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["The Star-Spangled Banner"] A winner of the Lord beseech you, that you walk worthy of the vocation, wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. there is one body and one spirit even as you are called in one hope of your calling one lord one faith one baptism one god and father of all who was above all and through all and in you all but unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of christ wherefore he saith when he ascended up on high he led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men now that he ascended what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth he that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things and he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of christ till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of god unto a perfect man under the measure of the stature of the fullness of christ that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive but speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things which is the head even christ from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supply according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the body under the edifying of itself and love this i say therefore and testify in the lord that he henceforth walk not as other gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind having the understanding darkened being alienated from the life of god through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart who being past feeling have given themselves over under lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness but you have not so learned christ it so be that you have heard him and have been taught by him as the truth is in jesus that he put off concerning the former conversation the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts and be renewed in the spirit of your mind and that you put on the new man which after god is created in righteousness and true holiness wherefore putting away lying speak every man truth with his neighbor for we are members one of another be angry and sin not let not the sun go down upon your wrath neither give place to the devil let him that stole steal no more but rather let him labor working with his hands the thing which is good that he may have to give to him that needeth let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth but that which is good to the use of edifying that it may minister grace unto the hearers and grieve not the holy spirit of god whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice and be ye kind one to another tender-hearted forgiving one another even as god for christ's sake hath forgiven you let's bow our heads for a word of prayer father in heaven we just pray now lord that you would fill brother dylan aus with your holy ghost and enable him to preach the sermon you've laid on his heart with clarity of mind with boldness i pray lord that you help us to pay attention and help us lord to apply the message to our lives so that we may be more complete christians we love you and i pray this prayer in the name of jesus christ amen amen well thank you all for being here this morning thank you pastor shelly for the opportunity to preach very excited to be preaching this morning we just read ephesians chapter number four and before we get back into this chapter i'll have a little bit of a longer intro this morning but the title of my sermon this morning is road rage road rage and you're thinking what this is kind of a weird thing to preach about well really the sermon is just going to be about anger about the biblical doctrine of anger what the bible has to say about anger and rage and wrath and all these things but it's kind of funny when i moved to texas as soon as you drive into the state of texas you see this big sign that says drive friendly the texas way and you know like when you tell your kids like hey be nice to your sibling it's because they're not being nice to their sibling so i kind of looked at that sign i was like oh that's kind of funny they're saying hey we got to drive nice because i've noticed since i've lived here that road rage is a serious problem in texas and as has anyone else noticed that lots of road rage here this is not just my opinion or my own personal experience because i actually have data to back this up i looked this up i was wondering is this just my experience am i just crazy or is this a real problem and it is a big problem in texas and you know judgment begins at the house of god so let's just talk about it here but basically what i did was i just googled texas road rage shooting texas road rage incident and i just took the article titles from 2023 and we're in march we're in the first quarter of 2023 so this is just i'm just going to read you the titles of these articles of all the texas road raging shooting incidents that's happened just in 2023 okay let me just read some of these for you jay i do have a little bit of echo i don't know if you guys can fix that january 9th 2023 this title says man taken to hospital after road raid road rage shooting on central expressway police say excuse me feb uh january 10th fort worth police searching for suspects in road rage shooting january 12th family of young austin mother killed in road rage attack asks for help identifying shooter january 17th houston fatal road rage shooting of 17 year old results in 30-year sentence january january 23rd man says he was knocked out and needed stitches after road rage punch near willowbrook mall january 25th suspect in deadly dallas road rage shooting identified february 5th texas road rage incident ends violently with one man stabbed in the chest february 11th man charged allegedly killed motorcyclists in road rage shooting near home depot in spring texas february 13th man charged with murder in connection with deadly road rage shooting last month february 17th driver shot during possible road rage incident following crash in bel air february 26th passenger shot in possible road rage incident san antonio police say march 2nd one person cut in fort worth road rage incident police say march 7th road rage shooting victim quote i have no idea what i did to set them off end quote march 10th motorcyclists killed in suspected road rage crash in wise county march 21st arrest made in road rage incident that killed motorcycle rider in rome march 21st again the same day dallas police investigating after woman killed in road rage shooting march 25th just a couple days ago uh or is that yesterday what that was yesterday okay march 25th chester county man wanted in connection with road rage incident in west chester so that's a lot that's pretty crazy that pretty much every other day it seems like there's like a road rage stabbing or shooting or assault or just something crazy crazy happening and i thought well maybe it's just because there's such a large population in this state that you just have a lot of these incidents but listen to this statistic this is actually referring to 2022 says san antonio so just the city of san antonio saw as many fatal road rage shootings as 40 other states just the city of san antonio so road rage here is just unbelievable in fact just a few weeks ago on my way back from church on a wednesday night i witnessed a road rage crash people flipping each other off trying to get in front trying to get in front trying to get front next thing you know they're spinning and crashing