Controlling the Spirit #2: Anger

Introduction to Controlling the Spirit and Key Proverbs

0:00 Children, this is cassette number 30 in a series given by Pastor Albert and Martin in the adult Sunday school class of the Trinity Baptist Church on September 15, 1991. Now we return this morning to our study of the seventh major area of godly parental admonition as that instruction is contained in the book of Proverbs. And I have identified this seventh major area in this way. Parents must admonish their children to seek to attain the moral nobility of controlling their own spirits. Parents must admonish their children to seek to attain the moral nobility of controlling their own spirits. Or if we were to use New Testament language, the virtue of self-control. And in our initial consideration of this vital aspect of parental training last Lord's Day, we examined the four primary texts which address this issue. And I shall only read them in your hearing as a brief

1:16 review. Proverbs 16 and verse 32. Proverbs 16 and verse 32. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.

1:35 This is why I use the terms moral nobility. There's something noble about a mighty warrior, about a mighty conqueror, but there's something even more noble. And that's the noble moral ability of controlling one's spirit. Proverbs.

1:53 Proverbs 25 and verse 28. Proverbs 25, 28. He whose spirit is without restraint is like a city that is broken down and without walls. And then Proverbs 14, 29.

2:13 Proverbs 14, 29. He that is slow to anger is of great understanding, but he that is hasty of spirit. He that is slow to anger is of great understanding, but he that is hasty of spirit. Exalteth folly.

2:26 And then Proverbs 17 and verse 27. He that spareth his words hath knowledge, and he that is of a cool spirit is a man of understanding. Now after opening up these four texts which you all gave to me, and almost in the order in which I had listed them, we drew. Three very simple conclusions from them.

Three Conclusions from the Proverbs Texts

2:57 Number one, that each of these texts assumes the innate and natural expression of sin through the activity of the human spirit. And this is a direct blow at humanism which assumes and propagates the heretical notion that the human spirit is essentially good. Therefore to restrain it is to suppress. That which is essentially and fundamentally good.

3:27 These texts will not at all be at home with the theology of humanism. Secondly, all of these texts affirm that unbridled self-expression is a sin and not a virtue. Unbridled self-expression is a sin and not a virtue. And how desperately this needs to be emphasized in our discussion.

3:53 Today, at many levels, I cannot take the time to underscore them. Let me just highlight one as we review this point. In the news this past week, I saw a brief report on a certain rock group. I don't even know the name.

4:10 I don't keep up on those things. And they said the reason they are the only rock group that is consistently playing to sold-out auditoriums and theaters and stadiums. Stadia and all the rest is that they are the one rock group that has maintained totally unpredictable self-expression to the point of madness and abandonment. This was not just the assessment of the commentator, but they interviewed young people and said why do you go to hear this group as opposed to all the others?

4:47 And their answer was uniformly, you never know what's going to happen. And what they meant is you never know what's going to happen. And what they meant is you never know what's going to happen. And what they meant is you never know what's going to happen.

4:53 And what they meant is you never know what kind of madness will result from the spirit of totally unrestrained self-expression all the way to destruction of their instruments to the most lewd and unashamed expressions of mock sexual experience and madness and anger. And this is what makes them so attractive and gives them sold-out audiences. That is frightening. That is frightening.

5:23 The climate of our society has been so pervaded with a perspective antithetical to these texts that we've studied together. And then thirdly, we saw on the basis of these texts, all of them assume that the control of one's spirit is an attainable virtue. When he speaks of a cool spirit and one who rules his spirit, the assumption is it is possible. When he speaks of a cool spirit and one who rules his spirit, the assumption is it is possible.

5:54 For one to rule his spirit and to have a cool spirit in opposition to the hasty spirit and the spirit without restraint. And whether in common grace through the external restraints of parental discipline and training, or whether by common grace merging into internal special saving grace, in which case one of the ninefold fruits of the spirit, which is selfless. Self-control will be the primary root of this virtue. There is no intimation in these texts that this is a noble virtue to be praised by poets and to be the subject of philosophers' dreams and writings, but certainly unattainable by we poor mortals. Not at all. They all assume that the control of one's spirit is an attainable virtue. Now today we move on.

