Theme: AVOIDING ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR
Text: “Let all bitterness and wrath, and anger and clamour and evil speaking, be put away from you with all malice.” – Ephesians 4:31.
Comment: As mortals we cannot totally avoid wrath or anger – for offences must come. However, it is the way we manage such situations that show whether we have understanding or not. The Bible says, “Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil. (Ephesians 4:26, 27) We can be angry if we have cause to, but we should not sin thereby. It was due to uncontrolled anger that Simeon and his brother Levi utterly slew all the male inhabitants of the land of the Canaanites and the Perizzites because of their sister Dinah whom Shechem the son of Hamor defiled. Jacob their father did not like what they did – and this was reflected in his parting words to them, when he said: “Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.” (Genesis 49:7) People of God should allow their emotions to be controlled by the spirit of God. “And the fruit of the spirit is love, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance…” – Galatians 5:22, 23.