against the wall i've told the story before about in houston how a guy tried to literally kill me in a road rage incident a church member here showed me last week they had dash cam footage of they were driving in arlington and they saw a man get out of his car in a road rage incident walk up to another person's window and this person was smart the church member drove like into a parking lot to get his family away and he said as he was turning he heard gunshots so like this is happening all the time it's happening in broad daylight you know bible says that perilous times shall come crime is skyrocketing you know people say that our prisons are overpopulated and you know i would agree that there's many charges that shouldn't exist there's many laws that uh are not biblical but when it comes to major things like murder rape assault burglary all these things there's something called a clearance rate which is basically the rate at which law enforcement solves crimes so let's say that there's a hundred reported murders and police only solve 50 percent of those and the clearance rate is 50 well if you look up the clearance rate for a murderer in the united states it's like 50 and for many other very large crimes it's even less than that so actually the people in jail is just a small fraction of the people that have committed these crimes so crime right now is just exploding right under our noses and the statistics aren't necessarily reflecting that accurately and so but really the thing is it's not a political problem it's a spiritual issue all of this violence all of this anger it really is a spiritual issue and so what i want to preach about this morning is basically just an overview of what the bible says about anger because what's happening with all these road rage shootings and incidents it's people that are just full of wrath full of anger so much so that they're going to go kill someone over something so stupid and so i four statements this morning if you want to write these down you can number one anger is not inherently sinful anger is not inherently sinful and i'm going to be you know talking negatively about anger this morning but i don't want you to get the wrong idea that i'm just saying anger is always wrong or that you should never be angry there's never a time to be angry that's not true anger in itself is not inherently sinful you're there in ephesians chapter number four look at verse 26 the bible says be ye angry and sin not let not the let not the sun go down upon your wrath neither give place to the devil so according to the bible it is possible to be angry and to not sin there's some things that are just inherently sinful the bible can never say hey blaspheme and sin not that's not possible because blaspheming is inherently sinful you know commit fornication and sin not that's impossible fornication is just always sinful it's inherently sinful but being angry is not inherently sinful it depends on the context it depends on why you're angry or how you're responding to that angry anger and also go ahead and go to john chapter number three i'll read for you psalm chapter number seven verse 11 the bible says god judgeth the righteous and god is angry with the wicked every day it's impossible for anger to be a sin because god is angry every single day every single day god is angry with the wicked and there's a lot of preachers the new evangelicals the niv rock and roll type churches where they want to make jesus to be this hippie that's just cool with anything he's never mad he's the jesus of the chosen who's just always super chill and you know the jesus of the chosen that's like making fun of john the baptist for being a hard preacher that's not the jesus of the bible the jesus of the bible is angry every single day with the wicked and you know we should be too anything that makes god angry you have 100 a free license to be angry about that as well because it's never a sin whatever god is angry about john chapter 3 verse 36 he that believeth on the sun hath everlasting life and he that believeth not the sun shall not see life but the wrath of god abideth on him according to the bible if you're not saved god's wrath is just placed on top of you and he is ready at the moment you die to send your soul to hell for all of eternity now of course god also is merciful so we have to balance these things god is loving he's merciful and he wants people to get saved but while someone is not saved he's angry with them he's angry with them that they have not chosen to believe the free gift of salvation that he's offered to them freely by giving us his son to die on the cross he's mad that they've rejected that and he's ready to send them to hell and if they die without believing in christ that's exactly where they'll go immediately go to exodus chapter number 16 i'll show you some other incidents of justified anger in the bible exodus 16 so just to give you some context of this chapter it's talking about the manna from heaven and if you remember when god gave the manna they were supposed to eat all of it and they were supposed to hoard any for the next day god wanted them to trust in him and so he didn't want them just holding all the manna back and being preppers and just trying to like keep a store of it in case oh man god might not come through for me tomorrow right he told them to eat it all look at exodus 16 verse 19 it says and moses said let no man leave of it till the morning notwithstanding they hearken not unto moses but some of them left of it until the morning and it bred worms and stank and notice and moses was wroth with them moses wroth is just the past tense form of wrath he's so angry he has wrath that they decided not to obey god's word and you know of course sin should always make us angry when people break god's commandments when we break god's commandments that should make us angry we should be ready to take vengeance on every act of disobedience right that we do against god we should be angry about sin that's a completely justified anger that's an anger that more people should have go to matthew chapter 21 you know jesus when he was in the flesh alive on this earth he showed anger during many times of his ministry where he was angry at people where he was screaming and rebuking people and we're going to see a story here where he takes it up a notch even above screaming and just words matthew 21 verse 12 it says and jesus went into the temple of god and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple and overthrew the tables of the money changers and the seats of them that sold doves and said unto them it is written my house shall be called the house of prayer but ye have made it a den of thieves so jesus here is so angry because god's house is supposed to be about the preaching of god's word it's supposed to be about praying it's supposed to be about fellowship with the believers it's supposed to be about sending people out with the great commission and what have these people what are these jews done they turn it into basically an exchange house a place where they make money a place where they sell things right and that makes jesus very angry so much so that elsewhere in the bible talks about how he literally fashioned a whip meaning this wasn't just an explosion of anger that came out of nowhere he said you know what i'm gonna call i'm gonna patiently here make a whip i'm gonna go ahead and just make this thing because i'm gonna go in there and i'm gonna