Anger

Hello, and welcome to the Salt Church Podcast. Thank you for tuning in to this week's message. Join us as we explore God's Word providing practical teaching for day-to-day living. The message you are about to hear was recorded live at our Sunday morning worship experience. If you would like to learn more about Salt Church, please visit us at saltchurch.

org. We hope that you are encouraged by today's message. Good morning! Okay, you know, just before this, Brother Alex said, will you be needing the table and the chair? And I said, yes, because everyone knows I sometimes have shoe malfunctions, so if something happens.

But now that I notice the height, I think there's no way I can get on this without something happening. So we'll just, it'll just be a prop to lean on, if that's cool. I only get to do this maybe once a year or so, so it's very exciting to get to talk to you. It's a huge privilege. It's an honor to be able to bring God's Word to you, my Salt family.

And I'm going to try my very best not to embarrass Leon or my family or my mother who is here or anybody else. But I really can't make promises. So I'll try my best. I do think this is a great one, much like Chris Scott a few weeks ago said that he thought that pride sermon was for him. This one is for me.

I would have marked out anger if I could and done a strike through and just entitled this rage. Because I don't know about you, but I mean, I go from zero to 60 in no time. I go straight to debilitating, violence-inducing rage. So this is the perfect one for me. So do as I say and not as I do.

You'll also notice I have all my things in case I get nervous. I've got some little fisherman's friends if I get dry mouth. And I've got some water. And unlike all of the tech-savvy boys, I have actual paper notes. I have actual papers here.

And you will be happy to know that I cut it down from seven pages to three. You are welcome. Three pages here. So I'm excited. So let's jump in.

Crushing kryptonite. We are destroying anything that is trying to destroy our destiny, our purpose. We've already talked about lying. We've already talked about gossip. And we've talked about pride.

Now we're on to anger. You'll see on the screen our series verses. And we're going to come back to them several times. So you can just take note now. The first one is from 1 Corinthians.

That is why many of you are weak and sick. And some have even died. Not from cancer. Not from heart attacks. From these things that can destroy your destiny.

And the next two. The people. I want you to remember this one, guys. The people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits. That's from the book of Daniel.

And we're going to come back to it. And, of course, from Psalms. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you.

And lead me along the path of everlasting life. We're going to come back to these because there are some great, great tie-ins. But let's jump right in to anger. Anger and sin. Here's my question.

Can you be angry and not sin? Well, first, let's go to the book of Ephesians. It should be on the screen. Ephesians 4.26 says, In your anger do not sin.

Now, I'm going to pause right there for a second because I actually like the New American Standard translation, which says, Be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on you while you're still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold. But the first part, that first command that we get at the top of this verse is incredibly instructive, and it's important. This is the Apostle Paul. He's talking to the Ephesians, but he's quoting King David.

He's quoting something King David said in Psalm 4.4. Tremble, as in your anger, but do not sin. That's a command as well. Tremble in your anger, but do not sin.

We'll come back to that in a second. So, if the Holy Spirit, through the Apostle Paul and King David, is exhorting us and commanding us to be angry about something, then clearly there is some sort of sinless anger that is a possibility. What would that be? See, I offer up the idea of righteous anger. Righteous anger.

That begs the question, what is righteous anger? Righteous anger is simply anything that makes God mad should also make you mad. What? Getting mad at something that makes God mad. Now, this word order is super important, guys.

Righteous anger, righteous comes first. Remember what Daniel said. The people who know their God will do great things. To know our God, we have to know our God's character. And the character of God is not defined by anger.

It's defined by righteousness. This righteousness and anger, this parallel, this combination, they're going to be together. All throughout this message, we have so many verses that are going to support that, but you've got to keep that in mind, okay? Keep righteousness at the forefront. Perfect, righteous anger.

Now, let's go back. I want to go back to Psalm 4, 4, really quick. Again, remember I said that's what the Apostle Paul is quoting. He's quoting from King David. King David said, Tremble, as in your anger, and do not sin.

But he went on. He goes on. And he says, When you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent. So, righteous anger is connected in this verse to being silent. Searching your heart and being silent.

And I'm going to say the first thing today that might offend somebody. So, just get ready. Here we go. I knew Chris would already be offended. I'm going to get a drink of water.

I need a drink of water first. Okay. The God of the universe. The God who spoke the universe into existence. The God who raised the walls of Jericho to the ground.

