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Aggravation
Matthew 5:21-26
In our house I have collected, and rebought a lot of the toys that I
played with as a kid. I have them proudly displayed in our home on
shelves surrounding the downstairs room. I have a vase full of marbles,
and some old cars. I have an old Atari game and a little dog on a
string. There are bunches of green army men ready to go to war with the
cowboys and Indians, and of course weebles. These old toys remind me of
a time when there was no stress or strain in my life. A simpler time
when a day could be filled running through the yard and the nights spent
around a table playing Candy land, or Shoots and Ladders.
Sadly as we get older we begin to spend all of our time on grown up
things and put the toys away. But I have noticed that even though the
army men are in the closet we still play game. Over the next few Sunday
nights I want us to look at the games people play, and we are going to
do this with the help of some board games. Some of these you have heard
of, some of you have even played them. But I think that all of them have
something to say to us and our walk with Christ.
Tonight I want to introduce you to the game Aggravation. This game I
loved and hated to play when I was a child, depending on how the game
was going. The premise of the game is to aggravate everyone you know
before they aggravate you! Players try to get their marbles from home
base around the board from Base to Home. There are shortcuts and a super
shortcut but if you land on an opponent, you can send them back to the
beginning, causing their aggravation.
As I have been thinking about this game I am not really sure that we
need help teaching our kids they seem to know so well anyway. Anger can
be heard as early in life as a baby’s cry and probably the most powerful
emotion we feel.
In a biography about his life, the story is told that Mickey Mantle had
a friend who would let him hunt on his ranch. One day, along with
teammate Billy Martin they went to the ranch to hunt. Billy stayed in
the car while Mickey checked in with his friend. Mickey was given
permission to hunt, but the rancher asked him for a favor. His old mule
was going blind and had become crippled, but the rancher just didn't
have the heart to put him out of his misery -- so he asked Mickey if he
would shoot the old mule as a favor. Mickey agreed but decided to have a
little fun with Billy Martin.
When Mickey came back to the car he pretended to be angry. "What's
wrong?" asked Billy. "My friend told me NO HUNTING!!!" Mickey pounded
his fist on the dashboard and said, "Why, that guy got me so mad I'm
going into the barn and shoot one of his mules." With that, Mickey
jumped out of the car and headed for the barn. In quick order he took
care of the mule and started back to the car to tell his friend it was
just a joke.
But before he could get to Billy he heard two shots fired and found
Billy Martin standing over two dead cows. "What are you doing?" asked
Mickey. Martin answered, "Why I saw how mad you were and so I wanted to
let the rancher know he couldn't fool with me either."
Turn with me to Matthew 5:21-26 and lets read the text.
First as Christians we must be aware of the seriousness of unrighteous
Anger.
Jesus starts our text tonight by quoting Exodus 20:13, to show us what
the law says about murder. It is an ungodly act of violence that is
totally against the will of God. And if Jesus had stopped right there,
everyone in the crowd would have all shook their head in agreement and
someone might have even said, “Amen."
But before they could take a breath Jesus comes at them through the back
door. You know what that is don’t you? When someone is talking to you
and you are in full agreement then they drop the bomb in your lap that
makes you come face to face with your sin.
You see the bomb that Jesus drops in their laps is found in verse 22,
But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be
liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the
council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of
fire.
Taking someone else’s life by murder is a terrible sin, but unrighteous
or unjustified anger is a great sin as well because it also violates
God’s command to love. But notice what I said, I didn’t say that you
could not get angry; I don’t believe that is what Jesus is teaching
here. Righteous or justified anger is not forbidden in the Bible.
You can look in John 2 and see where Jesus became angry with the
dishonest merchants who were polluting God’s temple. He had a good
reason to be angry since they had turned the Temple into a shopping
mall.
When Moses came down from Mt. Sinai and saw the people worshipping a
golden calf, he had every right to be angry.
Jonathan became angry with his father Saul for treating David shamefully
in 1 Samuel 20:34, he had every right to be angry.
Paul writes to the church in Ephesus “In your anger do not sin…”
Ephesians 4:26
Some anger, brethren, is not wrong. If we have valid reasons to get
upset, then our angry feelings are not immoral. On the other hand, some
anger is wrong and destructive.
Anger that is unjustified is wrong.
For example, When Abel offered a better sacrifice to God, his brother
Cain became angry. His anger was prompted by his jealousy, which lead to
Abel’s murder. That is unjustifiable anger.
Did you know that back in 1984 in Dadeville, Alabama two men were
arguing in a Sunday school class and one man got so upset that the other
that after church he went out to his truck got a gun and shot and killed
him in the parking lot. One man became so jealous and angry because the
other fellow was a better Bible quoter, he shot and killed him. You
think that you’ve heard it all now don’t you?
It’s not just murder that makes anger wrong. Jesus teaches here that if
your anger prompts you to say hateful or hurtful things to others is
wrong and destructive. Look again in verse 22 at what Jesus says about
the destructive potential of words. The NKJV reads:
But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause
shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’
shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall
be in danger of hell fire.
When we are angry and say hurtful things to others, we are sinning. We
need to be very careful with the words that we offer to others. And we
must remind ourselves daily that angry outbursts of lethal words can
damage self-concepts and destroy personal relationships.