Two Major Manifestations of Self-Control: Anger and the Tongue

6:53 We move on from an examination of these primary texts as they demonstrate the crucial nature of this issue, and we ask the question, according to the book of Proverbs, what are the two major areas in which the presence or absence of this virtue will most frequently and patently be manifested? According to Proverbs, what are the two major areas in which the presence or absence of this virtue will most frequently and patently be manifested? According to Proverbs, what are the two major areas in which the presence or absence of this virtue will most frequently and patently be manifested? The virtue of self-control and the ruling of one's spirit.

7:31 The virtue of self-control and the ruling of one's spirit will most frequently and patently be manifested.

7:46 Now, are you prepared to answer? If so, give me the first. What is the first area? And you ought not to have to look far for it.

7:54 It's included in our four major texts. And some of them. Yes, Adele? Yes.

7:57 the tongue, all right? I'm going to call that with respect to the activity of the tongue. And what's the other one? All right, anger with respect to the passion of anger. So what we want to do this morning is to note that with respect to the passion of anger and with respect to the activity of the tongue, according to the emphasis of Proverbs, the presence or absence of this virtue will most frequently and patiently be manifested. And if Solomon perceived that and recorded it by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, we must believe that it was with a specific end in view, namely, to equip us as we seek to isolate and identify and identify and implement the areas in the training of our children which ought to

Biblical Witness in Proverbs on the Passion of Anger

8:54 leave primary emphasis, surely, in commending to them by admonition the virtue of a controlled spirit to concentrate on these two areas which are brought forward more than any others in the book of Proverbs, namely, the passion of anger and the activity of the tongue. Let's start this morning, then, with the passion of anger and consider briefly the biblical witness here in Proverbs. Proverbs. We go back to chapter 16 and verse 32. Chapter 16 and verse 32. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he that ruleth is than he that taketh a city. In this text, the manifestation of a self-governed spirit, in terms of the Hebrew parallelism, is that a person is slow. To anger. You see, the governing or the ruling of the spirit in this text comes to light in being chapter 14 and verse 29. He that is slow to anger is of great understanding.

10:19 Now we have in the structure of Hebrew poetry here a contrast. You know, sometimes we said you have a repetition, then you have a progression, or you have a contrast. Well, here's the contrast.

10:33 He that is hasty of spirit exalts folly. In this setting of this verse, being harett is the opposite of being slow to anger. You see that in the passage. The man who is not slow to anger, but is quick to anger, is not a man of hasty. He is one of a hasty.

11:02 And then 1911, here we have a contrast between discretion and the absence of that which is folly. The discretion of a man maketh him slow to anger. We read in another passage that the man that's of a hasty spirit exalts folly. He's the man that is quick-tempered, the child that is quick-tempered, given to temper fits and tantrums, and outbursts of temper in sulking and retreating from social company, and stewing in his juices, or going into his bedroom and kicking the wall.

11:42 All of these various manifestations. Well, these are manifestations of folly as opposed to discretion, for the discretion of a man makes him slow to anger, and in one of its applications, makes him slow to anger when someone has wronged him. And it is his glory to pass over a transgression. The man of a quick-tempered nature, the child who is developing an uncontrolled spirit, will take every little offense and be ready to strike out in anger.

12:14 And to be a scrapper, and so doing, exalts folly, the opposite of discretion. Then in chapter 15 and verse 18, here we have the contrast between a wrathful man and one who appeases strife. A wrathful man, subcontention, but he that is slow to anger

12:44 appeases strife. Here again, we see the contrast between that person whose anger, is not governed and channeled, but it is one that gives vent to its own immediate passions, and becomes contagious. Whereas the one who is in control of his spirit, will not only be slow to vent his own anger, but he will appease strife as it would break out in others. Not only is he self-possessed, but he encourages self-possession in others.

