A Destroyer: Unrighteous Anger | +Quigg Lawrence

Please be seated. Darken the lights. Roll tape. Here's a little tee ball game for you. Name right now. All that because a 13-year-old caught a strike ball. It's unbelievable, isn't it? You guys, this is real. You can go to YouTube. There's hundreds of these videos of kids six, seven years old playing tee ball, and the parents are having a slugfest because they're so filled with rage because a 13-year-old umpire made the wrong call.

Anger in Scripture and Proverbs

Today, we're going to be talking about anger, and it's an exhaustive subject. There's three hundred sixty-six mentions, I think, in the Bible. We can't do all of them today, but we're going to focus on Proverbs because we're in Proverbs. Hopefully, we're going to learn some wise things from Proverbs that will help us avoid that. Help us avoid seething and bitterness and erupting and all those things. Not just tell us don't be angry, but how we can overcome our anger in Jesus' name.

In Proverbs, you know, we've been studying. I think it was two weeks ago. We talked about how there are two women in Proverbs—two women with names. The first one is wisdom, and the other woman in Proverbs is named fool or folly. Wisdom and folly. What's amazing is both these women call out, "All you who are simple, all of you who lack judgment, come to me." You're being called to wisdom or to folly, to follow the Lord or to follow a fool. Hopefully, in Proverbs, we learn wise sayings that help us walk in the ways of the Lord and not pierce ourselves with many griefs.

Let's get into it. First thing I want to tell you is pastors get a lot of emails and sometimes they're the nice ones—little, you know, cards that are so sweet. And y'all, if you buy me a card, buy me a twenty-nine-cent one. I don't need a four ninety-nine card, okay? I don't need that. Save that money, give it to the poor. Just a note card.

But we have some humdingers. I think Miss Annette has hidden those notes I've gotten. I've got notes and emails and let me just say, bless their heart. They have called me every name and honestly, sometimes I deserved it. Fair enough? Hey, if I mess up, I'll fall on my sword and say, guilty as charged. Couple times in thirty-some years, I've done something like, "Oh, Quigg." I get called out on it and people nail me. There are other times where I just feel like pastors are kind of like Christians because we are Christians. Pastors and Christians are like golf balls, and what do you do with a golf ball? You tee it up and you smack it. See, the thing is a golf ball can't hit back. A golf ball just receives. And it's really the same for believers.

Jesus says, forgive seventy times seven. Jesus says, turn the other cheek. — Matthew 18:22, Matthew 5:39

In Romans 12, God says, "Hey, don't seek revenge. Vengeance is mine and mine alone. Allow me to work justice." — Romans 12

I want to say that while I have been the recipient of a bunch of doozies, my word, I was going to show them on the screen and I thought, "That would not be edifying." So anyway, the point is not how many people have written me nasty emails. I'm sure if you are in business or in public, you've gotten some real scorchers, right? You have? Yeah, me too. The point really isn't to look at those folks over thirty years who send nasty grams. The point is really to look inward.

Let judgment begin with the household of God. — 1 Peter 4:17

So I realize I've told this story. This is the problem. If you stay at Church of the Holy Spirit five years, ten years, twenty years, thirty years, you're going to hear the same story three or four times. Sometimes I feel guilty about that, but I'm like, "Hey, we celebrate Columbus Day once a year, so if we do that—Columbus Day, who cares? Could we not—sorry if I offended somebody—could I not use the same story once a year? I think so."

Again, there's righteous and unrighteous anger. We'll get to that. Righteous and unrighteous anger. I really don't need to look back thirty years to see an example where I had unrighteous anger. I've lost my temper with the vestry and had to apologize to each one of them. Just like a little two-year-old erupting because I didn't get my way. Yeah, sinner. Did you know that?

But the event I was really thinking of is perfect for Father's Day—it's what my two-year-old son taught me. I think he must have read the book of Proverbs. He did start reading very early. But we were driving somewhere, and the context is I was doing my doctorate. I was leading a church, and I was sleeping about five hours a night for three years. We go on vacation, I have a stack of books. Anybody do that in graduate school? Just books, books, books? My poor wife, she did so much while I studied. I'm in the car and I'm studying and all that, and I haven't slept well. See, I'm making excuses already. Making excuses. Did you pick that up? Anyway, I'm there. She's driving as she normally does.

I'm in the passenger seat studying these books, and the little guy in the back is making some noises. It's irritating me because I hadn't slept well—maybe I took prednisone, I don't know. I'm just starting to get a little tense, and it kept going and going. I'm like, "Get up, Quiet down." It just kept going and going, and finally, there was an eruption.

Want to compare it to vomiting because that's really about as unpleasant as it was. You ever done that? Sometimes you know what's coming. This one, I didn't even know it was coming, man. Just out of nowhere. I did not vomit on my son, but I did erupt on him.