start whipping people buying and selling in god's house that's how angry he was to the point where he didn't ask them politely to stop he just walked over to their table and just flipped it over i mean that oh wow jesus is so rude i mean isn't that so rude that's what people would say but no that's actually righteous indignation that's righteous anger right and if if someone comes in this church and starts buying and selling things just flip over the table okay just i don't know maybe pastor doesn't want that let him flip it over but there's a time to have justified anger to have righteous indignation and i'll tell you what america would be a better place if more people were angry at sin america would be a better place today if you're angry about sin people think you're a weirdo people think that you're just insane for being mad of someone committing fornication they think you're insane for being angry at divorce they think you're insane for being angry at the lgbt takeover of our nation but really we need more people to be angry with sin in our nation and people will attack the preachers of the new ifb will say oh you guys are so angry you guys are so mean you guys are so angry it's like yeah i am angry at sin yeah i am angry at false prophets yeah i am angry at false doctrine but notice does that anger motivate us to sin or does it motivate us to preach god's word or does it motivate us to start more churches or does it motivate us to go get people saved that's what it motivates us to do so how is that a sin it's not it's righteous indignation and our country used to get mad and used to get upset by the sin and the filth and that's not happening today now people are angry if you preach the bible now people are angry for king james only now people are angry if you're uganda and say hey let's pass a law where we put pedophiles to death by the way god bless uganda god bless uganda so number one i just wanted to explain that anger is not inherently sinful but number two the vast majority of time people get angry it is sinful the vast majority of the time people get angry it is sinful if we would be honest with ourselves myself including probably the last time that you got upset it probably wasn't just because of the injustices of this world and the sin of the world it was probably over something dumb like someone cutting you off in traffic last time you got angry it was probably because you didn't get your way at work or you didn't get your way with your husband or you know you didn't get your fifth coffee of the day right and so you're so angry about it you had to work eight hour shift today instead of a six hour shift or something just ridiculous the last time you got angry it probably wasn't righteous indignation and think about this is it easy or is it hard to get angry it's very easy right and something that's just really easy for your flesh is usually sinful right if something is just really natural really easy to your flesh that means that it's usually sinful and think about it the last time you yelled at your spouse the last time you yelled at your kids the last time that you just freaked out it probably was unrighteous anger it probably was sinful anger because the majority of time people are angry it is sinful majority of time people are angry in the bible it's not over something good and let's just take a commercial break here and talk a little bit about road rage you know here's my tip for you when it comes to road rage is never ever ever escalate someone's anger on the road don't ever ever escalate someone's anger on the road go to roman or uh first peter chapter number three first peter chapter three you know i read to you all those articles of all those road rage shootings that have been happening in texas is happening over and over and over and over again and you want to know why a lot of this is happening it's because both parties are riling each other up escalating things it's not one person backing up and just saying hey i'll suffer myself to be defrauded you can cut me off no problem i'll forgive you it's some oh you flip me off i'll flip you off oh you break check me i'll speed in front of you and break check you oh you want to you know push push your car to me i'll push my car into you right what does the bible say look at first peter chapter number three look at verse nine says not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing but contrary wise blessing knowing that you're there and too called that you should inherit a blessing look it's it's natural in the flesh i'm not standing up here as some hypocrite saying i've never gotten mad at someone on the road but as our world gets more and more dangerous you have to be seriously careful about this and you have to take it seriously that hey on the road you should not render evil for evil when someone flips you off let it go don't worry about it they're just trying to rile you up because what's the alternative you get mad they get mad you cut them off they cut you off and next thing you know you got bullets flying into your windshield oops you probably didn't mean for that to happen what are you going to do then when bullets are flying into your windshield it's too late to change anything that's why it's so stupid to engage in road rage it is foolish it is not something christians should be doing and here's another thing especially ladies you need a reality check that you are so vulnerable in this world you are so vulnerable you are so fragile you are so weak and if someone wanted to hurt you they easily could but i even see women road raging and i'm thinking you are a fool you really want to go make some random dude angry at you you really think that you're going to be able to protect yourself that is so foolish let me tell you a story one time i was in vancouver washington my wife and i were on our way to church for a pie fellowship and this person was like speeding super fast past me or whatever and they got mad at something i did and they decided to break check me in the middle of the interstate okay so it's like dark it's raining and there's cars everywhere and this person break checks me to a complete stop in the interstate and they throw open the door and you know what walks out like an 18 or 19 year old chick okay she gets out of her car and she stands on the interstate with cars going by her in the dark in the rain because she was angry at something i did i'm just thinking like this woman has no sense of reality because if i was just some psycho psychotic man that just wanted to fight i'm a man i could snap her in two if i wanted to i could throw her off of the interstate right but in her stupid mind she thought it's a good idea to get out of a car at a man what is wrong with people right you you people have lost their sense of reality and sometimes on the road i think people just like they see a car and they forget that there's human beings there right a lot of these a lot of these incidents are people like killing motorcyclists where they just get mad at the motorcyclists and they're just like let's just crash into them and kill them but under what circumstance would you ever just shoot a motorcyclist in the head you wouldn't but for some reason road rage just puts people under the influence it makes them not think and so when you ever see people road raging you should never escalate it you should never return evil for evil because something very bad can happen to you and especially ladies driving by