Ephesians 4:26-27
Whose Footprint is That? (Part 2)
Safeguarding Against Satan’s Schemes
Introduction:
Disciplines of a Godly Man, Wesley illustration criticism, pg140
William Barclay, pg 180-181
Review last week, Putting off old, putting on new, “lying”
Our sermon title today is “Whose Footprint is That?” When you see a footprint you know someone has been in the area. You know they have had activity in that spot. Peter, speaking of Satan says, “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” (1 Pet. 5:8). Does the devil have footprints here at EFC? How about in your home? Our subtitle is “Safeguarding Against Satan’s Schemes”. I am playing on that phrase in verse 27 where Paul says, “and do not give the devil a foothold.”
What is a foothold? The dictionary defines foothold as: “a secure position, especially a firm basis for further progress or development.” What that means is that when we are saved but we live like we’re not, we give the devil a secure position in our lives. Do you want the Devil to feel safe operating in your life? How about in this Church? When we don’t apply what God’s Word says to our lives we give the devil a secure position in our marriage, our family, our Church. And by doing this we give him a firm foundation for furthering his own agenda in our lives. When we live according to our old sinful self, Satan has power and opportunity. That is why we are not to live according to our old selves, Paul said in verse 22, “Put off your old self which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires.” How do we do that? How do we Safeguard EFC? How do we safeguard our homes?
Last week we looked at Safeguard #1: Telling the Truth. This week we look at Safeguard #2.
Safeguard #2: Deal with your Anger (v26)
Paul now addresses our anger. Starting in verse 26 he says, “In your anger do not sin; do not let the sun go down while you are still angry.” The Roman poet Horace said, “Anger is momentary insanity”. There is nothing so insane as a fit of white hot rage. Far too often in our lives we find that our anger controls us rather than us controlling our anger. In God’s eyes, our uncontrolled anger is unjustified every time. Aristotle said, “Anyone can become angry, but to be angry with the right person to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way – this is not easy.”
Point #1: Sometimes anger is not sinful, but most of the time our anger is. Notice how Paul says, “In your anger do not sin”. The NASB says, “Be angry, and yet do not sin”. We get angry. We vent our anger; blow our lid; seethe, rant, we criticize and cut down, grow bitter, seek revenge and so on. But very seldom do we actually have justifiable anger.
There are two wrong reactions to sin. First is to hate the sin so much that you can’t differentiate the sin from the sinner. In other words we hate what someone did or does so much that we hate them. That’s not God’s hate. God hates sin, but loves sinners. And that is what we are to do. Matthew Henry says, “If we would be angry and not sin, we must be angry at nothing but sin.” When we are loving others like God has loved us, it is at those times we enter into a real understanding of how God has loved us.
The Second wrong reaction to sin may very well be just as damaging to the church, if not more so. It is “indifference”. When Christians have no sensitivity to sin then we show how insensitive to God’s holiness we are. J.C. Ryle, the great 19th century pastor and author said, “I am convinced that the first step towards attaining a higher standard of holiness is to realize more fully the amazing sinfulness of sin”.
When we are indifferent to sin it is because we are indifferent to holiness. But we are the holy ones of God, and as such we should hunger for holiness, which makes us sensitive to sin. John Wesley said, “Give me a hundred men who fear nothing but God, and who hate nothing but sin, and who know nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and I will shake the world.” Jesus did it with 12.
If that is true, what can God do here with the men of EFC? If each man here feared only God, hated only sin, knew and loved only Christ, what could God do? If we were devoted to holiness what would God do? Someone once said, “It is not so much great talent that God blesses as likeness to Christ. A holy man is an awful weapon in the hand of God.” If you are indifferent to sin it is because you have no love for holiness. Usually it is because you are in love with things of this world.
