Do you consider yourself an emotional person? Someone often overcome by strong emotions. Maybe you flare up in anger quickly or you get super happy one minute and then super sad the next? Or maybe you are the kind of person who watches a movie and cries every time even if it’s Mall Cop 2 or Rocky 4 or the new barbie movie which I have not seen. In the fall months, loads of things change. Kids start school or go to college. The Minnesota Vikings begin to lift our hearts up with hope only to drop them in a few months, smashing them into little pieces. Some of us have a larger range of emotions and feel them more deeply. Some of you maybe are less emotional in the way I just described it. But all of us have emotions. All of us are emotion full.

Emotion-full

So I’m going to stay away from the word emotional this morning (because unfortunately it can have negative connotations). And instead, we will look at what it means to be emotion-full. What I mean by emotionful is engaging in and experiencing the full range of emptions that God have given to us. If we’re honest, we can all admit that our emotions have gotten the better of us at times. We have been overcome with rage or sadness or we have been naively optimistic only to dropped from the high horse.

Having or being had

Sometimes, instead of us having emotions. Our emotions have had us. And that’s okay! And what I hope to do starting this Sunday is to try to understand our emotions according to the Bible. To have our feelings flourish and serve us within the rule and authority of our Lord Jesus. So this fall, let’s get emotion-full!

Ephesians 4

So we will look at a variety of emotions in the coming weeks but this week we will look at one of those powerful and misunderstood emotions: anger. And the text we will go to is the book of Ephesians chapter 4 verses 20-27. I’ll read it, then we will explore it together. “But that is not the way you learned Christ!— 21 assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus,22 to put off your old self,[f] which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, 23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. 25 Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. 26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil.”

Background

Before we get into the emotion of anger, let me give a bit of background here. Paul wrote this letter to this church to tell them about their new identity as saved people. The first 3 chapters of the letter is a journey up the mountain into the wonders of God’s grace and love through Christ. God had a plan in place to redeem and transform people into a new kind of humanity through the death and resurrection of Jesus. So it’s loaded with all that God has done to bring you into His family by His choosing and by His grace.

Who to the what

In chapter 4 then, Paul moves toward the what now. If you are now a believer in Jesus, the who has been established. Now it’s time get to the what. What do I do now that I’m a new who? Or how does the who now shape and determine the what.

Living different

So in verse 20 he is saying that you can now live differently than you used to live. You can live differently than “the Gentiles” (or non-believers) live. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God. They are callous and sensual and greedy and corrupt. They’re who has not changed. Therefore their “what” has not changed. And Paul is saying, “you can change because you have been changed.”

Back to identity

But he doesn’t say, “be better than those people who are greedy and sensual and corrupt.” Instead, as a warning for this church not to live like that, he goes back to identity. “That is not how you learned Christ” he says, “Assuming that you have heard about Him and were taught in Him.” Look how he begins the discussion of transformation. He starts with Jesus, learning Christ. It’s an interesting way of saying it isn’t it. To learn Christ is to understand and be influenced by Who He is and what He has done. To be a Christian is to not mainly adhere to set of doctrine or beliefs. It is to submit to a person from whom all those doctrines and beliefs come.

The way, the truth and the life

This is how Jesus did it in his ministry. He says, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Why does this matter? Because if we don’t know this and begin here and continue here with Jesus, we will eventually go rogue. We will move on from him. We will think we can figure life out on our own. We will think, “okay Jesus got me started, got me on my feet. I’ll take it from here. I have my set of beliefs securely in place. Now I can really get busy being awesome!”

Moving deeper into

But to learn Christ, to hear about him and to be taught in Him is to never move on from Jesus. I have said this before, “Jesus is not someone you move on from. He is Someone you move deeper in to.” He holds the power we need to be transformed: to not to do what we shouldn’t do and to do what we should do. He empowers the Who in chapter 1-3 and the what of chapters 4-6.

Put off the old self

So what do we do now that we have learned Christ? We learn verse 22, “to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires.” So notice what Paul doesn’t say, “okay to be a good Christ follower, you gott dress up and clean up your act. You gotta take that old sinful, pre-saved self and clean it up and buff and wax.”

He does not say that you need to improve your old self. Instead, he says you gotta put it off. It can’t be made good. In fact, if our old sin nature just needed some love and coddling, Jesus would not have died on a cross. He would have come as a nice add on to your life. He would have taught you how to get better, how to lick your bad habits, how to be an improved you. But that is not why He came.

Showing us the standard

He came to show us the standard: which is Himself. And since none of us live up to the standard, He needed to die for us. And that death on the cross became the death of our old nature. Paul says, “I have been crucified with Christ. And “put to death the deeds of the body.” And “You have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” What is he getting at? He is saying that to receive the life of Jesus is to have your old nature die with Jesus at the cross. The death of the old self is final, it is complete. It is not to be mostly dead but all dead. And that dead, old nature is to be put off not improved. You gotta leave the carcass at Golgotha.

