Anger is unavoidable—but how we handle it makes all the difference. In this episode, we turn to Ephesians 4:21–27 and explore the striking command to “be angry and do not sin.” Discover how God’s Word draws a clear line between a righteous anger that protects and a destructive anger that slowly tears apart marriages, friendships, and even churches.

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Welcome to the Fortifying youg Family podcast.

It can be daunting to navigate through an anti marriage and family culture.

Our teacher will expound biblical principles to help fortify our families and keep these sacred institutions strong.

And now, here's this week's teaching from Sam Wood.

Turn with me to Ephesians chapter 4, Ephesians chapter 4, and let me start at verse 21, Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 21, and I'll read down through verse 26.

So look with me in the word of God.

And as we look at the word of God at verse 21, Ephesians chapter 4, the Bible says, if so be that ye have heard him and have been taught by him, the truth is in Jesus that you put off concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt according to deceitful lust, 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.

Tonight I want to deal with an emotion that we all have that when it becomes sinful, it destroys friendships, it destroys marriages.

In fact, it will even destroy and has destroyed many churches.

The emotion I'm talking about we see in verse 26 is anger.

How many of you have ever been angry before?

Raise your hand.

Okay, so I'm here with a bunch of angry people.

Okay?

We've all had anger, the emotion of anger at some time, in some form, in some way or another.

Now, the context of the verses that we're looking at in regard to anger here tonight in verse 26 and 27, the context, the reason I started in verse 21 and read down through this is that in verse 21, through verse 24, Paul instructs us that we're to put off the old life, that is of sin and put on the new life of holiness, that is, as a new creation in Christ, we're to be holy, even as God says that he is holy.

He says this because he wants the church of God.

He wants our fellowship to be unified and in holiness, and as a unified fellowship in unity, one another.

And sin certainly breaks fellowship, but holiness promotes fellowship.

In verse 25, Paul first deals with lying and how lying is not only sinful, but how that it will break fellowship.

And certainly I know that we would all agree with that.

It certainly does.

And it's a Needful message.

Certainly that needs to be preached, maybe for another day.

But I want to look at verse 26 and concentrate on verse 26 where he says, be angry and sin not.

Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.

Neither give place to the devil.

From this command, we really see that there are two types of anger.

There is good anger and there is bad anger.

The Bible says, be ye angry.

Wow.

God is actually commanding us.

This is not a suggestion.

God is commanding us to be angry.

And a lot of.

I've had a lot of people come up to me and ask me about this verse many times.

What do you think about that?

When God says to be angry, I say, well, I have to believe it.

That's what God says in His Word.

And we need to understand certainly what that means.

And if God commands us to be angry, then anger must be good thing.

Now let me pause and say that I'm not sure that any emotion that God has given to us in our creation, we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

So I don't believe there's any emotion in and of itself that we might say that is sinful.

All our emotions are part of us as we are made in the image of God.

Therefore, any emotion we have that goes bad is because that particular emotion is tainted with sin.

So we need to understand that.

I think that's very, very important.

We understand.

We actually see in Scripture that God is constantly angry.

In fact, let me give you a reference to that.

In Romans chapter 1 and verse 18, it says, for the wrath or the anger of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men hold the truth in unrighteousness.

Now, in that verse where it says, for the wrath of God is revealed, that word revealed is the present tense in the Greek.

It's saying that God is constantly angry.

What is he angry at?

Wickedness and the unrighteousness of men.

Now we also see an example of Jesus getting angry.

In fact, we could go to many examples in the Bible in the New Testament of Jesus getting angry.

But turn with me to Mark chapter three.

Let me read a few verses here.

And I want to look at this example, this illustration in Scripture of Jesus getting angry.

And from this illustration, really, we can get a definition really of what anger is.

So look at it with me in Mark, chapter three and verse one.

And let me read down through verse five, it says, and he entered, or Jesus entered into the synagogue, and there was a man there which had a withered hand.

They watched him whether he would heal him on the Sabbath day, that they might accuse him.

And he saith unto the man which had the withered hand stand forth.

And he said unto them, is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath days, or to do evil to save life or to kill?

But they held their peace.

Look at verse five.

And when he had looked round about on them with what church?

With anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts, he saith unto the man, stretch forth thine hand.

And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored whole as the other.

Now why was Jesus angry?

Why did Jesus get angry, the Pharisees on the Sabbath?

What made him angry?

Well, he got angry at the Pharisees because they were taking the wonderful law, the Sabbath, of resting on the Sabbath and twisting it into an instrument of fear and self righteousness.

So what does Jesus do?

He asks him in verse four, Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath day, or to do evil to save life or to kill?