You guys, I'm so embarrassed about this, but I share it because I know you—if we were to play your films, you've erupted as well. I got so angry, and I said some things. The kid was two years old. He loved me. He looked to me as his dad, his hero, and I just annihilated him with my anger.

It didn't take more than about five seconds where the conviction of the Holy Spirit came on me. I'm like, "Dear God, Lord, what have I just done to my son?" You could do a million things wrong as a dad, but erupting and ripping the soul out of a two-year-old because you had to study your books is ridiculous. It is sin, and he was traumatized by it.

I turned around and looked at him. He's sitting in his little plastic bowl that you moms carry around for your kids, eating Cheerios, and he says, "Daddy." Like he didn't even understand it. All he knew is his dad was insanely crazy, blowing up mad, and he didn't know why, and he felt horrible, and he just tried to comfort me.

You guys, I felt like such a schmuck. That's Yiddish. I was a schmuck, a bad dad, an angry person. And you know what? You don't just say sorry to that. When godly conviction comes on you, the Bible says:

Godly sorrow leads to repentance — 2 Corinthians 7:10

Not to sorry. Godly sorrow leads to repentance. As the Spirit of God convicted me, it was heavy. I grew up in a house where there was fussing and fighting and pushing, and I don't ever want to live there again. But I told the Lord, "Lord, heal me of this anger. I don't care what I'm studying. I don't care what my job is. It's irrelevant. My job is to love my kids."

The Bible says:

Fathers, do not exasperate your children. — Ephesians 6:4

So I went to a Christian bookstore. Remember those? I went to the section about anger and got a bunch of books. I started reading them. They were all great and helpful, but really it's here, man. It's in the heart. I said, "Lord, I don't want to be that person. That's not who you made me to be. That's not who your Son is. I don't want to terrify my children or anyone else."

I sought some wise counsel. I took action. If you're in anger this morning, if you're seething or if you've erupted, what I'm going to say is: do something about it. Don't just say sorry and keep repeating it. Do something about it. Call on the name of your mighty God.

I'm here to confess to you that in that case and many other places, I've lost and I've erupted with anger.

Righteous vs. Unrighteous Anger

Now, there is righteous and unrighteous anger. Remember I told you that? Righteous and unrighteous anger. What would be an example of righteous anger? Traffickers. Human traffickers. I don't think anybody here would disagree with that.

Can I share with you something the Lord's been putting on my heart, and I don't quite know what to do with it? I've been reading statistics about children—the number of children that are sexually abused and the number of children that are physically abused. Just sexual abuse alone, not counting physical abuse: one out of four girls, one out of five boys. One out of four girls, one out of five boys. And that's what they know of. Then you add to that those who are physically abused. Doctors, nurses, you guys who work in ERs, you know what I'm talking about.

All of a sudden, one day I'm looking out—there are 256 kids here in this church on Sunday before COVID. And I think, "Lord, statistics really don't lie. If there are 256, that means there's at least 15 to 20 more kids here that this is happening to right now."

And so, friends, there is a place for righteous anger. There is. I want to tell you this morning that I honestly, before Jesus, I stand before Him—I'm not mad at any of you right now. I'm not mad. I'm really not mad at anyone. Why? Except for the devil. I'm mad at him because he destroys lives.

And specifically, one thing that's got me hacked off—yes, pastors like seats full and they'd like to have a full house because it's like going to a party. You have a party, you want everybody to come. But it's not that. The thing that I'm angry about this morning, I'm not angry at people.

I'm angry at Satan. I'm angry for the way he's beguiling over 200 of our members who used to come happily to the household of the Lord. Who used to come happily, go on mission trips, and now they're nowhere to be found. We reach out to them and some say, "Day late and a dollar short." Sometimes I think, we're not a concierge service. We're pastors. We're here to equip you, but I'm like, "Lord, free our people from Satan's beguiling lies."

A lot of my friends even, they're like, "No, we're good. We're good. You kind of got out of the habit in fourteen months. We're good." Honestly, y'all, I'm not mad at them. I'm mad at the one who's lying to them, and I'm fearful for what this will mean down the road.

So yes, there is some anger. There's righteous anger. The last one is the number of kids that are abused. We should be angry about that, and we shouldn't just be angry. We should take action as a church. I don't know what God wants us to do, but we need to have listening ears.

What the Bible Teaches About Anger

Now we want to go to Proverbs and look at what the Bible teaches about anger. Let me start outside of Proverbs with three scriptures. What does God's word say about anger? There are actually over 300 verses, but I've picked three from outside of Proverbs.

First, Ecclesiastes 7:9:

Be not quick in your spirit to become angry, for anger lodges in the belly of fools.

Don't be quick, right? Says, don't be quick in your spirit to become angry. Anger lodges in the bosom of a fool.