themselves you don't ever want to be in a situation where here you are getting shot at or people are trying to open your door and get to you that's that's horrible you should not be foolish and make such a silly decision also here's the best part of that story though is i said that we were going to a pie fellowship well when we break the car the pie just completely smashed against my windshield and my wife is just sobbing you know and i'm like you're entering the pie i don't care you know i was like yeah the competition was based on taste not look and then she won the pie competition i was like yeah so it was a really good pie you know it was hilarious but the road rage wasn't hilarious and i've seen road rage incidents in my life in washington and texas i told you someone tried to kill me in houston i've told that story before if you haven't heard it i'll tell you after the service but go to james chapter number one james chapter number one i'm talking about how the majority of the time when you're angry it's not righteous indignation it's sinful and these road rage incidents it's not righteous indignation it's sinful anger is what it is james 1 19 says wherefore my beloved brethren let every man be swift to hear slow to speak slow to wrath why for the wrath of god worketh not or the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of god notice the bible is generalizing man's anger and just saying like in a general sense it's not the righteousness of god most of the time when man is angry it's not righteous it is sinful and road rage is a perfect example of that i'll read for you go to proverbs 19 i'll read for you proverbs 16 32 it says he that is slow to anger is better than the mighty and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city some people think well i don't care i'll road rage all day long because i'm so tough and i'm so strong and i'm such a good fighter if someone wants to try to fight me on the road hey i'll take care of it i know for sure i'll be able to back you know back this person down and defend myself but you know what's better than being a good fighter you know what's better than being a strong person is someone that's slow to anger you know what's better than being a good fighter is someone that avoids the fight altogether and it's way more wise for you to not try to escalate people's anger on the road than for you to just trust in your flesh trust in your ability to defend yourself to go fight someone for no reason you say oh okay yeah you're really strong but that doesn't mean you won't go to jail okay so you defend yourself great have fun in jail oh you know you're so strong you're ready to beat someone up good luck against nine millimeter bullets flying at you was that worth it absolutely not proverbs 19 look at 11 proverbs 19 verse 11 it says the the discretion of a man defereth his anger and it is his glory to pass over a transgression this would be a great bible verse to just put on your dash in the car you know it's a it's your glory to pass over a transgression right because let's be honest you see driving transgressions all the time you know as the illegals are just flooding into america and they've never learned how to drive hey you see it a lot i'm i'm not saying there's not a reason to get angry on the road you could find a reason anywhere anytime if you want to get angry but hey it's a glory to pass over a transgression the discretion of a man defer it his anger what is discretion the definition of discretion one of the definitions is the power or right to decide or act according to one's own judgment freedom of judgment or choice so you know my my judgment and our good judgment should tell us that it's not a good idea to get into a road rage incident because number one like we said you can get shot you can get crashed off the road you can get in a fight with someone you can get on the news you can go to jail you can go to court discretion should tell you that all those things are bad and are any of those things worth someone just cutting you off are any of those things worth someone just flipping off no so wisdom should tell you having good discretion should tell you that it's not a good idea to just escalate people's anger on the road go to ecclesiastes chapter number seven ecclesiastes chapter number seven ecclesiastes seven verse nine says be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry for anger resteth in the bosom of fools and i i mean one of the most foolish things i could think of is okay you made me angry on the road so i'm going to kill you that is so sick that is so disgusting that is so wicked just because you got a little upset at someone to just say okay now i'm just gonna shoot you now i'm just gonna take my truck and just plow it into your motorcycle and just kill you but that's what's happening that's what these people are doing how what a wicked thing to do and what a foolish thing to do to throw your life away to murder someone in cold blood just because you got angry at them on the road what a stupid foolish thing to do go to proverbs chapter number 12 proverbs chapter number 12 proverbs 12 verse 16 the bible says a fool's wrath is presently known but a prudent man cover it shame you can identify a fool because they always want to tell you everything they're mad about they're just they're on a hair trigger they're ready to get angry and every little thing that annoys them every little thing that they don't like every little injustice they're just ready to let you know how angry they are and that is what a fool is that's what these people in the road are doing as soon as you do something bad they're flipping you off they're ready to hurt you they're ready to fight you but even outside of the road we've all known people like this in our lives where they're just always negative you bring up anything and they're mad just no matter what the topic is they're just ready to be angry about it that's a foolish person that's a person no one wants to be around that's a person who's toxic and who is a fool i'll read for you psalm 37 8 says cease from anger and forsake wrath fret not thyself in any wise to do evil so we've seen the bible over and over it paints a negative picture of anger most of the time when man is angry now if you type up anger angry wrath wrath in a bible software you know you're going to see it the most is god and we already talked about his anger is always righteous but when most of the time you're seeing that man get angry it's usually not righteous number three go to proverbs 15 number three people who don't learn to control their anger don't get angry they are angry there is a difference between a person who gets mad at something that happened and someone who just is an angry person and there are people who they're not getting upset by their circumstances or their environment or something happened to make their math they're just mad all the time they're on the road and they're wanting someone to cut them off they're wanting someone to do something bad they're wanting someone to look at them in a weird way so they can fight there's people like this where they just are angry people and it's not that the strife stirred them up it's that they stirred up the strife yeah okay proverbs 20 where i tell you to go proverbs uh 15 18 says a wrathful man stirreth up strife notice it doesn't say that there was strife and so this man became wrathful no he was already wrathful he was already angry he was already mad