Learn of Me Regarding Anger
Genesis 4:5-7; Jonah 4:1-4
Genesis 4:5-7
5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.
6 And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?
7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.
Jonah 4:1-4
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.
2 And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.
3 Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.
4 Then said the Lord, Doest thou well to be angry?
Glory to God. As we continue on the subject of anger, please note that misplaced anger can lead to the sin of murder in some fashion. Whether it is physically murder or in the heart. God didn’t warn Cain against murder-but He did warn him his anger would lead to sin. However, Cain failed to listen to God, and he killed his brother. Then later in the Bible, God visited Jonah to warn him-and it doesn’t seem He listened either. But in Jesus name that will not be our portion. We will listen and receive His learning to avoid all the enemy is trying to cut off through the emotions of anger.
Beloveds, we are all here to learn. Isaiah 1:17 says, “Learn to do well” and Isaiah 26:9 tells us “learn to do righteousness.” This implies we must learn to do things God’s right way for we’ve been taught by many (not our fault) the unrighteous ways to handle things and those ways are habits. But God is the breaker of habits!
Do you remember just a few days ago the Holy Spirit spoke from Matthew 11:29 saying, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” What is He saying? Learn of me for your rest. Why? For any disorder we are dealing with-when we learn His ways, His Word about the subject and couple it with submitting to His ways by making gradual changes-then and only then can we find rest to our souls. But the opposite is also true. If we fail to learn of Him-then unrest to our souls will remain.
I believe God told us 2019 He would make us better. Well, this is another teaching in that direction. He’s making us better as we come and sit at His feet to learn things we haven’t considered may be self inflicted wounds to our souls. It appears the Holy Spirit is teaching, when our anger leads us to a place of killing-we are operating in the realm of “not well” and we move our lives to “not well.” Why do I say that? Well, God is not going to change His commandment of thou shall not kill. Is He merciful if we kill? Most definitely! But whenever possible, as we see in Jonah- even God preferred mercy over the death of the people of Nineveh. But Jonah was angry about God's decisions and twice in this chapter of Jonah, God warns Jonah about well and anger.
Jonah clearly had an anger problem, and His anger was so great He wanted God to kill even the babies and children. Meditate on that. He was so angry, He cared not for the ones who hadn’t done anything at all. He had a “kill them all attitude”, and God didn’t like it at all. But the Lord shows us his anger problem was beyond Ninevah. When God removed the gourd, Jonah got angry about that too. This was a totally different situation and the Lord comes back to say again, “Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, “I do well to be angry, even unto death.” Jonah totally missed God was showing him he had a deep problem in himself and it was his anger. So the book ends with God asking him His last question and returning to the original situation: “Should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?”
And God didn’t even record his answer for I believe He left the prophet to check and pray about his own heart. At that point-He ended the book of Jonah and nothing else is recorded about what Jonah did in life other than what was recorded in the book. We never hear of God using Him to do anything for Him again beyond the experience of Ninevah because Jonah refused to get his anger in check. In Jesus name, that shall not be our portion. Our destiny shall not abruptly end because we refuse to heed the corrections of the Lord regarding anger. Pray against anger!
Prayer:
Father, we thank you for today we are here to learn again of You and ask for your help regarding anger. Holy Spirit give us the grace to restrain from anger and when anger arises bring this Word to our remembrance. Lord, we know we aren’t perfect in this area, so we come to you today asking help to be better. Lord, help us to recognize some situations you allow for us to work the Word you have taught. Some situations are for You to see if we will comply with Your way. Lord we desire to be well in all areas so heal and cure us from anger that will make us not well in Your eyes. Teach us to hold our tongue; teach us to pray more first before we let the enemy take us down the wayward path of anger. Now Lord, we receive Your better. Cover us by the blood of Jesus and keep us safe and sound. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.
You are blessed! Go in peace!