Suburban

We bought a Chevy Suburban about 6 years ago. It had 200,000 miles on it when we bought it. And apparently, that particular engine had an issue with the liftgate assembly and the eco feature. So it burned oil like crazy, like gasoline. I can remember meeting with a fella at a park in Luck, WI. And we met for an hour or so to talk through church stuff and whether or not he was going to join the church. And after we were done, we went to our vehicles. I started our 2007 Chevy Suburban. And a huge plume of smoke came roaring out the back. And this guy probably thought I was crazy. But he did come back to the church.

Loads of money

We spent thousands of dollars on this engine to get things fixed. We tried different oil filters and assemblies and new spark plugs. And eventually, the mechanic told us, you’re gonna need a new engine. Jaw drop. What? But he was right. The old corrupt nature could be dressed up and fixed up no more. It needed to be taken out back behind the barn. So we got a new Jaspar engine with a 3 year, 100,000 mile warranty. Just the thing we wanted to buy after buying a new vehicle!

But you know what that was the best thing for us. And even as the outdoor body of the truck is wasting away with rust and corrosion. That new engine is being renewed day by day.

This is what it means to be a Christian

That is what it means to be Christian. It is to say, “I’m done throwing thousands of dollars at the problem, putting bandages over a festering wound, treating a cancer with a little bit of ibuprofen, adding ingredients to a bad stew that just needs to get thrown away.” And this is really hopeful. Because the gospel brings such clarity. It says: the old nature needs to be taken out back and crucified. And in Jesus it has been already. Now it needs to be put off and not carried with you.

Mind renewal

So how does this happen? It happens through mind renewal. Verse 23 says, “to be renewed in the spirit of your minds.” And what happens for most of us is this: instead of being renewed by the goodness of Jesus. We ruminate over our own badness or someone else’s. We get looped into what we are doing wrong instead of setting our minds on all that Jesus has done right for us.

Rubber band

When I started pastoring a church in Balsam Lake, WI about 12 years ago now, I met with a fella going through tremendous relational loss. And he realized that he was losing important relationships. And that he would need to change some things. And one of those things was his speech, swearing and cursing. So a way to do that was to have a rubber band around his wrist. And every time he cursed or swore, he would pull the rubber band and it would smack his wrist. So we would be meeting and he would cuss a bit and then I would hear an “ouch.”

Punishment

He was punishing himself. He was ruminating on his old self. Trying to dress it up, improve it. And it did not seem to be about Jesus. It seemed to be about him. And I can relate. Did it work? Maybe for a little while. But to put off the old self and to be renewed is to say to your old self, “you’re dead to me. I am tired of carrying you around, covering for you, hiding you, trying to improve you. I’m moving on. I have someone I want to be like not out of self-loathing but out of love for Him.

Put on the new self

So we are told to put off the old self, be renewed in the spirit of our minds and in verse 24, we are to put on the new self. This new self is not a better version of you. Instead it is you recreated after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. This new you is pure and good and holy and even blameless. How? Because these things have been given to you by the grace of Jesus. You do not need to work to become a new creation. You already are. So you are not working to become something. You are seeking to simply be what you have already become. And without this understanding, getting a grip on anger or any other emotion will just frustrate us.

The what

So with at least some of that ground covered, the Who. We can now get into the what. Verse 25, “Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. 26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil.” The community that Jesus started is to be marked by truth telling, putting away falsehood. And if and when anger is roused in the community, it is to be dealt with in the right way.

Be angry and do not sin

Paul says be angry and do not sin. Now Paul does not say, “do not sin by being angry. Or when you are angry, you are sinning. So stop it.” Or even, “some anger is fine and won’t lead to sin. But other anger you should watch out for.” He says: in anger, do not sin. In other words, he separates anger and sin. They are not the same thing. And this is helpful because you might get angry today. I hope you don’t but you might. And let’s be real, there are things to get angry about. It is in fact one of the emotions that God gave to us.

Next time you get angry

So the next time you get angry, don’t think, “I am sinning.” Think “I am angry and I don’t want to sin in my anger.” When you feel anger, you might feel condemned, guilty, out of control. And I’ve found that when a person feels condemned, guilty, out of control they act like they are condemned and out of control. Something or someone you care about has been threatened or attacked and it has stirred anger in you and you feel out of the control. But what Paul is saying is this, “you are not out of control. You are feeling profound anger. Now don’t sin as a result of that anger.”

Don’t let it grip you

So hear this again or in another way. He doesn’t say, “don’t get angry.” That is like saying don’t be human. He saying, don’t let anger so grip you and influence you that you are compelled to act out that anger in sinful ways. You can be emotion-full without being sinful. I want to camp in this for a little bit because some of you are way to angry and some of you are not angry enough. You have experienced injustices and mistreatment or you have seen it taking place and your anger has not been roused.