The God who parted the Red Sea. The God who raised his son from the dead after three days. The God who holds our lives in his hands. That God does not need you or me to defend him. Let that sink in.

Because righteous anger, which is good. Okay. Righteous anger is good. Being mad at what makes God mad. And that's anything that perverts his will or his creation.

That profanes his goodness. That profanes his righteousness. Or gets in the way of his purpose for us, his people. That makes God mad. But guys, God does not need us to fight his battles.

Not only that, he doesn't even need us to fight our own. What does the scripture say? The battle is not mine. The battle belongs to the Lord. So if I can't even fight my own battles, what business do I have trying to fight God's?

I don't even want to serve a God who needs me. That's not the God I serve. I do not want to serve a God who needs me to pony up and go to bat for him. He doesn't need it, folks. So we need to keep that in mind with the righteous anger.

I am the chiefest of sinners. Anybody who knows me knows this. When something happens, you know, and it's evil. It's a perversion. It's turning his word.

You know, whatever this evil is, harming his creation. You know, not caring for his people, you know, hurting a child, whatever it is, it just builds up that holy rage in you, but we need to search our hearts and our beds and be silent. A lot of prayer is going to go into righteous anger, and we'll talk about some examples of that later. When Jesus, the perfect example, God, fully man but fully God, he did it right, and we're going to look at what he did. But before we get there, we're going to talk a little bit about why we get angry.

Because if we can be angry and not sin, mostly by keeping our mouths shut, then obviously we can probably be angry and act out of that anger, and sin is going to be on the way. Sin's going to be behind. So, to get to the root of this, we first need to talk about why we're angry, why we are angry, why do we get angry? The first thing I'd like to say is that anger, it's not the root. Anger is the result.

Anger is what comes out of whatever is going on in here. Anger is a secondary emotion. I cite my sources, so as you can see on the screen, all of this wonderful psychological stuff is courtesy of Dr. Lisa Marie Doherty. Is she here?

There she is. If you're not coming to the salt, ladies, you're missing out. You're missing out because she's a psychologist, a legit one, and knows all the stuff. And she teaches us so many things, and she uses big words, and we just kind of go, yeah. That's amazing.

But, you know, she talks about this a lot, and it's incredibly important and illustrative, as you'll see. Anger is a secondary emotion. Something else is going on if you're angry. I'm not angry. I'm just loud.

Just wanted to let you know. Leon thinks I'm angry all the time, and he tells me that. He's like, babe, I'm scared of you because you just always sound angry, and I mean, he's like big man, but I scare him. So sometimes I get loud, not angry. You'll know when I'm angry.

Anger is a secondary emotion. So ask yourself if you're angry. Let's pause and think. Why am I angry? The first one that comes to mind, fear.

Am I afraid? Am I afraid? I could just leave because this entire sermon is encapsulated in one line. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. What did he say?

Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to the dark side. Done. I mean, Yoda knew it.

He knew it. If you're afraid, if you're in fear, anger's around the corner. Sin is around the corner. So watch out. Thank you.

Yeah, you know, courtesy the Kramer family. Am I afraid? Am I, oh, here's the good one, guys. Am I offended? Someone offended me.

I am hurt, she said. She said those yoga pants made my butt look big. I'm not talking to her again. I'm going to a new church. I'm offended.

I would like to recall one of our series verses. Search me, oh God, and know my heart, and let me know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you. I missed it in there where God said, oh, tell me all about how offended you are, and I will just, I will go out and do something about it. Offense, guys.

I know that's a hard one. It's a big one. Very rarely, though, does giving in to your feeling of offense lead to anything good. I know. Once again, I have an A plus in being offended.

Oh, my goodness. I could go to the Olympics and medal in being offended and lashing out and losing friends and losing people and profaning the gospel of Jesus Christ, taking the name of the Lord Jesus Christ in vain. It's not cussing. It's going out and professing to be a follower of Christ and then acting like a tail hole to someone you see. That is taking the name of the Lord in vain.

And offense, anger, all the time, guys, it leads to it. So I just threw a few up there. You could probably add a ton. Jealousy. Am I frustrated?

Okay, if you have small kids, this is you 110% of the time. You just live in a ball of frustrated rage and you're just desperately trying not to beat your children. I'm like, please, guys, let me get to the day where I don't beat my kids. You know, at some point, Max is like, I'm scared of mommy. And I mean, I don't want that.

