MORNING:
1 Chronicles 3-4 (family); Amos 3 (secret)
EVENING:
Hebrews 9 (family); Psalm 146-147 (secret)
A CHRISTIAN CATECHISM:
Q37.What benefits do believers receive from Christ at the resurrection?
A37. Being raised up in glory at the resurrection, believers shall be openly acknowledged and acquitted in the Day of Judgment and made perfectly blessed both in soul and body in the full enjoyment of God for all eternity. Matthew 10:32; 1 Corinthians 15:43; 1 Thessalonians 4:17; 1 John 3:2
Q38. What shall be done to the wicked at their death?
A38. At their death, the souls of the wicked shall be cast into the torments of hell; and their bodies will lie in their graves until the resurrection, and judgment of the Great Day. Psalm 49:14; Luke 16:22-24
Q39. What shall be done to the wicked at the Day of Judgment?
A39. At the Day of Judgment, the bodies of the wicked will be raised out of their graves, and together with their souls, they shall be sentenced to unspeakable torments with the devil and his angels forever. Daniel 12:2; Matthew 25:41; John 5:28-29; 2 Thessalonians 1:9
CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST DEVOTION:
“Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath” (Ephesians 4:26).
I have heard quite a few expositions of the passage above that try to justify man’s anger somewhat. Even from the text itself, it almost seems to suggest “when” we are angry and not “if” we are angry. Another English translation puts it this way: “In your anger do not sin” (NIV).
There should be no doubt for anyone that we do get angry. We know this by our own experience, and if we are truly honest with ourselves, we should readily admit it; and if we are not honest with ourselves, we can bend the knee and sincerely ask the Lord to reveal a moment of anger in our lives and our angriest moments will come rushing to us in a flood.
One of the root meanings for our text’s word, angry, is “to have a violent passion.” (Because yesterday’s devotion speaks of passion for the truth of Christ and Him crucified, it seemed to be appropriate to mention this before we enter our next series of Scripture portions.) This word from our text has the same root as the verse a little later: “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice” (Ephesians 4:31).
Hmm. Does the Word of God contradict itself? Some have tried to get around this difficulty by suggesting that righteous indignation, such as when Jesus turned over the moneychangers, is an anger that God allows us to have. But this doesn’t square with the whole of Scripture. Jesus Christ was, first of all, God; and therefore, the only one on the planet who was ever good at all (see Mark 10:18). Second, Jesus Christ, as Man, was the only sinless, perfect, righteous, and truly holy man who ever lived. Are you beginning to see the fruitlessness of comparing our anger with that of Christ’s? “But wait,” says one, “Yet, in Christ, He is in us and we in Him!” Exactly, say I; you’re on to something; yet, we must view it through the whole counsel of God. In fact, the same Greek word for anger is translated wrath in this well known verse: “For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God” (James 1:20).
A holy hatred for sin is not the same as the anger spoken of in these three verses from Ephesians and James. How can we obey His command to be meek, gentle, love our enemies, &etc., while being angry? We cannot. When it says, Be angry, and yet do not sin, it is a Hebrew conundrum, a riddle. You see, there’s no way that you, me, we can be angry without sinning. This conundrum is designed to bring us to the Cross of Christ.
Every command issued in the Scripture, every doctrine taught, every blessing pronounced, is given in order that we get to Calvary’s Tree and stay there. How can I possibly justify my anger when I’ve seen the love, the grace, the mercy, and the free and sovereign will of God almighty displayed at the Cross? and that’s not to mention His infinite glory, His majesty, His splendor! Simply, I can’t. We can’t.
When the light of God at the Cross of Jesus Christ illuminates His truth, we recognize that our anger is sin, and must be repented of. Therefore, “let not the sun go down upon your wrath.” In other words, we must recognize the anger for the sin that it is, and confess that sin before the day is done.
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
Do thou from anger cease, and wrath
see thou forsake also:
Fret not thyself in any wise,
that evil thou should’st do.
For those that evil doers are
shall be cut off and fall:
But those that wait upon the Lord
the earth inherit shall.
For yet a little while, and then
the wicked shall not be;
His place thou shalt consider well,
but it thou shalt not see.
But by inheritance the earth
the meek ones shall possess:
They also shall delight themselves
in an abundant peace.
Psalm 37:8-11 A Psalm of David.
Scottish Psalter
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