ANGER Issues

Thursday, March 16, 2023

So stop telling lies.  Let us tell our neighbors the truth, for we are all parts of the same body.  And “don’t sin by letting anger control you.” Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, for anger gives a foothold to the devil.  If you are a thief, quit stealing.  Instead, use your hands for good hard work, and then give generously to others in need.  Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.  And do not bring sorrow to God’s Holy Spirit by the way you live.  Remember, he has identified you as his own, guaranteeing that you will be saved on the day of redemption.  Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior.  Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.  Ephesians 4:25-32

Each of the words or actions apostle Paul says we must banish from our nature is a characteristic, or outcome of anger.  Lying, harboring a grudge, stealing, foul language, abusive behavior, bitterness, rage, slander, and every other anti-social behavior is a child of selfish anger.  At the very least they all are cousins.  And they all are born in an unforgiving heart.  This is why the tail-end of Paul’s counsel is to let the heart tender-up, to learn to forgive.

Choosing to be angry, punishing another rather than forgiving, is that which gives foothold to the devil.  Paul is giving the mountain-climbing metaphor to make it clear, that Satan has a long, nearly impossible job ahead of him getting into your brain and taking over when you’re tenderhearted…a forgiver.  When you’re angry he has no problem climbing all over you. 

Without mincing words the apostle is making it clear, anger is a choice which serves Satan, not Christ.  It is choosing self, rather than what Jesus said about denying self and taking-up the cross.

If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross daily, and follow me.  Luke 9:23

There is not much wiggle-room in that.  And it is a hard thing to break habits that are long-entrenched.  But the words of Christ do not pull punches about giving-up that which gives foothold to the devil’s ways.  The question, for most of us, is:  I want to give up lying, foul language, and all that other stuff, but I keep falling-back into it – I don’t like being angry, but it happens all the time; am I doomed?

The short-answer is emphatically…NO…if you’re a follower of Jesus, you’re already forgiven, you’re not doomed, you’re a human with a carnal nature that can’t be behaviorally-perfect.  The next thought is:  Well, how can I have hope of ever being obedient and getting rid of this anger? 

That is a longer discussion, but the short answer is that leaning on Christ, staying close to the Master, sitting at His feet, and hanging with His people are the ways that God changes us.  Some are blessed to give up anger issues, and the transformation is almost immediate.  Others must persevere, because the behavior has so entwined in every aspect of thinking and doing, it is a longer, more difficult uphill challenge. 

This is why the apostle also advised believers to never stop praying.[1]

For You Today 

Got anger issues?  Keep praying, work on the behavior, trust God today.  And when you wake up tomorrow…REPEAT.  He’s not done with you.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

Go to VIDEO (read by author)

There are about 2,500 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library.  To dig deeper explore some of these:  So Much Anger - series PART ONE  and PART TWO  and PART THREE       

Title Image: via Pixabay.com    Images without citation are in public domain.

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©  

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[1] 1 Thessalonians 5:17

The Car that Teaches Us to Pray

 

Wednesday, June 9, 2021

Never stop praying.  1 Thessalonians 5:17

As the old saying has it, if I had a nickel for every time that car broke down I’d be a rich man.  More accurately, I’d at least have an extra hundred bucks in my pocket, if you added-in the money saved on repair parts.

It didn’t matter whether it was a Ford, Chevy, or Dodge, it was mine – and it was my first – and I had mobility.  (Well, up until I got at least a mile from home and found myself stranded…again.)

One night that Oldsmobile taught me to pray like an apostle…without ceasing!  I’m fairly certain memory serves me correctly, that I was on my way to work; so this wasn’t a frivolous joy ride.  It was dark, no street lights, and it was that less-travelled road.  The muffler hitting the pavement was the first clue things were happening pretty much in their usual order – leave home, pause, get stuck…again!

A brief look with the flashlight told me this was going to be another day in paradise.  An hour later paradise included three skinned knuckles, elbows aching, shoulders refusing to lift one more time, and a muffler still hanging down on the ground.  It was time for serious help.  So I began praying, Lord, help me with this thing…I don’t like it here in the dark, on the ground, and that thunder in the background is getting closer.  I promise….(well, never mind all the things I promised God that evening – I’m sure I didn’t follow through with most of them).

The prayer was followed by an overwhelming sense of guilt, the kind a teenage boy (or a 74-year-old man) feels when he’s praying for a two-ton car to begin cooperating with his feeble mechanical skills, and the boy (or old man) hasn’t checked-in with God in months…or years.  It’s like remembering that rich uncle when you’re down to your last dollar…you haven’t even called him the past decade, but now you need what he’s got, and you’re ready to get chummy…even downright nephew-ie, as you ask him for a “loan”.  As in a woeful prayer life, you haven’t exactly been nephew-ing without ceasing, but you’re going to ask anyway.