And it comes from frustration. It's not, I'm not angry for nothing. Trapped. Think of animals. Am I trapped?

Think of even a wild animal when they're cornered. They lash out. This is universal. Am I feeling pressured or forced? Am I feeling pressured or forced?

And this is a big one. Do I feel disrespected? I think that's close to offense, but not quite the same. These are just some. But stop and ask yourself if you're angry.

Do any of these apply? Stop, think, be silent, and think. For a great biblical example of someone who got angry and did not know how to handle that anger, all we have to do is look right back to the beginning of time in the book of Genesis chapter 4. One of the most frustratingly ambiguous stories in Scripture is the story of Cain and Abel, Adam and Eve's first children. Cain was the older child.

Abel was the younger. Cain worked the soil. Abel worked with the flocks, raised the flocks. At some point, we see that they made offering to the Lord. Abel made an offering of the fat portions of some of his firstborn livestock.

Cain made an offering from the fruits of his labor. They brought them before the Lord. God looked with favor on Abel's offering. He did not look with favor on Cain's. Thousands and thousands and thousands of pages have been written by brilliant people about why he favored one and not the other.

Some people say it's because Cain's was a bloodless sacrifice, which wouldn't have atoned for sin. My concern there is I don't see what sin needed to be atoned for, but that's just my question. Another one says it wasn't made in faith. Moses referenced that. He did not make his sacrifice by faith, maybe by sight instead.

It was more in his flesh and not his spirit. Yet another says it's because Abel brought the offering from the first fruits. It specifies that it was the firstborn. It does not specify that Cain's, that it was his first fruits. Would you like to know what I think?

Who cares? Who cares? It's not the point. Here's the point. Cain was jealous and he got angry and he pouted.

Guess what? In life, guys, at some point, God is not going to favor what you do. At some point, you're going to make a mistake. You're going to do the wrong thing. You're going to disobey him probably today.

I will probably do it in the next 20 minutes and he will not look on me with favor. It's going to happen. You're going to get jealous. You're going to get angry. The point is in verse 4.

And the Lord said to Cain, why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? Why are you pouting like a little baby? That's what he's saying. If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?

If you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you, but you must rule over it. Notice that God started exactly where we did. Why are you angry, Cain? Why?

Maybe if he had just stopped to think and listen and search himself. And say, why am I really angry? Because Abel didn't do anything to him. Maybe if he just paused and listened, but he didn't. He did just what his father did.

He didn't listen. He stewed in that anger, and he stewed, and he stewed, and he stewed, and then he murdered his brother. I know that's kind of a downer. So we're going to move on to our next point. Wrong ways to handle anger.

Just note to self, murdering a sibling is always the wrong response. It's just always, always, always the wrong response. Now, there are generally two categories of anger, like, in terms of people. We have spewers, and we have stewers. Is it stew?

Stewers? Stewers? Stew? Stew? You went around.

Okay. Let's start with the spewers. I'm a spewer. I'm just going to go out there and lay it out and say I am a spewer. A spewer expresses her anger.

Man, they lose it quickly, overtly, loudly, loud and proud, right out front. Raise your hand if you're a spewer. Come on. Okay. Fewer spewers.

Just so you know, you are the other one if you are not this one. So if your hand does not go up, you should repent. Okay. Spewers, spewers, they express their anger, right? They express it.

Now, I desperately wanted to show some clips of some famous spewers in movies and things because I love those kind. But they're also laced with profanity, I couldn't. I even tried to find some with, like, the bad words bleeped out, and I said, Leon will kill me. I can't. But I love spewers.

One of my favorite spewers in all the world. Raise your hand. Probably everybody, me, like me or older, if you've seen Blue Chips, 1994, Nick Nolte. Oh, it's a sad, sad number of hands. Rob, yes, thank you.

Anybody else? Christy, yay, Chris. Yeah, okay. Well, this is not going to go over well. Okay.

Blue Chips, 1994, Nick Nolte. He's basically playing Bobby Knight, who I don't know a whole lot about basketball, but since marrying Leon, I do know more now about the NCAA and college ball. Well, Bobby Knight coached at Indiana, and he was well, well known for his spewing, throwing chairs across the court, frequently being arrested for assault, very combative with the press. Bobby Knight was a consultant for Blue Chips. I think that's absolutely hysterical.