and so because he was angry and mad what did he do he stirred up strife and this is a person who just is an angry person they don't get angry they are angry that is a terrible attribute to have as a person but he that is slow to anger appeaseth strife so if you want to have a bunch of problems in your life you want to have a bunch of issues and strife and fighting and bickering well then just be an angry person and you'll get lots of that and you ought to examine your life you know are you always fighting with your spouse you always yelling at your kids are you always fighting with your co-workers it's probably because one person involved just is an angry person it's not that they got angry it's not that something happened to make them angry it's just they are an angry person and if you don't fix that in your life you will have nothing but problems you will destroy the relationships in your life proverbs 26 proverbs 26 verse 21 says as coals are to burning coals think about this visual you have coals that are already on fire and you add coals to it as coals are to burning coals and wood to fire so is a contentious man to kindle strife notice there wasn't strife that made him contentious the man's already contentious and he wants to kindle strife he wants to go make fires he wants to bring his fire with him and catch everything else on fire we've all noticed we've all known people like this and here's the truth if you want a reason to be angry you will always find it if you want to find something to complain about something to be unhappy about something to just nitpick and other people that they don't do that makes you mad you'll always find it because we're sinners and so it's real easy to find things to make you mad but guess what it doesn't make you a good person to just always be angry it makes you a fool and it makes you someone that no one wants to be around and it makes you someone that's always going to have strife in your life that's obviously not a good thing proverbs 29 22 says this an angry man stirreth up strife notice again the strife didn't make him angry he was already angry what did he do he stirred up strife and a furious man notice this aboundeth in transgression people that are always angry you know what they're doing they're always sinning they're always sinning with their mouth they're always sinning with their actions and so these furious people on the road they're abounding in transgression and they're ready to murder over their anger what a sick thing you know and sadly you know some people are in marriages like this where you know spouse didn't do something to make them mad they just are mad spouse is just always mad always angry there's some people where this is your parenting style you know what you're just angry and you're just always screaming and yelling at your kids all the time and that is going to bring strife and transgression in your life you're not going to have a good relationship with your spouse you're not going to have a good relationship with your kids when you're always a wrathful angry person no one wants to be around that no one ever says man i really love my mom and dad because they're always so angry when i was a kid no it's usually like yeah my dad abused me when i was a kid because he was such an angry drunk and he'd hit mom and he'd hit me right or same thing for domestic spousal abuse anger is always involved number four out of control anger can destroy yourself and those around you out of control anger will destroy yourself and those around you this is something that if not checked in your life you will destroy your life if you were just an angry person and i talked about how can you do this you could do this through your actions and you could do this through your words let's talk about actions first go to genesis chapter number four let's see some examples of where people just brought destruction because of anger genesis chapter number four start reading verse one it says and adam knew his wife eve and she conceived and bear cane and said i have gotten a man child from the lord and she again bear his brother able and able was a keeper of sheep but cane was a tiller of the ground and in process of time it came to pass that cain brought of the fruit of the ground and offering unto the lord and able he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof and the lord had respect unto able and to his offering but unto cain and to his offering he had not respect and notice this and cain was very rough so cain is mad he's super angry and it says in his countenance fell verse six and the lord said unto cain why art thou roth and why is thy countenance fallen if thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted and if thou doest not well sin lieth at the door and unto thee shall be his desire and thou shalt rule over him and cain talked with able his brother and it came to pass when they were in the field that cain rose up against able his brother and slew him so here we have a story in the bible where cain he's upset god didn't accept his offering and instead of responding to his anger appropriately by saying hey i messed up i need to change something here instead what does he do he just murders his brother in cold blood the first murder that we see in the bible and where did it come from it says that he was roth he was angry and when you're angry when you're roth in an ungodly way it'll cause you to be destructive it'll cause you to destroy things in your life to where he destroyed his own brother he killed his own brother go to genesis chapter 34 genesis chapter 34 genesis 34 start reading in verse number one it says and dina the daughter of leah which she barrened jacob went out to see the daughters of the land and when she come the son of haymore the high vite prince of the country saw her he took her and lay with her and defiled her so what happens jacob's daughter dina she goes out to see the daughters of land and she ends up committing a grievous sin of fornication now let's go to verse number seven it says and the sons of jacob came out of the field when they heard it and the men were grieved and they were very roth because he had wrought folly in israel in lying with jacob's daughter which thing ought not to be done now is this righteous anger is this unrighteous anger right now it's righteous anger it's totally justified to be angry that your sister committed fornication right it's a it's okay to be angry that someone defiled your sibling that makes sense but what happens in the story is they don't go about their anger in a right way and they end up bringing destruction basically what happens is they tell sheikim and his family hey if all of you guys get circumcised we'll give our daughters to your to your men you can give your daughters to our men we'll share and have marriages with each other and so all of you guys need to go get circumcised well let's start reading in verse 25 and says and it came to pass on the third day when they were sore so sheikim and all their family they did do it they went and got circumcised they were sore from it that the two sons of jacob simian and levi dina's brethren took each man his sword and came upon the city boldly and slew all the males so were they right to get angry yes were they right to go commit murder no and so we have to learn the proper way to deal with our anger because even if you are angry in a justified sense it could still lead to that just intoxicating mentality to where