13:20 And to these texts, we could add, and we don't have time to look at them, but for you who take notes, 1417, 22, 24, and 25, a very critical text about the contagion of the spirit of anger, and 2922. Now, in the light of the biblical witness concerning the passion of anger as one of the primary ways in which the presence or absence of the control of one's spirit, will be manifested, what practical counsel can I give to you as parents? What are you to do if you as a parent are to give convincing admonition to your children relative to the ruling of their spirits, specifically with respect to the passion of anger? Any parent here who's never had to deal with an angry child? Any Christian here, parent or non-parent, who doesn't have to deal with the issue of anger? None of us is exempt from these directives. Well,

Practical Counsel #1: Acquire a Biblical View of Anger

14:29 let me give some practical counsel with respect to this issue. Number one, and this is absolutely critical, you must not start anywhere else. You must seek to acquire a thoroughly biblical view of the passion of anger yourself. You must seek to acquire a thoroughly biblical view of the passion of anger yourself. Give admonition to your children concerning the whole matter of the control of their spirit with reference to anger if you have a distorted view of this passion of anger. If you view it as utterly and inherently sinful and never to be expressed in any way, under any circumstances, it is always evil, you are imparting heresy to your child. You're making your child unlike God. But if you don't know the difference between righteous and unrighteous anger, you may help him to become more like the devil.

15:41 So what do I admonish you to do? I encourage you to obtain and listen carefully to Pastor Nichols' series on this subject of anger. How many messages were there altogether, Pastor Nichols, do you remember? About ten. But in counseling with people, I've had any number of people say that that series was a great means of grace under God to help them to think biblically about the subject of anger. Because until you think biblically about the subject of anger, you're not going to be able to fulfill your parental duty to admonish your children relative to self-control, to the ruling of their spirits as it pertains to this very violent passion of anger. Second thing I would encourage you to do, under requiring a thoroughly biblical view, is, and here I'm going to propose something more formally to my fellow elders and then to the deacons, because many of you could not afford to purchase

16:43 Baxter's Christian Directory. Huge volume, it'll break a bookshelf if it's not too thick. But as in so many matters of practical concern, Baxter has a most helpful treatment of this subject. He has, on pages 284 to 287, one of the most helpful material I've ever seen on the subject of anger. And he starts out interestingly by defining anger this way. Anger is the rising up of the heart in a passionate disposition against a perceived evil, which would cross or hinder us of some desired good. It is given us by God to oppose His glory or our own

17:43 neighbor's real good. That's his definition. He said it's a God-given capacity. It is not something spawned in hell.

17:57 It is part of our image-bearing capacity as creatures made in the image of God. I never thought of that. Well, then don't you try to give proper counsel to your children, or you may develop distorted, incompetent children who are squashing. Even expressions of righteous anger, and thereby distorting the image of God, they are to bear.

Practical Counsel #1 (Continued): Baxter's Christian Directory on Anger

18:25 And then he goes on to say, anger is good, and thus is useful to its appointed end, in a right manner and measure, but it is sinful when, and then he gives nine marks of sinful anger. All right, having identified it, he says, all right, now you've got to start meditating about how to deal with your sinful anger. And then he gives a number of meditations about dealing. And after he gives twelve meditations, then he takes up objections. And I couldn't help but laugh. I brought these things down to supper last night with my wife, and I said, honey, no new thing under the sun, is there? Listen to the objection. But you will say of a hasty, that is, I am of a hasty, intense nature and cannot help it. Oh, indeed. And Baxter answers that

19:17 objection with the word of God in a way that is absolutely irrefutable. Objection. But the provocation was so great, it would have angered anyone who could choose. If you only had to live with my wife, you'd know I couldn't help but be angry. If you had to live with my husband, you couldn't help but be angry.

19:39 No new thing under the sun, written in the mid-sixteen hundreds, and as a pastor, he'd heard all the common cop-outs. Objection number three. But it is so sudden. When did Baxter sneak in?

20:11 Baxter sneaked into my house and listened to my excuses. Well, he was there, all right, because he knew the human heart, and he knew his Bible. Objection number five, or four. It is but a short outburst, and I'm always sorry when I've done it. I mean, what's the big deal?

20:31 I don't go around ranting and raving for three days and nights. I just blow my cork for thirty seconds, and I always repent. And he answers that in an irrefutable way. Then another objection.

20:44 But there are none that will not repent. Be angry sometimes. No, not...

20:54 He answers that objection biblically as well. And he answers another objection. When people start quoting the Bible to justify their sin, he had it in his day. But the apostle says, Be angry and sin not, let not the sun go down on your wrath.

21:08 My wrath is down before the sun, therefore I don't sin. And he answers that objection.

21:16 You see why I say you need to read this? Some of you won't do it. You won't do it. Even if we put it in your hands, in big print, in revised simple English.

21:26 You know why? Because you've heard your own heart echoed here. And you're not prepared to deal ruthlessly with your anger.