But if you've not seen Blue Chips, go home and YouTube Nick Nolte kicking the basketball across the court because I think it's one of the funniest things I've ever seen. When he's a spewer, he just immediately let loose his anger. And as Proverbs says, fools vent their anger, but the wise quietly hold it back. Another verse in Proverbs, Proverbs 14, 17 says, a quick-tempered person does foolish, foolish things. So that's what spewers do.

Spewers are foolish. They don't, what? Lay in their beds, search their hearts, and be silent. I'm terminally incapable of being silent. My mom, actually, we were talking about this the other day.

Believe it or not, one time and one time only, when I was in high school, my, I think it was my biology teacher, she offered to take up a collection from the class. And I went to a private school, so they had money. I didn't, but they did. Take up a collection from the class for me to not talk the entire hour. She didn't think I could do it.

But little did those private school kids know that I wanted money more than I wanted to talk. So, you know, with the right motivation, I did keep my mouth shut for an entire hour. And I made a lot. I mean, I can't remember how much, but I think it was over $100. I mean, that's a lot.

And it was, this is a small school. These were small classes, maybe 10, 11 people. So, again, you're going to see the repetition of this theme, being silent, being silent, keeping your mouth shut, stop, think. We also have stewards, guys. Stewards suppress their anger.

Suppress their anger. Raise your hand, everybody else. Because you're all stewards. You're one of the two. You're a spewer or a steward.

Yeah, that's Christy Scott. Yeah, she's so, like, placid and holds it together, and she smiles. And then when she's angry, it's frightening. It's scary. I felt it just a couple times.

I'm like, oh, my God, it's so scary. It's pretty scary. Now, my favorite, who I think is an awesome, awesome steward, I say Clark Griswold in Christmas Vacation. Clark Griswold, Christmas Vacation. And that man, God bless him, he tries.

He tries so hard. He spends an hour and a half, a little full, a lot of sap. It's no problem. It's no problem that I had to dig this tree out of the ground with my bare hands in the dead of winter, and the roots are six feet long. It's no problem that it's destroyed my house.

It's no problem. No problem, Helen. It's okay. Until he realizes we're at the threshold of hell. That's where we are.

He tried to hide it. He tried to push it down. And then he got a one-year subscription to the Jelly of the Month Club instead of a bonus. And when a steward loses it, it's huge. It's destructive.

It leads a SWAT team to come busting up in your room. It's bad, guys. Psalm 32.3, when I kept silent, my bones, they wasted away through my groaning all day long. Now, interestingly, this verse is not actually talking about keeping silent in anger, but about keeping silent or holding something in.

It was unexpressed sin. Same thing. So, your rage is probably sin, okay? Most of the time, it's going to be sin. And when you hold it in and when you suppress it, until you confess it, you will get no relief.

You will get no relief. Another excellent, excellent example of a steward, of a classic biblical steward, Luke 15, story of the prodigal son. We all know this story. It's an incredible, incredible picture of our salvation relationship with the father because we are all the prodigal son. We are every single person.

We are all the prodigal son. We had a father who divided his property amongst his two sons. The younger one ran off and wasted it all in wild living. That's what my Bible says. Wild living.

I like that. Wasted it all. The older one stayed home, supported his father, did his work, did the right thing, did not squander it. The young one, of course, loses everything and eventually comes back home begging his father, confessing his sin. He confessed his sin.

He begged his father for forgiveness and said, you know, you don't have to give me anything. I'll take whatever scrap you have. I just want to come home. And the father, of course, of course, the father, just like our loving, merciful God, forgave his son and brought him in. And not only did he bring him in, he threw a huge party or fate, as Peppa Pig says.

I'm learning all the British ways to say things. Threw a huge party for his son. And, you know, trotted out the fatted calf and got all the servants involved. A huge, huge thing. The older son did not like this.

He did not like it at all. The older brother became angry and refused to go in. He just sat outside the door. He just stewed in his anger. Why?

Why? Because he was so inward focused. He could not see the spiritual reality going on around him. He couldn't see the bigger picture. And that's what happens when we...

We cannot see the spiritual workings in the spiritual realm, and when you're looking through your flesh eyes and not your spirit eyes, sin is going to crouch at your door. The devil will get a foothold. So what do we do? What do we do with our anger? Well, I think we've already learned the answer.