you just go and do stupid things or you go and do foolish things and this was absolutely not right what they did verse 26 and they slew haymore and sheikim his son with the edge of the sword and took dina out of sheikim's house and went out the sons of jacob came upon the slain and spoiled the city because they had defiled their sister they took their sheep and their ox and their asses and that which was in the city and that which was in the field and all their wealth and all their little ones and their wives took they captive and spoiled even all that was in their house so just because your sister commits fornication it doesn't give you a right to just go murder people steal all their goods plunder their city take their wives take their cattle take their little ones it doesn't give you the right to do that and just because you've been wronged in some way in your life that doesn't give you the right to avenge yourself bible says vengeance is mine sayeth the lord i will repay it's god's job to take vengeance and of course he's given us institutions for man to take vengeance on god's behalf in this world like the government and if the government did their job they're the instrument of god's vengeance in many ways but hey even if you don't have that system you still don't have the right to take things into your own hand and just avenge yourself and to right the wrongs on your own behalf the right thing to do is hey to pray to god you know pray to god that god can work out the situation in the best way possible pray to god sometimes in some cases against people you see a predatory prayers in the bible there's many times it's okay to pray against people but the act the answer is not just going committing murder the answer is not just going out and stealing things and when people are cut off in the road and someone does something wrong to you on the road let me tell you what the answer is not to pull out your gun and just start shooting them your amp the answer is not to just take your car and just start running people over and just to run people's motorcycles onto the side of the road that's sick that's not right and if it wasn't happening in such a huge scale i'd have a hard time believing that people even do this that you're just on the road you're just going to kill someone for someone cutting you off but it happens it does happen this is uh jacob when he's about to die and he's preaching to his kids what's going to come to pass in the latter days this is what he says of simian and levi that did this grievous thing jacob said this i'll read for you genesis 49 5 simian and levi are brethren instruments of cruelty are in their habitations remember that word cruelty oh my soul come not into out there come not thou into their secret under their assembly mine honor be not thou united for in their anger they slew a man and in their self will they digged down a wall cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel i will divide them in jacob and scatter them in israel so notice jacob is not condoning actions of his sons he's not saying oh yeah yeah i mean dina committed fornications you guys are writing what they did he said no that was cruel that was wicked that was outrageous that should have never happened he's not condoning it he's saying this was a horrible thing that happened go to first samuel 18 let's look at another story where a man's anger causes him to destroy those around him first samuel chapter number 18 first samuel 18 verse number six and it came to pass as they came when david was returned from the slaughter of the philistine that the women came out of all the cities of israel singing and dancing to meet king saul with tabarets with joy and with instruments of music and the women answered one another as they played and said saul has slain his thousands and david his ten thousands notice saul's reaction to this so is saul happy for david that he went and killed the philistine and did something great for the lord no he's envious and this is what it says verse eight and saul was very wrath he's very angry he's very upset and the saying displeased him and he said they have ascribed unto david ten thousands and to me they have ascribed but thousands what can he have more than the kingdom and so did saul say you know what david's doing better than me so i'm just gonna work harder than david now i'm gonna start killing more philistines than david i'm gonna start doing right or did he try to destroy him let's read what happens in verse number nine it says in saul i david from that day forward and it came to pass on the morrow that the evil spirit from god came upon saul and he prophesied in the midst of the house and david played with his hand as at other times and there was a javelin in saul's hand and saul cast the javelin for he said i will smite david even to the wall with it david avoided out of his presence twice what a bizarre story what a weird thing to do you think that saul and david would be on the same team they're both supposed to be fighting the lord's battles saul should be excited that david went out and killed goliath but instead he doesn't just let that motivate him to be a better king to be a better warrior instead what does he do he gets mad and he tries to kill david the guy that just killed the enemy of the lord the guy that's doing god's work he literally tries to kill him can you see now the intoxicating effect of anger on someone to where you'd be literally willing to kill your brother in christ willing to kill your fellow soldier who's doing nothing but good for god's kingdom you're willing to kill him or attempt to kill him because of anger it goes to show how dangerous anger can be now destructive it can be now careful you have to be because it leads people to do just insane things but another way anger can bring destruction is by your words go to james chapter number three i'll read for you proverbs 27 4 it says wrath is cruel and anger is outrageous but who is able to stand before envy notice the bible keeps saying that their wrath was cruel it was cruel proverbs saying their wrath is cruel and another thing that happens when people get really angry is they say some of the cruelest things in their life some of just the most mean hurtful words that people have ever said have been when they're angry and this will bring destruction in your life this will bring destruction in your marriage this will bring destruction in your relationship with your parents in your relationship with your children because of the things that you say you know you can say things that can hurt people you absolutely can and you don't have just a free license to just say whatever you want to say that is not what the bible teaches people see preachers getting up screaming yelling and saying things that are extreme because they're preaching the bible let me tell you that's generally not the best way to act with people in your life i'm just going to tell you that right now james 3 verse 5 says even so the tongue is a little member and boasteth great things behold how great a matter a little fire kindler and the tongue is a fire a world of iniquity so is the tongue among our members that it defileth the whole body and set it on fire the course of nature and it is set on fire of hell this doesn't sound very positive the bible's not really painting a good picture of what your tongue can do verse seven for every kind of beasts and of birds and of serpents and things in the sea is tamed