21:34 Even if we make it available, I venture to prophesy. Some of you will not pick it up. If you pick it up to save face, to prove me wrong, you won't read it. And if you read it, you won't put it into practice and take it seriously and pray it in.

21:46 Why? Because you are not determined to deal biblically with your own anger. And if you're not, then there's reason to question whether you're in a state of grace. Because Paul says that those who do...

21:59 ...such things, and among them are mentioned anger and wrath.

22:02 If you go on in a pattern of unmortification of sinful anger, you have no grounds to claim you're a child of God. This is serious business. How can you instruct your children in the righteous dealing with this element, vital element, predominant element of the ruling of their spirits, namely the passion of anger, if you yourself do not have a biblical view of, and are not biblically dealing with, your own anger? Then after he deals with meditations, then he gives practical directions against sinful anger.

22:40 And among them, it's very interesting to whet your appetite, direction number seven. If you cannot ease your quiet or restrain yourself, go away from the place in the company where you're about to blow your cork. That's very good.

22:55 Then he goes on to say, without any delay, confess the sin to those that stand by. Say to those you're beginning to be angry, with, quote, I find a sinful anger tingling in me. I'm beginning to forget God's presence in my duty. I'm tempted to speak provoking words to you, which I know God has forbidden me to do.

23:14 End quote. Such a present opening of your temptation will break the force of it, and such a speedy confession will stop the fire that it go no further. Full of practical directives, precisely 16 of them. And the last one is, take some faithful friends, friend into your confidence to be your monitor as to your progress or lack of the same in the control of your anger.

23:41 16 practical directives. Some of you have been saying, oh, I've been praying about my anger for years. What have you been doing about it? You really want some practical help?

23:49 I've suggested a series of sermons. Here are four pages of Baxter,

23:56 and it's excellent material. And if you and I are to give the counsel we ought to our children, for it's not my purpose to deal with the subject itself, please, please, I beg you, in the name of Christ and for the good of your own soul and the souls of your children, seek to acquire a thoroughly biblical view of the passion of anger yourself. Be convinced that it is not an inherently sinful passion. Know how to recognize righteous from unrighteous anger.

Practical Counsel #2 & #3: Deal with Your Own Anger and Recognize Anger in Children

24:29 Know how to deal biblically with righteous anger and how to deal biblically with unrighteous anger. Know how to deal biblically with unrighteous. Second word of counsel, not only must we seek as parents to acquire a thoroughly biblical view of the passion of anger ourselves, secondly, you must seek to recognize, I'm sorry, you must determine to deal biblically with your own anger as a parent. Once you've attained proper views, then you must determine to deal biblically with your own anger as a parent, both before God and before man.

25:10 Not just before God, not just before man, and this is where Baxter's counsel is so helpful, because he takes in both dimensions. He talks about, in terms of where you are in your circumstances, the moment you're conscious of the rising of a sinful dimension of anger, immediately lift up your heart to God, and then if necessary, immediately open your heart to others and say there's something beginning to be wrong with me, something to brew in here that you don't see or hear, but you're going to both see and hear it in five minutes if something doesn't happen, will you now help me to overcome this passion that I know is wrong, that is rising within my breast. That's good practical counsel, that you and I may fulfill the determination by grace to deal biblically with our own anger as parents before God and before man. And here again, I commend Baxter to you, but then, thirdly, you must seek to recognize and to check the manifestations of sinful anger in your children and recognize and encourage and guide the manifestations of righteous anger in your children.

26:26 You must seek to recognize and to check the manifestations of sinful anger in your children to recognize, encourage, and guide the anger in your children. the expressions of righteous anger in your children, and you must do both, for they are the manifestations of a controlled spirit. The man whose spirit is in control will, as we saw in Nehemiah, experience at times righteous anger, but he said, I consulted with myself, then I spoke to them. He had control of his spirit so that the righteous passion of anger found righteous channels. Not a righteous passion cutting unrighteous channels. Not a righteous passion being denied and mortified and neutered, but cutting right channels. Don't assume that our children know instinctively anymore how righteously to express themselves.

27:32 If they have other anger, then they will naturally suppress their sinful passions of anger. And let me break that down into two areas that I know would be raised if I were to open up for questions right now. I hope we'll have about ten minutes at the end to open up for questions. First of all, those manifestations, particularly here of sinful anger, those manifestations made before your children develop verbal skills.