Others of us have been angry way too much and get mad at the smallest things, especially when they involve a hit on our ego. Anger is a normal response to the loss of or threat to something or someone we love. The feeling itself is not sinful. The response to it though can lead to sinning.

Opening the door to the devil

And anger can open the door to the devil doing some pretty destructive things. So Paul says, “give no opportunity to the devil.” So another right response to anger is this, “I am angry. I am not sinning. However I am extra vulnerable to the devil in my angry state.” Do you remember what the Lord told Cain back in Genesis 4, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.” Letting anger fester is a way of giving an opportunity to the devil to stir you to sin. And that’s what happened to Cain.

Good or bad

Now as of now, we have not addressed good righteous anger or bad selfish anger. Whichever kind of anger it is doesn’t matter so much. It is the response to the anger that we can control by putting off the old nature. So instead of anger having you. You can have anger. It like all the other emotions comes underneath the Lordship, the authority of Jesus. You can say, I have anger but Jesus you have me. Anger doesn’t own me. Jesus owns me.

Psalm 4

The anger Paul has in mind here may be the kind of anger that comes from injustice. It is actually a quote from Psalm 4:5, where the Psalmist says, “Tremble and do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.” To tremble here means to be angry. It is to quake with anger. And this anger is from being mistreated. It is just. The psalmist is being criticized and mocked and he is telling himself and others to not sin, to be silent and then in verse 5 to trust in the Lord and to pray to have his heart filled with joy.

The Psalmist

So here is the psalm writer. Someone injured him. Said things and did things to him to hurt and harm him. And there he is on his bed, searching his heart, seeing the anger there. And what happens? He prays for joy. His anger is replaced by joy as he looks at the goodness of the Lord. That is the renewal of the mind. Not ruminating on your anger or on the injustice. Not mulling over your strategy for revenge. But meditating on the goodness of Jesus.

Keep looking at Jesus

And some of us have undergone injustices that have wounded us deeply. And at times the anger flares up. And that is okay. I don’t think Paul or anyone else is saying, stop feeling angry. He is saying, stop ruminating and brooding over angry thoughts. Don’t go to bed turning the anger over and over in your head. Be renewed by looking at the beauty and excellencies of Jesus. Frederick Beuchner has a quote. He says, “Anger is fun. To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back--in many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.” Brooding in anger can feel good for awhile. But it leads to a dead end. It’s a path to nowhere. Jesus showed us a better way. As He always does.

Jesus

You know if anyone had the right to hold a grudge and didn’t it would be Jesus. Nobody wanted to take his mother Mary in when she was about to give birth to Him. At age 2, there was a bounty on his tiny head. He was cursed at, spit on, hated by many. People were trying to shut him up, kick him out and put him to death from the very beginning of his life. His 12 followers left him when they had the chance. He invested everything and got nothing in return but distrust and fear and embarrassment for being associated with Him. He was crucified surrounded by empty, failed promises from his closest friends. And on the cross, His Father looked down on Him not with love but with wrath as He endured the just penalty for our sins.

How He responded

People were mad at Jesus. The Father inflicted his holy wrath onto Jesus. And with all that anger both just and unjust swirling around Him, do you know what was in Jesus’ heart? Joy. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, despising the shame. He meditated on the goodness of the Father when He was in the garden and his heart was filled with joy even within his agony. And when the sun went down over the place of the skull, Golgotha, it went down on Jesus’ joy not his anger. Is this possible for you and me?

Persistence

Yes. But not automatically. It comes through persistent renewal of the mind (verse 23). It takes practice. It takes work. Not to become a new person. But to live according to the new nature you’ve been given. It’s not to deny anger but to deny it unlimited access to you heart. So practically speaking, if you have consistent anger that comes over you often from an injustice, I recommend working it through with a friend or someone skilled in addressing emotional pain. Or you may want to write a letter expressing your anger, your pain. (You can reams and reams of paper pretty cheap on amazon!) That can be really good and can help you to put the anger out there (putting it off) instead of letting it stay in here.

Abe

Maybe you have heard this: “When Abraham Lincoln had to write a letter to someone who had irritated him, he would often write two letters. The first letter was deliberately insulting and raw and unfiltered. Then, having gotten those feelings out of his system, he would tear it up and write a second letter, this one tactful, discreet and respectful.” Anger should not be contained. It can’t be. It should be expressed or communicated in a way that does not damage people or relationships. This requires wisdom, skill, patience and trust in God throughout the process. And the end goal is that the heart would be filled with the joy of knowing Jesus. That our hearts would be like the heart of our Lord Himself.

This Tuesday and fall

This Tuesday night at Saks, the guys will be looking at this topic of anger. What is it good for? Where does it go bad? And when the gals get together, you’ll have a topic to discuss as well. But as we explore the God given emotions we all have, let’s bring these to Jesus. Let’s embrace the full work of redemption, even at the deepest level. So that we can experience deeper joy in knowing Jesus, our Lord. Let’s pray.