Well, that night afforded the strangest response from God – two really.  The first was when I picked that car muffler off the ground one more time, and CLANK – it went right back in place.  A few thousand wraps with the roll of wire I kept in the trunk to hold this behemoth Olds-98 together, and there you have it…ready to roll!  The second response from God was when I actually said the words out-loud on the back roads that night…thank you, God.  I really was thankful, but God’s next words were what changed everything for this non-church-attending, sometimes-believing (but never in a fanatical sort  of way), teenager.  I know I didn’t hear the words in an audible way, like Moses at the burning bush, but He seemed to speak directly to my heart without words.  I know it was God, because Russell, as slow on the uptake as he was around God-things, could not have come up with this; the Lord said thus:

It’s all good, son…this time.  But, listen…if you keep practicing prayer like you do maintenance on your car, your voice is going to fade on this end.  Russell, I don’t want our relationship to fall apart like that jalopy…so how about we talk more often?

For You Today

It’s like my late friend Donna used to say, I got so much to talk to Him about, I just never get around to saying ‘Amen’. 

If you haven’t heard from Heaven lately, it may be that jalopy needs a little TLC.  So, maybe it’s time to get with it before the prayer muffler hits the pavement?

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!   

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[1] Title Image: Pixabay.com   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©

Keeping the Lights On

 

Wednesday, December 2, 2020

“Watch out!  Don’t let your hearts be dulled by carousing and drunkenness, and by the worries of this life.  Don’t let that day catch you unaware, like a trap.  For that day will come upon everyone living on the earth.  Keep alert at all times.  And pray that you might be strong enough to escape these coming horrors and stand before the Son of Man.”  Every day Jesus went to the Temple to teach, and each evening he returned to spend the night on the Mount of Olives.  The crowds gathered at the Temple early each morning to hear him.  Luke 21:34-38

Like it or not we all have a dance with issues of darkness.  As a small child I did not want to turn off the lights; darkness frightened me.  (Things do go “bump” in the night, you know).  As an adult the table turned, and I cannot get to sleep if there’s a light on.  But that presents other problems, such as getting up in the middle of that darkness, thinking you’ll have no problem getting through the darkness.  After all, you’ve done it a thousand times, and you know where to walk; but this time you discover someone moved that chair.  (Rather, your bare foot finds out for you).

On a spiritual plane Jesus taught the principle of keeping the lights on.  This entire chapter of Luke’s Gospel has Jesus’ teaching of the end of days and the coming judgment.  To be caught in the darkness of carousing, drunkenness, and all the worries of this life (and aren’t there many?), is to be unprepared for the Advent, the next coming of our Lord.  The word of Jesus’ message is alert, and the Lord taught us how to do that. 

There are three moving parts to keeping the spiritual lights on.

1.   Pray

Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything.  Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.  Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand.  His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:6-7

This is Paul the Apostle’s advice to a church family he loved very much.  The worries of life are no match for prayer.  There is no mistaking the fact that praying is a trust issue.  To pray is (in the language of the Scriptures) to bind oneself to the care of another.  We bind ourselves to God’s will as we bow before Him…praying.

2.   Keep Praying

Never stop praying.  1 Thessalonians 5:17

Paul told another loved group of disciples at Thessalonica that a little “now I lay me down to sleep” praying will not suffice in spiritual warfare.  You’ll just wind up sleeping in the darkness.  To never stop praying means just that; keep yourself in prayer mode day-in and day-out.  Be (as Paul told Timothy about his preaching) always at it, in favorable circumstances or not.  Make prayer an ongoing conversation with your Heavenly Father.

3.   Pray with Other Believers

And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.  Hebrews 10:25

Ours is not a solitary faith.  It is true that we are individually responsible for our choices…those which lead to good or evil.  But we are never to imagine we are to depend only on ourselves to muddle through.  My single most annoying flaw (most annoying to me, and to my Heavenly Father) is failing to enlist or involve others in my struggles.  And that is exactly what Paul writes to his fellow Jewish believers in this passage, that we cannot afford to experiment with “aloneness” when we are involved in Kingdom of God; it’s a group project!

I’m not sure God’s people grasp that nearly as much as the world does.  The diversity mania mantra is Stronger Together.  That is coopted from God’s Word to enforce a forced unity in people who resist change.  Taking it back to the holy meaning of praying with other believers, we must keep on gathering, because there is vital encouragement to be found in our worship.  Times of giving, building, testifying, and bowing before God in prayer and praise bring the kind of strength Jesus exemplified for us. 

For You Today

So…will you be a go-it-alone Christian?  Or does God’s Word now challenge you to engage with others, praying, never-ceasing, always engaging?

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

GO TO VIDEO

Title image, Pixabay.com and    W   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©

For other posts on this topic see:  On Guard and Wisdom from Above  

 

Doing Good

 

Monday, November 16, 2020

There will be trouble and calamity for everyone who keeps on doing what is evil—for the Jew first and also for the Gentile.  But there will be glory and honor and peace from God for all who do good—for the Jew first and also for the Gentile.  For God does not show favoritism.  Romans 2:9-11

There is a God-ordained balance to everything under the sun.  From the first rays of creation God chose to have the results of His work involved in spreading “good” and dispelling evil.  This is characteristic of God’s nature; He is good!

