Transcript:

Hello! This is Pastor Don of Christ Redeemer Church. Welcome to The Kingdom Perspective!

The devil is the mother, the fountain, of all grumbling and accusation. He has no gratitude in him but is upset and angry about everything.

Now, how does he get us to be complicit with his tactics? One of the chief ways is through our own unresolved anger.

Ephesians 4 warns us: “Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity.” The Scriptures are exhorting us not to hold on to our anger, but to deal with it before the Lord. Not dealing with it gives the devil an “opportunity”.

The word for “opportunity” is commonly translated “place” or “position”. It suggests a “foothold”, in a military sense. When we fail to process our anger before the Lord, it gives the devil a foothold in our life, a place of power from which he can manipulate us.

Nursing this bitter attitude convinces us of our own rightness. It distills our own perspective into a 200-proof, self-justifying liquor—a toxic drink that drives us into a stupor of self-obsession. With every lick of a wound… with every time you see that person at church… every time you hear another person speak positively or see them experience some good fortune… every time you run into them at the store…your heart goes “ballistic”, fomenting with anger. Every time you do this, you take another sip of the devil’s drink of self-justification.

And that’s when the devil’s got y0u! You’re intoxicated with your own self-righteousness.

What about you? Are you giving the devil a foothold in your life? Are you nursing bitter anger in your heart?

That’s something to think about from The Kingdom Perspective.

“Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity. He who steals must steal no longer; but rather he must labor, performing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with one who has need. Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.

~ Ephesians 4:25-32 (NASB95)