Most of the time, keeping our mouth shut is incredibly, incredibly helpful, but the first thing we can do, if our anger is sinful, which is probably going to be most of the time, for most of us, we want to put it out. Put it out. Don't pour it out. Put it out. Snuff it.

Snuff it. Proverbs 17 says, starting a quarrel is like breaching a dam. So drop it. Drop the matter before the dispute breaks out. I talk about this with the ladies all the time.

You know, just things, work, life. I may get angry about something. Somebody says something, I feel offended. I feel disrespected. I'm thinking, I've got this many degrees, and I've got this job, and I'm smart, and I don't need you to tell me that.

I'm not stupid. And I want to get the last word. I want to get the last word so bad. I want to sound smarter. I want to sound better.

I want to say the best, and I want to say it last. Anybody else? Yes. Can I tell you right now, the feeling of shame from giving into that absolutely sinful temptation is going to overwhelm you and feel awful. And the momentary tamping down of your pride, that just taking that second to stop and put out your anger and make that choice and say, I'm not going to say this.

I'm not going to type that. I'm not going to send that email. Just for a second, if you stop and you think, oh, guys, the blessing and the favor that pours on you when you obey the Lord, it is overwhelmingly better than the momentary enjoyment you might get from venting that anger, I can promise you. But it's a discipline. You have to choose to do it, and it's hard.

So you have to start in the small things with your kids, with your wife, with your husband, and then work up to the bigger ones. So put it out. Jesus did this incredibly well. And I know he was Jesus, but he does give us good examples. Notice how many times in scripture, just go through and read, because if anybody had a right to be enraged just all the time at people being morons, it was Jesus.

He was constantly, I mean, horrible things were said about him all the time to his face. If even one of those things were said to one of us, one time in our lives, we'd probably lose our minds. I mean, you know, you're a heretic. You're violating the law. You should be executed.

How dare you do this? How dare you do this? Who are you? Isn't that Joseph the carpenter's son? What business does he have getting up preaching?

Isn't he that poor farm boy? Jesus never vented his anger. Most of the time, he just turned around and told a parable, which somewhere embedded in that parable told them they were stupid, but he didn't say that. Sometimes he just ignored them completely. Sometimes he just responded much how he responded when he was a child, and he was separated from his parents.

He said, don't you know I'm about my father's business? Why are you asking all this stuff? I'm just doing the father's will. He didn't jump out. He didn't lash out.

He didn't say something ugly. He didn't tear down. We should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. Human anger, all of it. It doesn't say some.

It says all. All human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. Remember what we said? God is fundamentally righteous. That is his primary characteristic, and he demands it from us, and if we're acting out of our anger, we cannot produce righteousness.

It's got to be sinless, sanctified anger. Here's what else we can do. We can fan the flame of that sanctified anger, your righteous anger. Fan the flame. Now, how do we do that?

Okay, this is where it gets good. We're going to go to the book of Mark, okay? In the book of Mark, at the end of chapter 2, right before the story, we're going to talk about in a second. Right at the end of chapter 2, Jesus was being, you know, even his own disciples were, you know, they're looking around, what's going on? Why are you working on the Sabbath?

And he said, man was not made for the Sabbath. The Sabbath was made for man, and I, the son of man, and the Lord of the Sabbath. So keep that at the back of your mind. In Mark chapter 3, we learn that Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath.

Let's unpack that just for a second. So there's a man sitting in church, because that's where they are, like in this room right here, with a probably debilitating deformity that keeps him from working. So he's probably very poor. You know, that's the equivalent of having somebody in here who's, you know, who knows, whatever the equivalent would be, sitting in this room. And all the Christians are not ministering to him.

They don't care. No one is asked how he is. Do you need prayer? Do you need healing? Instead, all they care about is trying to catch Jesus doing something that they think is wrong.

Notice that they assume he can do it. It doesn't say whether he can heal on the Sabbath. It says they were watching to see if he would heal on the Sabbath. That should blow your minds. They knew full well that he could.

They believed it. These people believed in the power, in the miraculous healing power of Jesus Christ and knew he could do it. And there was somebody sitting right there who was hurt. Not only do they not care, they're actively watching to try to trap Jesus. Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, stand up in front of everyone.

Then Jesus asked them, which is lawful on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill? Remember what makes a righteous God angry? Evil. Evil. The perversion of what he has done, what he has created.

