to one another and definitely to our creator.

SPEAKER_02 29:48

God, I'm so angry right now. Would you do something?

SPEAKER_03 29:54

And the other part is inviting feedback to to to do some proactive work ahead of time and say to a friend or a family member, I know I'm getting angry a lot, so I give you permission to call me on it.

SPEAKER_02 30:09

Do it really lovingly because I'm gonna have a hard time with that. Um to invite that. Let's let's take some time to confess. Let's let's go into a posture of prayer.

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And confession uh certainly has an element of saying I'm sorry, but a big part of it is just to say, God, I'm so angry sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 30:34

Holy Spirit, would you work on this with me? I want to pray this prayer. Would would you say this?

SPEAKER_03 30:42

This is just a prayer of asking God to do a work before we uh step into campaign. If my heart were more content in you, O Lord, I would be less inclined to rage at others. Take from me my self righteousness and my ego driven demands for respect. Overthrow the tyranny of my anger, O Lord, and in its place establish a better vision of your throne, your kingdom, and your peace. Amen.