Desk of Dennis PillerFearlessly Courageous3 27 2023Click for Audio Version
Man tries to forget his weakness; God wants us to remember it!
Someone asked me a question at Curtis Jackson's vibrant Kingdom Man group that meets on Thursday night at 7pm at Grace Family Land O Lakes.. "Why are men so angry? Why do we struggle with it so?"I believe I said, we feel entitled. Pride is essentially at its root. Having been in men’s ministry for 5 decades you come to just know things about men and yourself. I know because I am speaking of myself. Over the years I did settle down to lesser degrees but it was certainly there.That question really got me thinking about why are men so angry. (Of course, that is not relegated to our gender or to any age) Pride is certainly at its root. So it drew me to drill down on what the Bible says about this ugliness that wrecks so many marriages, so many lives and seeds this ugliness into too many children…our children and the curse is passed on from generation to generation.So when was the last time you did a word study? When you didn’t have a clear answer and wanted to know what God says about this human ailment, this human catastrophe? Please follow me in my rationale. Follow me in the logic of seeing this in so many lives and being honest with ourselves as we filter that with Godly wisdom. In too many situations, I believe we feel we deserve to be given more and treated better… that we have earned more than what we are getting at the moment. And in our weariness from a hard day, after carrying the weight of work, family, being the breadwinner, being overlooked, being used by others, being under-appreciated, being misunderstood, or so we think…this seed of self grows into a sapling and then as our self-visualization of our own worth grows in our eyes, so does this seed of anger … Many people don't see their tribe or workplace recognizing our value, our imprint, our contributions, and sacrifices. We grow our emotion of intolerance, and so we begin suppressing our angry feelings of discontent, and to some degree, our self-exaltation in our own mind, and the sapling become a full-fledged oak of intolerance that drops acorns of criticalness, unforgiveness, contempt, and to add kerosene to the fire, no one sees or knows how hard we try to hold them down… how much pride we think we are eating internally, in what we think is humility, until there is no more stuffing it down, there is no more holding it back and it overflows…exploding like a volcano in the faces of those we have the weakest filter with. Typically those we say we love the most, the ones we do the most for, the ones we labor and slave to provide for, and in that we feel this sad sense of justification that we have "the right" to chide, snap at, bite, demean, berate and abuse them with our speech and our self-expression of entitlement.
Our sin has overtaken us. Pride has risen in all its glory. Our heart is so filled with it, we cannot contain it and it becomes more and more an expression of who we are, what we have become… This angry person that others see. And we become angrier as we can’t seem to camouflage it or stop what we have become. We become lonely and embittered more because of the isolation from others and our own retraction from society. And as 2 Cor 10:4 says we have built a stronghold around us protecting our rights…Protecting our justification. But God knows and told us how we can battle this demon… “For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 4 We use God's mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments”. Humility? Is nowhere to be found because you know you are right and they just don’t understand! and the stronghold grows bigger. But we still don't know we are fighting a spiritual battle and can't win it with our will.
Let me share one of my favorite authors:
“How different our standard is from Christ's. We ask how much a man gives.Christ asks how much he keeps.”― Andrew Murray
“The Christian often tries to forget his weakness; God wants us to remember it, to feel it deeply. The Christian wants to conquer his weakness and to be freed from it; God wants us to rest and even rejoice in it. The Christian mourns over his weakness; Christ teaches His servant to say, 'I take pleasure in infirmities. Most gladly …will I…glory in my infirmities (2 Cor. 12:9)' The Christian thinks his weaknesses are his greatest hindrance in the life and service of God; God tells us that it is the secret of strength and success. It is our weakness, heartily accepted and continually realized, that gives our claim and access to the strength of Him who has said, 'My strength is made perfect in weakness”― Andrew Murray, Abide in Christ: The Joy of Being in God's Presence
Can I close with another of his quotes:
“Every providence is God’s will; whatever happens, meet God in it, in humble worship.Every precept is God’s will; meet God in it with loving obedience.Every promise is God’s will; meet God in it with full trust.A life in the will of God is rest and strength and blessing. [. . .]The will of God must first live in us,… if it is to be done by us.”― Andrew Murray, Holy in Christ: A Devotional Look at Your Life
“It is only into the thirst of an empty soul that the streams of living waters flow.Ever thirsting is the secret of never thirsting.”― Andrew Murray, Abide in Christ
I have always said that until we are in enough pain we will not make a change. If you have this thirst to rid yourself of this angry emotion…. Repent…Ask God to make you over. Lay these emotions and your rights down at his cross. You will not be healed by you willing it…or you striving for it…It will only be by His Spirit that you will be set free.Proverbs 14:17“People with a hot temper do foolish things; wiser people remain calm.”The Good News is: Anger is a normal response to some situations, but it’s how you respond that makes you who you are.
Let's talk about this some more.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcuiuIwtpa4Bring the rain Mercy Me