But our anger gets in the way. Our rage is opposes God’s righteousness. What we mean is that our anger is not consistent with the righteousness that God requires of us. James 1:20 says, “for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.” Almost all human anger is sinful because it is selfish. It is not out of a deep regard for God’s character and purposes so much as our own. “People don’t do what I want” and “Things aren’t going my way”.
All anger is not sin though. William Barclay said, “There is an anger without which the world would be a poorer place.” What then is the right kind of anger? It is anger over the same things God is angry about. The closer to God we are the more indignation over sin we will have. When we are angry over sin we are angry over what God is angry about. Sin angers God. Sin should anger us.
Unfortunately we respond oppositely to the way God does to things. It is amazing how complacent Christians are over sin. “Well we’re all sinners saved by grace”, or, “who am I to judge?” When we are becoming angry we must ask ourselves the question, “Is God angry about this?” Let us not impose anger on God that He does not have. Let us not imagine Him to be upset over something just because we are. There are things that God is angry about, but, in my observation – of myself and of Christians – rarely am I so passionate about what God is and rarely is God so passionate for the things I am. Our hearts must be tutored so we become angry over only those things God is angry over and that we respond the way His Word would have us to.
The problem is that anger very easily leads to sin. Even righteous anger that is not dealt with properly can very quickly lead to sin. Anger is like hitting the turbo booster to propel us towards sinful behavior. In our anger we become hasty in judgment, speech and action. Galatians 6:1 touches on this when it instructs us about how to deal with a sinning brother, “Brothers if someone is caught in sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.” I can see that at least one application is that if I am angry over someone’s sin I need to be careful that I do not let that anger cause me to sin. This is what leads us to our 2nd point
Point #2: Deal with your anger Immediately. “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry” is good advice. Many marriages have had longevity because a husband and wife committed to never go to sleep angry at each other. Matthew Henry says, “Though anger may come into the bosom of a wise man, it rests only in the bosom of fools.” Fools don’t deal with anger. But the wise in heart do because they guard their heart (Pvb 4:23). There are 2.5 ways to guard your heart from ungoverned anger. These are 2.5 ways to help master your anger:
#1: Master your anger first by Forgiving. Colossians 3:13 says, “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” To forgive means to cancel a debt. When someone has injured or insulted us we naturally feel that they owe us. They need to come to us and make it right and pay us back for the damages they’ve done. Forgiveness means that we cancel their debt to us. Forgiveness also means to pardon someone from their penalty. How often in our anger over what someone has done do we want to make them pay? We want a payback. When we forgive we grant them a pardon from that penalty we want to inflict on them.
One of the dangers in dealing with our anger is to mistake forgetting someone’s offense with forgiving their offense. Forgiving is not forgetting. Forgiveness may lead to forgetting, but we must not think that because we have forgotten about an offense that it is the same as forgiveness. (Read Ten Questions, pg118… “Donald Whitney in his book, Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health makes some great comments….”). Our tendency is to try and commit ourselves to forgetting about what happened. To try and put it out of our minds - someohow that if we can just stop thinking about it or stuff it down deep, distract ourselves with other things, then we will be okay.
One problem with that is that while it may be put out of our minds the issue hasn’t been put out of our hearts. Bitterness and resentment begin to grow with an angry and unforgiving heart.
A second problem is that we really never can put the thing out of our minds. We replay the offense over and over, we play the tape in our minds again and again to see the person and what they did. Let’s be honest, no one has ever successfully dealt with anger by “forgetting” about what made them angry.
A third problem is that ignoring what has been done to you does not glorify God. The reason is because this is not how God has dealt with all the sin against Him. God did not get upset and ignore, or distract Himself from thinking about how He has been sinned against. He dealt with it. He confronted His offenders and He has granted forgiveness to His offenders. We glorify Him when we forgive our debtors the way that He has forgiven our debts. Therefore, rather than trying to forget, we should prayerfully commit to forgiveness. Only then can our hearts be healed. Only then can we genuinely fulfill God’s requirement of us to forgive. And only then can we truly glorify God.