I don’t know how many of you were raised like I was by parents who used
this verse to teach that you couldn’t call your brother or sister a
fool. And why I think that’s a little of it, it goes a lot deeper. You
see if I choose to call you something besides fool, I am just as guilty.
The word Racca is a Hebrew word and is pronounced like you are clearing
your throat. You don’t have to say it as much as make the sound. When
you did this at someone, you were basically preparing to spitting on
them but then thought that they weren’t even worth that.
Then to call someone a fool was to say that they were so far from God
that God himself could not save them. By law if one Jew said this to
another they cutting out the tongue, and place a hot iron 10 fingers in
width into the mouth of the person who used it.
So do you see what Jesus is saying here? How dare we use our words to
devalue a person that Christ loved enough to die for. In the heat of our
conflicts, we must avoid saying things that can do absolutely
unbelievable damage to both the self-concept of the person we are
talking to as well as the relationship itself. Angry words can cause
serious damage.
As Parents we have to be very carefully with the words we use to
disciplining our children. Angry words can affect them for the rest of
their lives.
Husbands and wives, must be very carefully with the words you say to one
another.
Christians should be very careful with the words you say to your
brothers and sisters. Angry words can destroy relationships and cause
others to abandon their faith.
We need to burn the words of James 1:26 into our hearts and conscience.
If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein
on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.
Have your words made your religion worthless?
Do you still have unresolved anger lingering in your heart?
Paul writes in Ephesians 4:31 "Get rid of all bitterness, rage and
anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice."
If there is anger lingering in your lives, then we have sin reigning in
our hearts.
When I was in College a friend of mine taught me something that you
probably already know but if you take the word anger and then add a D
you get the word “danger.” We are in a dangerous situation if we have
anger stored up in our hearts.
So as Christians we must learn how to handle our anger
If we are going to be angry and not have sin in our lives we have to
learn how to handle it. So I want to close tonight by offering you three
principles on how to handle anger constructively.
First we have to ask ourselves if we have a valid reason to get angry.
If the answer is no then we have got to let it go. A lot of times this
is hard to do in the middle of being angry, but if we have given our
hearts and minds to Christ it is something that we must do. Listen to
what Solomon has to say about anger:
Proverbs 17:14 The beginning of strife is like letting water out of a
dam, so quit before the quarrel breaks out.
Proverbs 19:11 Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory
to overlook an offense.
I think that those are pretty plain so I will treat this point like
anger without a reason and move on.
Secondly if we have a valid reason to get angry then we need to
verbalize it.
When people get angry they handle it in one of three ways.
They deny it. This is not healthy because denied anger always rears its
ugly head as gossip later.
Or some people explode and say things that they will later regret. You
know we say it’s easier to get forgiveness than permission, but that is
usually said by someone who has not eaten a lot of humble pie.
But the best way is to talk about our anger with the one who made us
angry in a positive and gentle way.
Solomon also wrote in Proverbs 15:1 “A gentle answer turns away wrath,
but a harsh word stirs up anger.”
This is always the hardest to do, but Christianity is not an easy way of
life. Living like the world is easy but living against the world is only
for the courageous. Cowards gossip courageous men and women go to the
person you are angry with and tell him or her your feelings in love.
And you have to go to that person. In verse 23 we read “Therefore, if
you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your
brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the
altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer
your gift.”
Some of you may think that the best way to resolve anger is to go
exclusively to God and ask Him to work it out. Some of you think that
the best way to resolve your anger is to talk to someone else about it,
but Jesus puts a high importance on getting right with your brethren,
even higher than worship. If we truly want to work out our anger then we
must go to the person we are having trouble with first and get it all
worked out, and then come to Him.
The most important thing that we can do with anger is Forgive the Person
Who Made You Angry.
Jesus talks about forgiveness an awful lot. His teaching on the subject
is that we can only receive what we are willing to give.
In Mark 11:25 “And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against
anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your
sins.”
And then in Matthew 6:14-15 “For if you forgive men when they sin
against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do
not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”
This is probably the hardest part. We all like to receive mercy, grace,
and forgiveness, but we all struggle giving it.
One of the ways that I am trying to teach the boys about grace in
through discipline; there have been times that they deserved to get a
spanking but we talk about it and I ask them if they want me to extend
them grace. At first Trafton would always say yes but a few months ago,
a light switch flipped in his brain. You see I am trying to teach them
if you get grace you have to give grace to everyone else, and that
includes your brother. So about two weeks ago, Trafton was tired, hungry
and he and Rylan were both wanting the same toy. Trafton put it down,
and Rylan scooped it up. Trafton picked up another toy and hit Rylan in
the face with it. Normal boy stuff and I sent him to his room. I took
off my belt and we sat down to talk about what he did and why he did it
and I told him to get ready for his spanking, then I asked him if he
wanted grace. He looked at me and said if it means I have got to be nice
to Rylan I’ll take the spanking.
Forgiveness means that you pardon the person of his or her offense; you
give up all feelings of getting even; you let go of all the hurt that he
or she has caused; and you keep no records of wrongs. Forgiveness means
it over; it is complete; it is finished.
I know all to well the effects of Aggravation, but if we are going to
receive the grace of God then we must be willing to forgive even if they
don’t deserve it.
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