and have been tamed of mankind but the tongue can no man tame it is an unruly evil full of deadly poison therewith bless we god even the father and therewith curse we men which are made after the similitude of god out of the same mouth proceed of blessing and cursing my brethren these things ought not so to be and there have been many relationships in this world that have been absolutely irreparably destroyed by the things that people say to each other and you need to be really careful when you're mad when you're fighting with someone to not be cruel with your tongue just because you're upset it doesn't give you the right to be cruel to someone it doesn't give you the right to be cruel to your spouse it doesn't give you the right to be cruel to your kids you don't want to be known to your kids as just that parent that was just always screaming and yelling and always calling them names and always saying things to them of course children are supposed to be under obedience completely to our parents that doesn't mean you should be mean to your kids i don't think it's cool to just call your kids a bunch of names and to treat them like they're your dogs or something like that i don't think that makes you cool i don't think that makes you look like you're such a tough authoritarian parent i think it makes you look like a fool actually because what you're doing is you're being cruel you're cutting them down with your tongue and you're destroying relationships in your life and hey you should care a lot about your relationship with your spouse you should care a lot about your relationship with your kids and you should not get the the short times of your life that you get angry to just cause lifelong devastation to your relationships because there are things you can say that can cut people down forever you need to be very careful with your tongue i'll read for you proverbs 21 verse 19 the bible is very clear about this it says it is better to dwell in the wilderness than with a contentious and an angry woman okay when when spouses are fighting and the wife is real contentious and she's real angry and she's yelling at her husband and she's calling them names you know what the husband's not thinking you know my wife has some good points she she might be right about that you know what he's thinking when can i move to alaska i'd rather deal with a grizzly bear i'd rather deal with a pack of wolves than dealing with the angry and contentious wife that's what the bible says here and notice the bible doesn't say it'll seem better to dwell in the wilderness it says it is better right so you ladies that think oh you know i don't understand why my husband you know we're having issues in our marriage i constantly tell him what he's doing wrong i constantly tell him how he can become a better husband i don't understand why he's not getting this it's like you're just going to drive him to alaska you're going to ruin your marriage you will never as a woman ever make your marriage better by being angry at your husband you will never make your marriage better by being contentious against your husband you will only destroy your marriage the bible says that women are to be obedient to their husbands in all things okay and that also doesn't give men a license to be cruel to their wives that doesn't give men a license to be jerks to their wives but i'm just telling you the bible paints the picture that usually is the angry and contentious woman that's causing the issues because usually men are pretty chill they're just like oh whatever you know they're not worried they don't really want to spend the energy on fighting right but the woman she wants to be contentious and angry but look that is your that's your sin nature that's not good remember what i said when things come natural to you it's probably bad you need to check your anger because you can destroy your marriage by being cruel with your tongue by being angry with your spouse by being contentious with your spouse you could drive him to the wilderness it doesn't say that he'll think that it's better it says that it actually is better okay so god is very clear about that proverbs 22 24 says go to colossians 3 while i read this colossians 3 i'll read for you proverbs 22 verse 24 it says make no friendship with an angry man and with a furious man thou shalt not go notice you could also destroy the relationships with your friends by being someone that's just always angry and contentious because the bible says hey don't make friendship with an angry man and there's been people in my life where i thought hey you know i love you you're my brother in christ i hope the best for you but i've thought like i just shouldn't be close to this person i shouldn't be very close friends with this person because they're just so angry all the time and just because they're so contentious and the bible makes it clear hey make no friendship with an angry man you shouldn't be around people like that because it's going to drag you down it's going to turn you into that same person and you don't want to destroy the relationships in your life you don't want to get into these crazy situations with road rage and all the negative that could happen in your life because of anger colossians 3 verse 21 says fathers provoke not your children to anger lest they be discouraged you know one of the most weighty responsibilities that you'll ever have in your life and one of the biggest blessings from god just one of the greatest honors in life that god has ever given us is being a father and you know there's a lot of things in my life that i want to do really well on i i want to be a good employee i want to be a good preacher i want to be good at a lot of things in my life but one of the most important things that i want to be said of me when i die is that i was a good dad and it's such a heavy responsibility because the bible says that you dad can provoke your child to anger and you can be the cause of their discouragement that's that's a very heavy thought to think about to think about god looking down from heaven and saying you want to know why your son and your daughter is discouraged in the things of the lord you want to know why they're not excited about church you want to know why they have a negative view of christianity in the bible it's because you are a jerk dad because you provoke them to anger and you discourage them that's a heavy thought to think about and so as dads you know we are the primary disciplinarian right we're supposed to be disciplining our kids and teaching them and yeah you know we should be tough on them especially compared to how the world is as parents right but you don't want to be so over the top that you discourage your kids they're still kids they're still just kids foolishness foolishness is bound in the heart of the child kids are going to do foolish things all the time it's just your job to discipline them and correct them and move on that's it it's not to just be angry at them all the time and to scream at them and to call them stupid and call them idiots and call them worthless and to call them all these mean names that's not your job and you know what if you discourage your kids god will judge you for that if your kids don't end up loving the lord because of your authoritarian style as a dad god's going to hold you responsible for that and you should take that extremely seriously so like i said you know anger can destroy the relationships in your lives it can destroy