You might say this to me: “You don’t know what that person did to me, how can you tell me to forgive them?” You’re right, I may not know what they did. But God does, and it is not me telling you to forgive. It is Him.
Master your anger by giving forgiveness.
#2: Master your anger by Forbearing. Forbearing is part of the believer’s maturity in Christ. This reminds us of the same thing Paul said in 4:2, “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. .” Forbearing means putting up with someone. We’ve all had moments where we wanted to say, “I will not put up with that person anymore! I will not suffer them any longer.” That is not forbearance. Forbearance means you continue to patiently, lovingly, graciously put up with someone and their everyday faults. The opposite of forbearance is to quit on them. Proverbs 10:12 says, “Love covers all wrongs” and Proverbs 17:9 says, “he who covers over an offense promotes love”. That’s what Jesus did. It’s what He does with us every day. And that’s what we are to do every day with each other. It is through love that we cover over the everyday wrongs of others – meaning we forgive them and don’t keep holding them against that person. Master your anger by forbearing in love with each other.
#2.5: Master your anger by Expecting Flaws in Others. We act surprised by people’s flaws whenever they come out. “Can you believe she would ….?” We expect people to have superior character all the time and we act stunned at those times they don’t.
But we should expect flaws in others. I’m not saying we should be cynical. What I’m saying is that the Bible says we all have a sin nature that makes us bend toward selfishness and sin. So we need to see people according to correct theology. We need to expect that people have weaknesses and imperfections and therefore we need to love them beyond their flaws and always be ready to forgive and forbear when those flaws show up. We have to keep ourselves ready to forgive and forbear.
One important point needs to be made here. We have all asked the question: How often do I need to forgive? Peter asked Jesus “How many times must I forgive my brother when he sins against me?” (Luke 17). We know Jesus’ answer. If he sins 7 times in a day and comes and repents all 7 times then we forgive 7 times. Jesus point was that we should be ready to give full and complete forgiveness. But you know, it may not be that the person sins 7 times in a day. Donald Whitney says, “It is not unusual at all for the memory of that offense to return to my mind 7 times in a single day. Just as in the situation Jesus described, I may find myself faced with the necessity to become willing to forgive at least 7 times that day.”
That is not a license or excuse for believers to behave poorly. While we expect imperfections to come through in people we also expect an authentic work of God’s Spirit in their lives. We expect people to sincerely be striving for godliness, holiness and righteousness. We expect that others will expect of themselves a godly lifestyle.
Conclusion:
C.S. Lewis said, “Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea until he has something to forgive.” We all have had, currently have and will continue to have things to forgive others. But forgiveness pleases God and is when we are most like Him. The early church father John Chrysostom said, “Nothing causes us to so nearly resemble God as the forgiveness of injuries.” Let’s end with several application questions to help us Deal with our Anger:
1. Are you ready to forgive? Is there anybody that you are not ready to forgive? Make it a part of your prayer life that God would give you an attitude of forgiveness. Don’t wait until someone has done something to you to start thinking about forgiveness, but, expect sometime – and probably soon – you will have to give forgiveness.
2. Is there someone in your life you need to initiate the process of forgiveness with? Maybe you need to seek forgiveness. Humble yourself and go ask for that person to forgive you. Maybe you need to seek someone out to give them forgiveness. Just as people who have sinned need to go seek forgiveness, when it happens that someone doesn’t come to seek forgiveness then we need to go to them and address the matter. Jesus said in Matthew 18, “If your brother sins against you then you go to him and rebuke him. If he repents, forgive him. You have won him over.”
3. DO you realize how much God has forgiven you? Again we have to come back to Colossians 3:13 when it says, “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” Dr. Martyn Loyd Jones said, “I say to the glory of God and in utter humility that whenever I see myself before God and realize even something of what the blessed Lord has done for me, I am ready to forgive anybody anything.” Do you see what the Lord has done for you? Do you see how much He has forgiven you and all that He has done for you?