Now this illustration, as I said from Scripture, gives us a good understanding really of what anger is.

And I want to give you a definition, I think a good definition of anger.

And that's this.

Anger is energy aroused in defense of something good and released against something evil.

Okay, let me say that again.

Anger is energy aroused in defense of something good and released against something that is evil.

Or we could say that anger is defending something we perceive as being good and attacking something we perceive to be evil or wrong.

Jesus gets angry in this passage.

He gets very, very angry.

Why?

Jesus is defending what in the world.

He's defending the law of the Sabbath because the Pharisees are twisting this law to mean something that God never intended for it to mean.

So he defends the law of the Sabbath.

Then he releases his anger or attacks their evil by speaking the truth and saying, is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath days or to do evil to save life or to kill?

Now only does he release his anger against their evil thinking, but he also releases his anger by attacking the disease.

He says he gets angry and heals this man with the withered hand.

So he gets angry at the evil that they're speaking the intents of their heart.

And he gets angry at the sickness.

And because of that, he heals this withered hand.

Of course, it wouldn't be good if Jesus didn't get angry.

He should have got angry in this situation.

Jesus is roused by the wickedness of the Pharisees.

So he defends the law of God and attacks their error and the Man's sickness.

God is angry.

I read the verse a while ago.

God is angry at ungodliness and all unrighteousness.

Men.

What is God defending?

God is defending his what?

His holiness.

He's defending his holiness.

So he gets angry constantly angry at the ungodliness and the unrighteousness of men.

What is he attacking?

He's attacking man's sinfulness.

So even as I said a while ago, we can really look at anger and say anger is defense of something good and released against or attacking something that is bad or something that is evil.

Now again, let me remind you that we are made in the image of God.

So if we're made in the image of God, if God gets roused and gets angry at wickedness, if God gets angry at sinfulness, then we should get angry at the same thing that God gets angry at.

That is we should get angry at evil, we should get angry at wickedness, we should get angry at ungodliness, just like God does.

This brings us to the second part of this command.

Not only is there good anger, but I said there's two types of anger.

There is bad anger and look at that at the beginning of this verse 2 it says be angry and do what?

Sin not.

So there's a good anger where that is not sinful, but there's a bad anger that can certainly be sin.

Sinful.

God gives us the emotion of anger to be used against sin and wickedness.

So we are to use anger to defend righteousness and holiness and destroy or tear down injustice and wickedness.

But there's also bad and there's also sinful anger as we see here in this verse.

Now let me illustrate it this way.

I was trying to think of an illustration.

Many years ago when I was co oping my way through college, I was worked in nuclear power plants and I worked in one up in Pennsylvania called Three Mile Island.

Any of you ever heard of Three Mile island before?

And I worked up there in that nuclear power plant.

And it's a wonderful thing when you work at a nuclear power plant to understand and realize the energy that is there in that plant that is released and can supply in a wonderful way if it's harnessed right, it can supply electricity for homes, hundreds of thousands of homes in the surrounding area around it.

But if that nuclear power plant has a core meltdown, then you've got a major problem.

If that core melts down in that nuclear power plant, then you potentially can harm those who live around that plant, but not only the ones who live around that plant, but you could harm many who live hundreds of miles around that plant.

You know, I thought about that.

You know, anger is kind of a similar way thing.

It can be good anger.

It's good if it's harnessed, if it's used in the way that God intended for it to be used.

But when you have a core meltdown, when you have a heart meltdown, the then that anger can be released in sinful ways that not only affect you but can affect many around you and can linger even for many, many years.

God gave us anger to use for his glory and for our good.

But when we have a core meltdown, it becomes sinful and can do a lot of harm to a lot of people.

I mean, many people are murdered because of anger.

Again, I deal and a lot of this is on my mind and heart when I'm talking about what I talked about this morning and preached on this morning as far as sexual temptation anger tonight, because I deal with a lot of these different issues with a lot of different couples.

Do you believe that anger is a major problem in many marriages?

How many of you ever been angry at your husband and wife?

Man, they were slow going up.

Okay.

I think we all be honest, we'd say, yeah, there are times that I've been angry at my husband or wife.

I can think of counseling situations where that husbands have not spoken to wives or wives have not spoken to husbands, and they've been angry at each other for not just a few weeks or a few months, but even years.

And if they don't deal with that, what's going to happen to their marriage?

They're going to end up in a divorce.

And many marriages end up in divorce.

And it starts with this emotion that we're dealing with here tonight called anger.

You see, very often our anger is not towards sin and wickedness in defense of God's holiness, but rather our anger is aroused in our sinful hearts to defend our egos, listen, to defend our pride, to defend our reputations, to defend our agendas.

Many times we get angry because of what we're defending.