people's lives literally and really quickly i'm just going to talk about for the rest of the sermon how we can control our anger really this should be a soul different a whole different sermon but i don't want to leave you guys with nothing so go to proverbs chapter 27 proverbs 27 you know we talked about basically just the doctrine of anger in the bible what the bible has to say about anger but let me just give you quickly a couple things you can do to help you control your anger and number one you're there in proverbs 27 the number one way you can help control your anger is to confront and rebuke the person making you angry that sounds weird you're like what rebuke here's the thing rebuke doesn't always have to be swinging from the chandeliers screaming at someone it could just be confronting someone about an issue that they had or a transgression that they did against you and just bringing it to their attention okay and look the bible teaches this proverbs 27 verse 4 says wrath is cruel and anger is outrageous but who is able to stand before envy then look at the next verse this is not a coincidence that these verses are next to each other it says open rebuke is better than secret love faithful are the wounds of a friend but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful you would think why would you ever rebuke someone to deal with your anger you're just going to lash out in them and scream at them and call their names not according to the bible these verses are right next to each other for a reason they're connected hey you want to deal with your anger just go up to the person that's making you mad that did something to you and just say hey you wrong me in this way and i'm upset about it and that does a couple things it gives them the chance to repent and get right and to restore relationship with you which most of the time especially amongst christian brethren that's going to happen people are most likely going to be humble and just take the rebuke and say hey sorry sorry i offended you and then you gain your brother right and that also allows you to get rid of the anger that you have because when situations get resolved obviously you have less anger right another option you have is to forgive i'll read for you matthew 6 9 it says after this manner pray ye our father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done in earth as in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever amen for if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly father will also forgive you but if you forgive not men their trespasses neither will your father forgive your trespasses and so one thing you can do when you're angry when someone does something wrong to you you can just choose to forgive that person whether they apologize for it or not and if you think about a lot of the situations in our life that we get angry about it's probably just small things it's probably just menial things that you could just probably just let go and forget about and if you can't hey then talk to the person confront them rebuke them but a lot of times it's just so much easier to just forgive someone to just let it go and i didn't say you know harbor it up in bitterness and not actually forget them it's actually forgive and forget them that's one way you can deal with anger as well another thing go to galatians chapter five another thing that could help you is to just be filled with the spirit more often being filled with the spirit more often is going to help you not to be just an angry person galatians 5 verse 16 says this i say then walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh for the flesh lust it against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary to one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would but if you be led of the spirit you're not under the law now the works of the flesh are these notice now the works of the flesh are manifest which are these adultery fornication uncleanness lasciviousness idolatry witchcraft hatred variance emulations and notice this wrath so one of the works of the flesh is wrath being angry but look at verse 16 again it says this i say then walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh think about this these people in these road rage shootings that are going out and shooting people and crashing their vehicle into people and stabbing people and beating people up do you think that these are people that woke up in the morning and read their king james bible prayed to god and was singing hymns on their way to work or do you think these are people that are walking in the flesh so here's the thing if you start your day you read the word of god you get prayed up you're singing hymns to the lord and someone cuts you off you know what you might do you'd be like hey you know what i'm just gonna give place to wrath i'm gonna forgive this person i'm not going to render evil for evil that's most likely going to be your attitude but when you're so in the flesh you're angry and you're just wanting someone to cut you off you're in the flesh you're going to be a lot more likely to get angry and to get into these situations so and like pastor shelly always says it's not hard to know what to do it's hard to do it right you want to avoid being in a road rage incident here you go read the bible every day pray every day and sing hymns to god and you're probably not going to be on the side of the road stabbing someone in the chest anytime soon just my guess right it and it's i mean it sounds like oh that's that's too simple i mean no it's true if you're walking in the spirit you're not going to fulfill the lust of the flesh so i just wanted to preach this because i've noticed a lot of anger in our society noticed a lot of people in the flesh i also wanted to give you some practical tips on road rage to not be escalating people because i would hate to hear about something bad ever happening to someone in this church i hope this sermon can help you also just to be a less angry person to walk in the or walk in the spirit and just to reduce conflict and strife in your life and with that let's end in a word of prayer heavenly father thank you for this day thank you for the word of god that gives us instruction on every area of our life i pray that every single person in here would work on controlling their anger would work on just walking in the spirit and that you would just protect our church our families during these perilous times and that you just bless our church we love you in jesus name of prayer amen all right in closing let's go to song number 41 song number 41 go there myself song number 41 sweet by and by song number 41 everybody singing out together on the first there's a land that is fairer than day and by faith we can see it afar for the father waits over the way to prepare us a dwelling place there in the sweet by and by by we shall meet on that beautiful shore in the sweet by and by we shall meet on that beautiful shore we shall sing on that beautiful shore the melodious songs of the blessed and our spirit shall sorrow no more not a sigh for the blessing of rest in the sweet by and by by we shall meet on that beautiful shore in the sweet by and by we shall meet on that beautiful shore to our bountiful father above we will offer our tribute of praise for the glorious gift of his love and the blessings that hallow our days in the sweet by and by and by we shall meet on that beautiful shore in the sweet by and by we shall