Whose Footprint is That? (Part 2)
Safeguarding Against Satan’s Schemes
Introduction:
Disciplines of a Godly Man, Wesley illustration criticism, pg140
William Barclay, pg 180-181
Review last week, Putting off old, putting on new, “lying”
Our sermon title today is “Whose Footprint is That?” When you see a footprint you know someone has been in the area. You know they have had activity in that spot. Peter, speaking of Satan says, “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” (1 Pet. 5:8). Does the devil have footprints here at EFC? How about in your home? Our subtitle is “Safeguarding Against Satan’s Schemes”. I am playing on that phrase in verse 27 where Paul says, “and do not give the devil a foothold.”
What is a foothold? The dictionary defines foothold as: “a secure position, especially a firm basis for further progress or development.” What that means is that when we are saved but we live like we’re not, we give the devil a secure position in our lives. Do you want the Devil to feel safe operating in your life? How about in this Church? When we don’t apply what God’s Word says to our lives we give the devil a secure position in our marriage, our family, our Church. And by doing this we give him a firm foundation for furthering his own agenda in our lives. When we live according to our old sinful self, Satan has power and opportunity. That is why we are not to live according to our old selves, Paul said in verse 22, “Put off your old self which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires.” How do we do that? How do we Safeguard EFC? How do we safeguard our homes?
Last week we looked at Safeguard #1: Telling the Truth. This week we look at Safeguard #2.
Safeguard #2: Deal with your Anger (v26)
Paul now addresses our anger. Starting in verse 26 he says, “In your anger do not sin; do not let the sun go down while you are still angry.” The Roman poet Horace said, “Anger is momentary insanity”. There is nothing so insane as a fit of white hot rage. Far too often in our lives we find that our anger controls us rather than us controlling our anger. In God’s eyes, our uncontrolled anger is unjustified every time. Aristotle said, “Anyone can become angry, but to be angry with the right person to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way – this is not easy.”
Point #1: Sometimes anger is not sinful, but most of the time our anger is. Notice how Paul says, “In your anger do not sin”. The NASB says, “Be angry, and yet do not sin”. We get angry. We vent our anger; blow our lid; seethe, rant, we criticize and cut down, grow bitter, seek revenge and so on. But very seldom do we actually have justifiable anger.
There are two wrong reactions to sin. First is to hate the sin so much that you can’t differentiate the sin from the sinner. In other words we hate what someone did or does so much that we hate them. That’s not God’s hate. God hates sin, but loves sinners. And that is what we are to do. Matthew Henry says, “If we would be angry and not sin, we must be angry at nothing but sin.” When we are loving others like God has loved us, it is at those times we enter into a real understanding of how God has loved us.
The Second wrong reaction to sin may very well be just as damaging to the church, if not more so. It is “indifference”. When Christians have no sensitivity to sin then we show how insensitive to God’s holiness we are. J.C. Ryle, the great 19th century pastor and author said, “I am convinced that the first step towards attaining a higher standard of holiness is to realize more fully the amazing sinfulness of sin”.
When we are indifferent to sin it is because we are indifferent to holiness. But we are the holy ones of God, and as such we should hunger for holiness, which makes us sensitive to sin. John Wesley said, “Give me a hundred men who fear nothing but God, and who hate nothing but sin, and who know nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and I will shake the world.” Jesus did it with 12.
If that is true, what can God do here with the men of EFC? If each man here feared only God, hated only sin, knew and loved only Christ, what could God do? If we were devoted to holiness what would God do? Someone once said, “It is not so much great talent that God blesses as likeness to Christ. A holy man is an awful weapon in the hand of God.” If you are indifferent to sin it is because you have no love for holiness. Usually it is because you are in love with things of this world.
But our anger gets in the way. Our rage is opposes God’s righteousness. What we mean is that our anger is not consistent with the righteousness that God requires of us. James 1:20 says, “for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.” Almost all human anger is sinful because it is selfish. It is not out of a deep regard for God’s character and purposes so much as our own. “People don’t do what I want” and “Things aren’t going my way”.