And what we're defending is not something that's holy and righteous, but something that might be within us that's very unholy and unrighteous.

Let me give you a couple illustrations of this.

Turn with me, if you would, to Esther chapter one, and look with me at verse 10.

I think it's good to illustrate this.

Just a couple illustrations in the Bible, Esther chapter one and verse ten.

And once you get there, I'll give you a second to get there.

In the Old Testament, the book of Esther, and we see the example of King Ahasuerus.

It says in verse 10, on the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry with wine.

Now, what does that mean?

He was drunk.

Okay?

The king was under the influence of alcohol.

The king was drunk.

He commanded.

Is that how you say that?

Bisha, Harbonneh, Bikhtha, Abaktha, Zether and carcass.

Wow, I should have started the next verse.

The seven chamberlains that served in the presence of Ahasuerus the king, to bring Vasti the queen, before the king with the crown royal to show the people and the princes her beauty, for she was fair or very beautiful to look on.

But the queen Vashti refused to come at the king's commandments by his chamberlains.

Therefore was a king very wroth, and his anger burned in him.

Now, let me stop and ask you, what is the king defending?

Why is the king burning inside with anger?

What is he defending?

He's defending his ego.

He's defending his pride.

He's.

He doesn't want to look bad in front of his subjects.

He'd ask his queen to do something.

She would not do what he asked her to do.

So it made him very, very angry.

He wasn't defending righteousness.

He was defending his own selfishness.

He was defending ungodliness, unrighteousness.

So he burned with anger.

But how does he release it?

What does he attack because of that anger?

Look at verse 19 in the same chapter.

If it please the king, let there go a royal commandment from him.

And let it be written among the laws of the Persians and the Medes that it be not altered that Vashti.

And what they mean by that is, once this law is written, it's written in stone.

It can't be changed that Vashti can't come no more before King Ahasuerus and let the king give her royal estate unto another.

That is better than she.

Now, what they're saying is, I want you to pass a law.

King to vanish Vasti out of the kingdom.

She can never become before you.

And everything she has, she loses.

Wow, that's pretty harsh.

Now, how does he react to that?

You know the story.

Does he agree or disagree?

He agrees, and he signs this law.

So how is a king releasing his anger?

He releases his anger towards his wife Vashti and makes a law that she can never come in his presence again and that she will lose all that she has.

Let Me ask you something.

You think probably a few days.

Well, he was partying here for a matter of months, but you think a few weeks later, a few months later, maybe he thought to himself, I sure would like to have Vashti come in here with me.

I sure would like to have her presence here beside me.

I like to hold her hand.

I sure miss Vashti.

But you know what?

He couldn't.

Because he had signed what?

He had signed a law.

He couldn't have her come back in his presence.

He had vanquished her from his kingdom.

All because he got what?

Angry.

He was drunk.

He got angry.

He lost his temper.

He blew up.

He burned with rage inside.

He signed a law that later he wished he had not signed.

And because of that, he lost his queen.

He lost his queen.

Look at another illustration in First Samuel, chapter 18.

This is a very familiar illustration for a moment.

First Samuel, chapter 18.

And look with me at verse 7.

The Bible says, and the woman, or the women answered one another as they played and said, saul hath slain his thousands and David, his what?

Ten thousands.

I mean, Saul, you've slain your thousands.

But David, man.

I mean, he's a man.

He slayed his ten thousands.

And Saul was very what, wroth?

He got very angry.

He got very mad.

And the saying displeased him.

And he said, they have ascribed unto David ten thousands, and to me, they have ascribed but thousands.

And what can he have more but the kingdom?

And saw eyed David from that day forward.

Now, let me ask you again.

I'm trying to get us to think through this a little bit.

What is.

What is Saul defending?

Saul is defending, again, his pride.

He's defending his ego.

He's defending his manliness.

I mean, they're coming to him.

Saul is very, very jealous of David.

And they're saying, david is the man.

He's slain 10,000.

You've only slain a thousand.

He's much more of a man than you.

Are he defending righteousness or is he defending unrighteousness?

He's defending his own selfish desires.

He's defending his own selfish ego because his ego has been hurt.

And because of that, in verse eight, it says that he was very wroth, or he got very, very angry.

And how does he release his anger?

Who does he attack with his anger?

He attacks David, the object of his anger says, and Saul eyed David from that day and forward.

And we know the story that literally, Saul went all over the countryside trying to find David and trying to do what to him?

He wanted to kill him.

His anger had moved to hatred and hatred to murder.

He was ready to murder David, whom at one time was like his own son.

Wow.

Be angry.

The Bible says and what and sin not.

You have listened to the first part of a two part message by Evangelist Sam Wood.

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