6^th Sunday of Easter at Epiphany on April 26, 2008

Genesis 4:1-16 Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, "With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man." ² Later she gave birth to his brother Abel. Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil. ³ In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the LORD. ⁴ But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering, ⁵ but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast. ⁶ Then the LORD said to Cain, "Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? ⁷ If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it." ⁸ Now Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let's go out to the field." And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. ⁹ Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" "I don't know," he replied. "Am I my brother's keeper?" ¹⁰ The LORD said, "What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. ¹¹ Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. ¹² When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth." ¹³ Cain said to the LORD, "My punishment is more than I can bear. ¹⁴ Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me." ¹⁵ But the LORD said to him, "Not so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over." Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. ¹⁶ So Cain went out from the LORD's presence and lived in the land of Nod , east of Eden .

Give God Your Anger

It is said that in the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific, some villagers practice a unique form of logging. If a tree is too large to be felled with an axe, the natives cut it down by yelling at it. Woodsmen creep up on a tree at dawn and suddenly scream at it at the top of their lungs. They continue this for thirty days. The tree dies and falls over. The theory is that the shouting kills the spirit of the tree. According to the villagers, it always works.

Ah, those poor, naïve, innocent people. Such quaintly charming habits of the jungle. Screaming at trees. How primitive. Too bad they don't have the advantages of contemporary thinking and the scientific mind like we have in America . We are so much more advanced. It makes so much more sense that we yell at the stepladder, blame the hammer, holler at the TV, kick the broken dishwasher or get mad at the faulty lawn mower. We are modern, urban, educated folks who yell at traffic and umpires and bills and drive thrus and machines. Machines and relatives get most of the yelling.  

For all of our supposed sophistication and technology and advancements, exploding with anger and frustrations in those ways doesn’t help. Shouting, screaming, or even kicking doesn’t improve the situation. As for those naïve Solomon Islanders, maybe they have a point. Yelling at living things does tend to kill the spirit in them. Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will break our hearts.

Today, as we examine the dialogue between God and Cain, we will learn the proper way to deal with your anger, frustrations, hurt feelings and bruised ego. Instead of letting anger build up inside you and exploding all over others – especially those you love – you will learn to give your anger to God.

Two brothers each presented their offerings to the Lord. Cain offered the Lord fruits and vegetables and Abel offered a firstborn from his flock. The Lord accepted Abel’s offering but rejected Cain’s. And it wasn’t because God preferred meat over vegetables, but because Abel’s offering was brought with faith and joy, while Cain’s was brought with selfish and self-seeking motives.

Cain was very angry, and his face showed it. He was angry and jealous of his brother’s favor with the Lord. He began to seethe and sulk, pout and plot. The Lord responded to Cain’s anger saying, "Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it." God warned Cain to be careful because sin was lying in wait for him. The Lord was giving Cain a choice to let his anger go, try the offering again and be accepted, or to give in and allow sin to take him down. Cain chose the latter option, which resulted in the murder of his younger brother, Abel.

Is anger crouching at your door waiting to attack? Has your temper ever led you to do things you later regretted? Has jealousy or envy stirred you to the point of sinning against someone close to you? Can your reaction to certain stressful situations be described in these terms: the slammed door; the “looks could kill” stare; the menacing tone; the threatening language; the silent treatment; the cold shoulder; the pointed finger; the blaming phrase; the furrowed brow and red cheeks?

These behaviors all emerge from our anger. They are weapons of the flesh. As knights of old drew their swords, we pull out these weapons when we believe we’ve been wronged or when we see something wrong.

In and of itself, anger is not a sin. It is an emotion and our capacity for emotions comes from God. It’s what we do with our anger that becomes a sin.

You can have righteous anger. Moses was righteously angry when he broke the stone tablets after seeing the Israelites worshiping the golden calf. Elijah was righteously angry on Mt. Carmel when he ordered the execution of the 450 prophets of Baal. Jesus was righteously angry when he overturned the moneychangers’ tables in the temple courtyard. What made their anger righteous and not sinful was that they were standing up for God, defending his glory, combating unbelief and sin.

Too often, our anger comes from standing up for ourselves, defending our own ego, combating the feelings that someone is taking advantage of us.

We often see our anger as justified; when in reality it is self-righteous. Anger may be an appropriate emotion for the moment, but instead of relying on God’s weapons of His Word, prayer and love, we instead grab for the nearest weapon of the flesh.

We seem to be living in an age of rage. We see examples of road rage on the highway, domestic rage in the family, and classroom rage in school. The problem is that anger is pure emotion, and emotion is usually irrational. Anger outbursts rarely solve any problems or do any good. They more often destroy things and people. Here is God’s wisdom: “He who guards his lips guards his soul, but he souls speaks rashly will come to ruin.” (Proverbs 13:3)

It takes no brains to lose your temper. It is easy to go off on someone else (usually one of the people you love the most). Angry words cut. They destroy love, destroy trust, and destroy joy. Once out, they are like toothpaste – impossible to get back in. They live forever in people’s memories and come back to haunt over and over.