All anger is not sin though. William Barclay said, “There is an anger without which the world would be a poorer place.” What then is the right kind of anger? It is anger over the same things God is angry about. The closer to God we are the more indignation over sin we will have. When we are angry over sin we are angry over what God is angry about. Sin angers God. Sin should anger us.
Unfortunately we respond oppositely to the way God does to things. It is amazing how complacent Christians are over sin. “Well we’re all sinners saved by grace”, or, “who am I to judge?” When we are becoming angry we must ask ourselves the question, “Is God angry about this?” Let us not impose anger on God that He does not have. Let us not imagine Him to be upset over something just because we are. There are things that God is angry about, but, in my observation – of myself and of Christians – rarely am I so passionate about what God is and rarely is God so passionate for the things I am. Our hearts must be tutored so we become angry over only those things God is angry over and that we respond the way His Word would have us to.
The problem is that anger very easily leads to sin. Even righteous anger that is not dealt with properly can very quickly lead to sin. Anger is like hitting the turbo booster to propel us towards sinful behavior. In our anger we become hasty in judgment, speech and action. Galatians 6:1 touches on this when it instructs us about how to deal with a sinning brother, “Brothers if someone is caught in sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.” I can see that at least one application is that if I am angry over someone’s sin I need to be careful that I do not let that anger cause me to sin. This is what leads us to our 2nd point
Point #2: Deal with your anger Immediately. “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry” is good advice. Many marriages have had longevity because a husband and wife committed to never go to sleep angry at each other. Matthew Henry says, “Though anger may come into the bosom of a wise man, it rests only in the bosom of fools.” Fools don’t deal with anger. But the wise in heart do because they guard their heart (Pvb 4:23). There are 2.5 ways to guard your heart from ungoverned anger. These are 2.5 ways to help master your anger:
#1: Master your anger first by Forgiving. Colossians 3:13 says, “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” To forgive means to cancel a debt. When someone has injured or insulted us we naturally feel that they owe us. They need to come to us and make it right and pay us back for the damages they’ve done. Forgiveness means that we cancel their debt to us. Forgiveness also means to pardon someone from their penalty. How often in our anger over what someone has done do we want to make them pay? We want a payback. When we forgive we grant them a pardon from that penalty we want to inflict on them.
One of the dangers in dealing with our anger is to mistake forgetting someone’s offense with forgiving their offense. Forgiving is not forgetting. Forgiveness may lead to forgetting, but we must not think that because we have forgotten about an offense that it is the same as forgiveness. (Read Ten Questions, pg118… “Donald Whitney in his book, Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health makes some great comments….”). Our tendency is to try and commit ourselves to forgetting about what happened. To try and put it out of our minds - someohow that if we can just stop thinking about it or stuff it down deep, distract ourselves with other things, then we will be okay.
One problem with that is that while it may be put out of our minds the issue hasn’t been put out of our hearts. Bitterness and resentment begin to grow with an angry and unforgiving heart.
A second problem is that we really never can put the thing out of our minds. We replay the offense over and over, we play the tape in our minds again and again to see the person and what they did. Let’s be honest, no one has ever successfully dealt with anger by “forgetting” about what made them angry.
A third problem is that ignoring what has been done to you does not glorify God. The reason is because this is not how God has dealt with all the sin against Him. God did not get upset and ignore, or distract Himself from thinking about how He has been sinned against. He dealt with it. He confronted His offenders and He has granted forgiveness to His offenders. We glorify Him when we forgive our debtors the way that He has forgiven our debts. Therefore, rather than trying to forget, we should prayerfully commit to forgiveness. Only then can our hearts be healed. Only then can we genuinely fulfill God’s requirement of us to forgive. And only then can we truly glorify God.