Adam and Eve quickly disproved that we are capable of sustaining personal goodness.  Jesus chided the man who came to him and called him Good rabbi, informing the man that only God is good.  Paul the apostle said the same in no uncertain terms, that we are all sinners, and that included himself:

And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.  I want to do what is right, but I can’t.  Romans 7:18

Fast-forward a couple of millennia and you have our day, truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne…we are still proving Jesus’ point that humanity is incapable of sustaining “goodness”. 

Yet, in today’s reading, Paul asserts there will be glory, honor, and peace for all who do good.  So, what gives, Paul?  Is there a possibility to enter that category of those who are blessed for “doing good”?  Or are we consigned to failure in our epic attempts to overcome our no-good selves with doing good?  The answer is a simple answer (to those with ears to hear) … yes and no.  Well, thanks, that clears it up.

Seriously…the answer is “yes” if all the so-called good we do is what we can do; we are doomed to fail in our own strength.  On the other hand, that reward of glory, honor, and peace is available to those whose lives are surrendered to Christ, being led (empowered) by the Spirit of God, not just personal advancement thru works. 

In Acts 8 Simon, a man who gained fame and wealth by using witchcraft saw the apostles laying hands on people so they would receive the Holy Ghost.  Simon saw the advantage of that power and offered the apostles money to have that gift of laying on hands.  Peter saw through this veiled offer to do good and told Simon he and his money would be destroyed for such evil.  In this we see the contrast of Peter, doing good works for the sake of God’s will, and Simon, barging-in with a plan to do powerful stuff to boost his popularity ratings.  An apostle was led and empowered by the Spirit of God; the other carrying on the tradition of evil with a false face of good to float a lie.

And the beat goes on…in politics, business, daily life, and even the church.  It is no wonder Scripture cautions us to pray without ceasing; our hearts are so prone to wander from God and into evil.  As the hymn has it:

Oh, to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee:
prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love;
here's my heart, O take and seal it; seal it for thy courts above. 

This is the kind of transparent, honest prayer which surrenders our hearts and lives to the keeping of God and invites the Spirit of God to do the good works of God’s Kingdom through us. 

It is the Spirit who empowers any genuine goodness.

For You Today

Whatever good you do today will never get off the ground unless your knees hit that ground first.

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

GO TO VIDEO

Title image, Pixabay.com   W   Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©

For other posts on Psalm 90 see:  The God of Equal Opportunity and  The Road that Leads Home  

 

Prayers with "Feet"

[1]

Wednesday, December 9, 2015

Devotion VIDEO here

No, O people, the Lord has told you what is good, and this is what he requires of you: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.  Micah 6:8^(NLT)

Among the prayers listed for today’s reflection I found this one for our country:

Almighty God, who has given us this good land for our heritage: We humbly beseech you that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of your favor and glad to do your will. Bless our land with honorable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogance, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion us into one united people. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in your Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to your law, we may show forth your praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in you to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.[2]

There is a long list of requests in that paragraph! 

       ·       Strength/will to do God’s will

       ·       Prosperity, wisdom, manners (manners? In 21^st century USA?  Really?)

       ·       Protection from violence, discord, confusion, pride and arrogance (guess we’ll have to 

             forego the 2016 election)

       ·       Justice and peace…thankfulness and vindication of our way of life

It’s not only a mouthful to speak; it’s quite a pocketful of miracles in a nutshell.

Years ago a lady in our church was called upon to pray for the missionaries during our midweek Bible Study and prayer time.  She took about a week to walk up to the microphone, heaved a great and very dramatic sigh, then prayed….O, Lord, please bless all the dear missionaries everywhere.  Amen!

Well, Russell, what’s your beef?  She did it; she prayed for those missionaries.  Do you think a longer prayer is somehow more holy?  If she added words would there be more blessings from above?

No…not really; it’s just that we seem to take the easy way out of most stuff, prayer included.  After the mass-shooting in San Bernardino last week, the criticisms flying around on social media for people who had posted prayers for the victims raised the issue for me about how much “feet” we actually add to our prayers.  Are those critics correct in saying our prayers don’t matter a whole lot if we’re not willing to do something to cooperate with what God might do?

Micah’s three-fold sermon on what God requires is about two-thirds internal commitment (loving mercy and walking humbly with God), but that other part is hard:  doing what is right!  When there is scarcity of doing, we always fail the loving and walking.  And frankly, if one support of a three-legged stool is broken, there will not be a safe place to sit!

Our prayers are important; if they were not, Paul would never have reminded us to pray without ceasing. 

But prayer – even unceasing prayer – when there is a lack of action, is much less than our best effort to serve God with excellence.  That kind of prayer probably does no more than bounce off the ceiling and echo around the room until it fades away without so much as a whimper of a half-blessing for all those missionaries…or shooting victims.

For You Today

Do you have an opinion, an urging from God’s Spirit to do right?

What difference will you make today?

Chew on that out on the Rocky Road today…and have a great day!

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[1] Title image:  By Xeroshoes (Own work), via Wikimedia Commons

[2] The Daily Office from Mission St Clare Morning Prayer 12-9-15