Think of the times you get angry. What pushes your buttons? The first instance of anger in the Bible is Cain. His offering was rejected and he became angry. Later we hear how Jacob pampered Joseph, and his older brothers felt rejected and they were angry. The people of Israel liked David better than King Saul, and the women even sang, “Saul has slain his thousand, and David his tens of thousands.” Saul was rejected and was angry. Jonah, now there was someone with a “whale of a problem.” (Sorry, couldn’t resist.) He didn’t think the Ninevites were worthy of mercy, but God did. By forgiving them, God rejected Jonah’s opinion. Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry.

I don’t want to oversimplify a complex emotion. Anger has many causes: impatience, unmet expectations, stress, hurtful words or actions, referees who couldn’t call a foul if the girl’s arm was ripped off (sorry, a flashback to girls’ basketball season). Much of our anger can be attributed to rejection. Your child rejected your authority and disobeyed. The student rejected the homework assignment and didn’t complete it. The boss rejected your idea and went with another plan. The drivers rejected the red left turn arrow from Durand onto 31 and kept going. Your NFL team rejected your advice shouted at the TV and drafted someone else.

If rejection causes anger, wouldn’t acceptance cure it?

If rejection by others makes you mad at others, wouldn’t acceptance by the almighty God of heaven and earth stir your love for His creation? Jesus said, “He who is forgiven little loves little.” We can replace the word forgiven with accepted and maintain the integrity of the passage. “He who is accepted little loves little.” If we think God is harsh and unfair, guess how we’ll treat people. Harshly and unfairly. But if we discover that God has doused us with unconditional love, would that make a difference?

And guess what? “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” (1 John 3:16) We drink from God’s unlimited love in Christ. Now we share that drink with others. 

If there is a lot of anger in our heart, then there is little room for love, patience, and understanding. Instead of filling our heart with anger, lets fill it with the love of Christ, the kind of love that would sacrifice Himself for us, lay down His life for us. He allowed Himself to be abused, be scorned, have people gossip, slander, and malign His reputation. Yet He didn’t get mad. He didn’t get even. He didn’t write nasty notes or call up talk radio stations or yell at the family or lash out at his disciples. He took it all. He took it all to the cross. To the grave. He constantly turned the other cheek. It wasn’t about Him. It was all about us and our salvation.

God’s anger management techniques are extraordinarily simple and practical (which doesn’t mean they are easy.) He says the first thing you need to understand is that He’s in control. Your anger will not bring about the right things of God. In fact your anger may push you into decisions and actions that are counter-productive to God.

It is God’s job to change people, to get them to do the right thing. It is not your responsibility to change your wife or husband, your friend or next-door neighbor or that moron behind the wheel. That’s God’s job. You are His ambassador, not His mafia muscle.

Imitate God who is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness. (Psalm 86:15) Be slow to anger. Give your anger to God, rather than “giving it” to someone else. Lay your temper, your frustrations, your unrighteous anger at the foot of Christ’s cross, so that He can bury them in the empty grave. This requires faith to believe that God is handling your aggravating situation. “Lord, I believe, help me overcome my unbelief.”

Be slow to speak. “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry, for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.” (James 1:19-20) You may have been taught to count to ten when you’re angry so you won’t rush into saying or doing something you later regret. One thing to remember as you count: The person you’re angry at is a fallen child of God, and God can take care of His own children. This is a precious soul that Christ has shed His blood for. Rather than damning that person to hell with your angry words and actions, work to console, counsel and lead this person to heaven. Also, if that person is a Christian, then the same Spirit that works within you also is working within your adversary. It may not appear to be so, but God has access to you both!

Confront the sin or forget it. If you feel someone has wronged you, you have two options. Either have the guts to speak to the person and confront what is troubling you or you totally forget anything ever happened. Deal with it or set it aside. Confront and forgive or forget and forgive. Otherwise you anger will be crouching at your door. It will devour you. It will consume you.

You can’t unspeak angry words. What you can do is acknowledge responsibility for your previous temper outbursts, ask for forgiveness, and grow in the grace of tongue-control. You can rebuke the selfishness in your own heart that thinks that the universe is all about YOU. Let go of your selfish pride and bruised ego. You can grow to be a Christ-like servant that uses ears, tongue, and hands to build up, not tear down. Start right now – who around you needs a word of kindness from you today?

God’s sweet prescription to cure those angry blues is first to let His gentle forgiveness for your own miserable sins wash over you. He loves you and forgives you through Jesus. And in Colossians 3 He gives you this invitation: “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.”

A stressful job stirred daily bouts of anger within Mr. Terry. His daughter, upon hearing him describe this years later, responded with surprise. “I don’t remember any anger during those years.” He asked if she remembered the tree — the one near the driveway about halfway between the gate and the house. “Remember how it used to be tall? Then lost a few limbs? And after some time was nothing more than a stump?” She did. “That was me,” Mr. Terry explained. “I took my anger out on the tree. I kicked it. I took an ax to it. I tore the limbs. I didn’t want to come home mad, so I left my anger at the tree.”

Let’s do the same. In fact, let’s go a step farther. Rather than take out our anger on a tree in the yard, let’s take our anger to the tree on the hill. Leave your anger at the tree of Calvary . Give God your anger. When others reject you, let God accept you. Take a long drink from His limitless love, and cool down. Amen.