You might say this to me: “You don’t know what that person did to me, how can you tell me to forgive them?” You’re right, I may not know what they did. But God does, and it is not me telling you to forgive. It is Him.
Master your anger by giving forgiveness.
#2: Master your anger by Forbearing. Forbearing is part of the believer’s maturity in Christ. This reminds us of the same thing Paul said in 4:2, “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. .” Forbearing means putting up with someone. We’ve all had moments where we wanted to say, “I will not put up with that person anymore! I will not suffer them any longer.” That is not forbearance. Forbearance means you continue to patiently, lovingly, graciously put up with someone and their everyday faults. The opposite of forbearance is to quit on them. Proverbs 10:12 says, “Love covers all wrongs” and Proverbs 17:9 says, “he who covers over an offense promotes love”. That’s what Jesus did. It’s what He does with us every day. And that’s what we are to do every day with each other. It is through love that we cover over the everyday wrongs of others – meaning we forgive them and don’t keep holding them against that person. Master your anger by forbearing in love with each other.
#2.5: Master your anger by Expecting Flaws in Others. We act surprised by people’s flaws whenever they come out. “Can you believe she would ….?” We expect people to have superior character all the time and we act stunned at those times they don’t.
But we should expect flaws in others. I’m not saying we should be cynical. What I’m saying is that the Bible says we all have a sin nature that makes us bend toward selfishness and sin. So we need to see people according to correct theology. We need to expect that people have weaknesses and imperfections and therefore we need to love them beyond their flaws and always be ready to forgive and forbear when those flaws show up. We have to keep ourselves ready to forgive and forbear.
One important point needs to be made here. We have all asked the question: How often do I need to forgive? Peter asked Jesus “How many times must I forgive my brother when he sins against me?” (Luke 17). We know Jesus’ answer. If he sins 7 times in a day and comes and repents all 7 times then we forgive 7 times. Jesus point was that we should be ready to give full and complete forgiveness. But you know, it may not be that the person sins 7 times in a day. Donald Whitney says, “It is not unusual at all for the memory of that offense to return to my mind 7 times in a single day. Just as in the situation Jesus described, I may find myself faced with the necessity to become willing to forgive at least 7 times that day.”
That is not a license or excuse for believers to behave poorly. While we expect imperfections to come through in people we also expect an authentic work of God’s Spirit in their lives. We expect people to sincerely be striving for godliness, holiness and righteousness. We expect that others will expect of themselves a godly lifestyle.
Conclusion:
C.S. Lewis said, “Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea until he has something to forgive.” We all have had, currently have and will continue to have things to forgive others. But forgiveness pleases God and is when we are most like Him. The early church father John Chrysostom said, “Nothing causes us to so nearly resemble God as the forgiveness of injuries.” Let’s end with several application questions to help us Deal with our Anger:
1. Are you ready to forgive? Is there anybody that you are not ready to forgive? Make it a part of your prayer life that God would give you an attitude of forgiveness. Don’t wait until someone has done something to you to start thinking about forgiveness, but, expect sometime – and probably soon – you will have to give forgiveness.
2. Is there someone in your life you need to initiate the process of forgiveness with? Maybe you need to seek forgiveness. Humble yourself and go ask for that person to forgive you. Maybe you need to seek someone out to give them forgiveness. Just as people who have sinned need to go seek forgiveness, when it happens that someone doesn’t come to seek forgiveness then we need to go to them and address the matter. Jesus said in Matthew 18, “If your brother sins against you then you go to him and rebuke him. If he repents, forgive him. You have won him over.”
3. DO you realize how much God has forgiven you? Again we have to come back to Colossians 3:13 when it says, “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” Dr. Martyn Loyd Jones said, “I say to the glory of God and in utter humility that whenever I see myself before God and realize even something of what the blessed Lord has done for me, I am ready to forgive anybody anything.” Do you see what the Lord has done for you? Do you see how much He has forgiven you and all that He has done for you?
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