Then there's this great passage, James 1:19 and following:

Know this, beloved brothers and sisters. Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. For the anger of man does not work out the righteousness of God.

So at the very least, we could say, yeah, everybody has anger—righteous and unrighteous anger. But if you go to unrighteous anger, please understand it doesn't work. It's like a piece of broken glass. One day when I was seized with anger, the Lord said to me, "You ever seen a piece of broken glass? That's like taking a piece of sharp broken glass with many sharp edges, you throw it in your mouth, you chew on it because I'm mad. I'm mad at them. And all you're doing is you're cutting yourself and bleeding yourself to death."

What did Mark Twain say? He said, "Anger is an acid that could do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured."

So we learn: be not quick in your spirit, anger lodges in the bosom of fools, be slow to anger, for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. Effectively, it doesn't work.

And finally, Ephesians 4:26, which is a strange verse to me:

Be angry and do not sin. Don't let the sun go down on your anger.

The thing I love about Scripture is it's honest. The very fact that anger is mentioned 366 times in the Bible tells you what? Don't overthink it. What does it tell you? That God's people struggle with anger. Otherwise, He wouldn't keep talking about it.

What He's saying here is, yeah, you're going to get angry, but when that anger starts coming on you, don't sin. And it says, don't let the sun go down on your anger. In other words, don't give it a toehold, because if you give it a toehold, it's going to get a foothold. You give it a foothold, it's going to get a stronghold. All of a sudden, it's going to wrap around your heart and you're going to be a bitter, miserable person, and you're going to destroy and annihilate the people in your life.

Proverbs on Anger

Those are some passages outside of Proverbs. Now we turn to Proverbs. The thing that keeps saying over and over and over again in Proverbs is: be slow to anger. Be slow to anger. If you want to know what Proverbs says about anger, it's be slow to anger.

Proverbs 14:29 says this:

Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly.

So slow to anger is the key there.

Proverbs 15 says this:

A hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but he who is slow to anger quiets contention.

Boy, have we seen that work!

How about Proverbs 16:32?

Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit is greater than he who takes a city.

The very fact that the Bible says "he who rules his spirit" tells you that believers possessed by the Holy Spirit actually have the ability to control themselves.

I always tell people, you're not a dog. You can control yourself. In Jesus name, by the power of his spirit, you're not a dog. You can control your little self by the power of the spirit.

Good sense makes one slow to anger and it is his glory to overlook an offense. — Proverbs 19

While these are powerful truths both outside of Proverbs and inside, I'm hoping that as we look at a couple other passages in Proverbs, it'll shed light on actually how do we avoid anger. When it starts welling up, what do you do with it? Or if somebody comes to attack you and pours their contempt or tease you up like a golf ball, what are we to do with it?

It's one thing to say, Don't do this. Don't do this. Don't do this. Or positively, Be slow to anger. Be slow to anger. Be slow to anger. But I need some help. Maybe you do this well. I need some help knowing how do I do that? Where's the power? If it's all on me, we're dead meat. If it's all on you, you're dead meat.

So let's go to some practical helps. First one is Proverbs 19:11.

Good sense makes one slow to anger and it is his glory to overlook an offense. — Proverbs 19:11

So what is the first point? The first point is overlook an offense. Overlook an offense. Overlook an offense.

In Jesus name, by the power of his spirit, not your strength. You as a child of God have the strength to overlook an offense. You may choose not to, or you may choose to, but just like the jail cell was open and they were no longer locked down in the jail, Jesus has broken the lock. We don't have to live in a jail of bitterness and anger. The door is open. You can choose to overlook an offense.

I see you guys do this. I've been to Kroger, that's why we no longer have Church of the Holy Spirit bumper stickers because some of our brethren and sisters drove very godly and very polite, and some of them not so much. But you pull into Kroger and you're waiting because there's a lot of people there and you've got a space, and you're getting ready to turn in there and you've been waiting, which seems like ten minutes is probably thirty seconds, but you've been waiting. All of a sudden, some slick devil comes and pulls in your space.

Now at that moment, you have a choice. You can walk in the spirit and love, or you can not. Most of you, for those small things, you're like, it's all right. Take my space. I'll drive across the parking lot and walk. That's no problem. Right? So it's fairly easy to do in a parking lot. It may not be as easy to do on the highway. If you want to watch something today, Google road rage. You'll see about 100 compilations. I've seen people pull out guns, get in fist fights, do what they did in that thing. But what Proverbs is teaching us as a help for dealing with anger is, in Jesus' name, you have the power to overlook an offense.

Somebody who doesn't have the spirit may not have that, but you as the children of God, if you are a child of God, you have that ability. Overlook an offense.