But the Pharisees remained silent. Jesus looked around at them in anger and deeply distressed because of their stubborn hearts. He turned to the man and said, stretch out your hand. Stretch out your hand. Stretch out your hand.

He stretched it out and his hand was completely restored. Jesus Christ, open and honestly in this verse, it says he was angry. We know that Jesus was sinless, so we know by default his anger was perfect and sinless. And what did he do? Did he say a word to the Pharisees?

He didn't say anything. He didn't even engage with them in any way. No, instead he laid his hands on somebody and healed them. He said, I'm angry. A working and exercising of faith, which is what he did there, and belief.

And The power of the Father. Guys, it is a far more powerful indictment of evil and perversion than anything we could say ever would be. Any comeback, you know, any argument, any debate. We love to debate. We're Christians, oh my goodness, we love to debate stuff.

There is no debate in the world that will speak like a miraculous healing from the Lord. That will shut them up. If you feel tempted to call someone out, shut your mouth and pray. Exhort, encourage, lead, believe, heal. Why are we so, so quick to open our mouths and just spew out stuff?

Jesus didn't do that. His first inclination was to heal. We can't have, almost not have a healing service. It'll scare people. Jesus is like, are you kidding?

His life was a healing service. Now, I know you're thinking, oh, there's these other times, though, that Jesus had righteous anger and he was loud. He wasn't silent. And you're right. And he did stuff.

Those were very, very specific instances, though, guys. Very specific. The cleansing of the temple, for instance, when he went in and he overturned the tables and all that good stuff. What was going on there was a massive, massive system of economic idolatry that he was tearing down. Now, the Jews at that time had to be, they had to come to festivals in Jerusalem, and it could cost them upwards of $3,000, $4,000 a time.

They were being gouged. It was horrible. It's the same systems that still exist in some third world countries. That's why they're so poor. And Jesus was so angry about it that he had to stop it.

What did he do as soon as he did that, as soon as he overturned those tables? What's the next verse? It says he sat down and the lame and the blind came in and he healed them. Guys, are you seeing a theme? That's how you fan the flame.

Of your sanctified anger. You must be other-focused. Another time in Matthew, the Pharisees, they said, Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath? And Jesus said, If you had a sheep and it fell into a pit on Sunday, would you not pull it out? How much more valuable is a person than that sheep?

To fan the flame of our sanctified anger, you must be other-focused. You must put yourself in the background and promote some other people. If you do that, you will be following the Lord's commands. You will be acting as he does. If you know God, you will be strong and you will carry out great exploits.

Let's pray about that together right now. Dear, dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much that you are perfect and righteous and holy. And that I don't have to be because you are and I never could be. Thank you that at your core, you are righteous, that you are not an angry God. Oh, God, break my heart for what breaks yours.

Break everybody's heart in this room for what breaks your heart. Break our hearts when we see that the one thing that we are put on this planet to do, to love and obey you and to feed your sheep, if that's not happening, God, help us to become righteously angry and make it happen. Oh, God, out of our righteous anger, let us serve and love. Let that be our knee-jerk reaction to love and to serve. And help us to stop and think and be silent.

And if there's anyone here who needs deliverance from anger and you are just absolutely controlled by it, ask your good God right now to just supernaturally come in and break your heart and change your heart and help you through his supernatural power to respond in love. Because he can do it. He can do it. If you believe, you have to pray with belief. You cannot just open your mouth and say the words.

You have to believe it right now and then walk out that door and act in it. He can deliver you from that anger. And if there's anybody here today who does not know the Lord and these words just sound foreign and you don't know what we're talking about, but you want to know who this Jesus is, you can have it right now. You can ask him. You can tell him that you believe that you have done wrong.

You believe that you are not perfect and that you need someone to help you. You need someone to save you. And tell him right now that you believe that he is the Lord. You want him to be the Lord of your life, the Lord of your heart, and you believe that he died for you, that he rose again three days later, and that he is alive today and he can be alive in you. And if you believe that and you want that, ask him right now.

Just raise your hands. Just lift your hands if that's what you want because he will do it right now. He will save you right now. He will save your soul and you will spend eternity with him. Nothing else has to happen.

Nothing else has to happen except believe in the name of Jesus Christ and confess it with your mouth. Thank you, God. Thank you, God, that you are a saving, loving, righteous God. We love you. We ask that you would be with us and infill us with your Holy Spirit as we go out today and the rest of this week.

Amen.