Now, the question is, how do we have the power to do that? I can only tell you what I know. What I know is when I'm really torqued off, when I'm really wrapped up, when I'm seeing red—I can nurse it and I can feed it and I can tell lies to myself or let Satan lie to me, or I can go stand under the cross and I can look at Jesus and I said, you know, Jesus, you tell us to forgive seventy times seven, but my count of sixty, almost sixty-two years old, you've forgiven me about a million and a half times. Who the heck am I to withhold forgiveness to somebody who sinned against me when I not only sinned back in the old fraternity days, I continue to sin. I don't do the things the Lord asked me to every day. I fail to answer his call. I'm lazy. I'm selfish. And yet the Lord—it's crazy. He still loves me. He still loves you.

That is outrageous. That is ridiculous. And so if you want the power to break free, if you want the power to overlook an offense, it cannot come from within you. It can't. You don't have the ability outside of Jesus to do that. But with him, you're more than conquerors. You can do all things through Christ who gives you strength.

Christ has broken the lock. He's given you the power. So stand under the cross. Look at Jesus. Think of how he's forgiven you, and from that, you will be humbled to say, Father, forgive me. Let me show mercy as I have been showed mercy, and as I'm being showed mercy, and as I will continue to be shown mercy. That's where the power is.

A Soft Answer

Number two, turn to Proverbs 15:1. This is the second helpful thing to deal with anger.

A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. — Proverbs 15:1

Now, let's not just think of this in Bible land. Let's think about this in real life. Imagine that you have a teenager, okay? They're pushing all your buttons, and buddy, they know where to find it. In fairness to teenagers, the Bible warns us not to exasperate you all. The Bible says, "Fathers, do not exasperate your children." Here we're learning that a soft answer turns away wrath. Have you ever had somebody just come at you? My tendency when somebody does that, if I'm in the spirit, it's one thing. Normally, somebody comes at me and I'm like, "Oh, yeah? Boom." You poke me with one finger, I'm going to poke you with two fingers. You poke me with three fingers, I'm going to poke you with four fingers. Do you know how that goes in your flesh?

But the Lord's way is so practical, guys. This is like the most clear cut thing to do with anger. When somebody is pouring their wrath on you, when somebody's teeing you up, rather than come at them and try to cut them back, just go—you say this to yourself, not to them: "My security is in Jesus. My identity is in Jesus. So you can rant, you can rave. I'm going to speak kindly and softly to you."

Do you ever see that work? Somebody's furious about something. I was a waiter, maybe you all worked as a waiter or waitress. Maybe you screwed up the order, right? And they got hot because they're just mad. People are just mad in general. And so what I used to do—we were trained to do this as waiters. We would come and say, "I am so sorry. We messed up. It's our fault. I'll tell you what, I'd like to bring you guys a free round of dessert or a free beverage or something, and I just want to apologize and say we'll try to do better." You would not believe what that does. When you get this, usually a guy gets mad. You do that and all of a sudden, a soft answer turns away wrath. In Jesus' name, you have the power to speak softly because your identity and your security is in Christ and the heavenly Father. That's your security. So you can take a lump. You can take one. Soft answer turns away wrath.

Third Principle: Forgive as You Have Been Forgiven

Okay, third principle. Go to Ephesians 4:32.

Be kind to one another and tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ has forgiven you. — Ephesians 4:32

This is the key for dealing with anger. So we're giving you three, right? The first one is Help me. Do you remember? Overlooking offense. Number two, a soft answer turns away wrath. The next one is this. This is so important.

I got that, but here's the one you really want to hone in on: forgiving one another. So if you want to know the power, let me just free you all. If it's up to you, you don't have the strength. You're not good enough. You're not kind enough. You're not loving enough. You're not selfless enough. In our flesh, our desire is to win and to hurt back, but that's not who we are anymore. We are children of God.

And so here we see in Ephesians 4:32, "Forgive one another," and what is the power? What's the power that drives that? What actually gives you the power to forgive somebody that honestly probably doesn't even deserve to be forgiven? The Lord's love for you. Who are we when the Lord forgives you? Can we make a list of your failures and your sins and your anger and the way you've erupted on people? And the Lord keeps forgiving and forgiving—not seventy times seven, but seventy times 70,000,000. He forgives you over and over and over and over and over, but you can't forgive this person? Jesus says, "That's a lie. You can. You have the power to do this. Look at me. Don't look at the mad person, the angry person. Look at me. Look how I have forgiven you, and then as you've been shown mercy, show it to others."

As Charlie Toll would say, if you've been shown mercy, you can't help it. You just can't help but show it to others because you've tasted it.

So friends, we want to close down. I want to encourage you that if you struggle with anger, you're not a freak. Okay? You're not a freak. You're a human. You're a person. All of us get mad, but Jesus will give us the power not to be a hostage to anger, not to allow it to wrap around our heart. But as we stare at him and consider his ridiculous mercy, then it breaks that and allows us to show mercy. Friends, that's the kingdom of God.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Amen.