28:02 Long before they can develop verbal skills, they will manifest passions of sinful anger. Long before they can frame it into words and call their brothers and sisters names, or even say to you as mommy and daddy, no, I'm not going to do it, and then stomp out. You learn the difference between the cry of pain, the cry of hunger, and the cry of frustration that's leading to anger. It's leading to unbridled anger in the child. Long before the child can speak, and woe is the parent who can't discern, not infallibly, but as a general rule, the differences in those cries. And you moms and dads must pray to God. Nobody's going to write a book, even Baxter, if he came back from the dead. Seventeen ways to distinguish between a cry of pain, a cry of hunger, and a cry of sinful, passionate anger. Nobody.

29:06 Not even Baxter could write such a book. But you have the Holy Ghost, and you are the child's parent, and you learn to discern, but you won't if you don't believe this lovely little creature, who's not yet come to some age of accountability, who is only theoretically rooted in Adam, will sooner or later sort of begin to draw up from the sap of his Adamic relationship to Adam, and in his personality, my friend, if you're that foolish and naive and unbidden, you're not going to be able to do that. You're not going to be able to be biblical. You'll never recognize a cry of anger than any other parent who doesn't even know your kid could recognize three blocks away. You have a biblical theology that your children are conceived in sin, that they go astray from the womb. Not when they get into the terrible twos, and the trying threes, and the frustrating fours, and the funky fives, and the silly sixes, and the slap-happy sevens, and I could go on making them all up. I mean, you can give anything a name. You can make it sound respectable. The scripture says they're just going astray in different

30:14 ways as they develop. The foolishness that is bound up in their hearts unpacks in different ways in different stages of development, but it's sinful folly that's being unpacked, not psychological stages. Some of you are still brainwashed by that terminology around Trinity Church, of the people of God talking as Christian parents, and the frustrating fours, and the funky fives. Stages. Terminology. Concoct. Talk the language of the Bible. Manifesting. Since he had his second

31:28 birthday, it's like he got a fresh impulse out of Adam and from the devil. That's more biblical. Now, you may not say that in front of the kid and scare him to death, but when you're talking to fellow parents and seeking counsel from your pastors, I just hate to hear people snickering with a kind of embarrassed excuse for their kid's behavior. Well, you know, terrible twos.

31:52 You'll never get a smile. A lot of response out of me, friend. I will not whitewash your own expressed sense of guilt that you're not dealing biblically with the issue by snickering any more than I'll snicker about jokes about old maids, people who have extended singleness, or snicker about other things that are no occasion of snickering. No, you and I must pray that God will help us to recognize those different crimes.

32:25 Those will have to be met most frequently before they have verbal skills with the rod. However, those made after verbal skills begin to emerge. Their ability to understand your words and convey words to you may manifest it by throwing something down in anger. Well, you've got to instruct them that that is unacceptable behavior because the kid who's allowed in his anger born of frustration or born of the fact that he can't have his way takes an object and throws it down is the kid who in his teens is punching people, who in his adulthood is guilty of physical abuse of his wife and his children.

33:09 A pattern has been engrained that when you're angry you strike, or when you allow diverted aggression the kid would now not dare hit you, because you let him go in his room and double up his fist and pound the bed. Later on, that's the kid that's pounding somebody's flesh. And you've got to recognize these things and deal with them. The wrong ways of dealing with anger.

33:37 Some kids will not pound the bed or kick the door. They'll go in their room and sulk as an expression of anger. They didn't like some directive you gave. And they may not give you lip, but they put out their lip, go in their room, slam the door, and sit there and sulk.

33:56 And some of you let them do it, as long as they're not giving you lip and causing you trouble. Now, you say, let them cool down. My friend, that is not a biblical way of dealing with anger. We as elders have to deal with wives who say, what do I do when my husband gets upset?

34:10 He just retreats, goes away, won't talk, and he shoots through.

34:18 He was allowed to retreat into his room and sulk. You say, Pastor, you sound like you're serious. Yes, I'm not making these things up. Every one of my fellow elders could write his own story and speak his own point here and give illustrations.

34:37 Alas! Fuck Trinity Baptist! Who are reaping the fruits of parents who didn't teach them to control their spirit and righteous anger. Long after verbal skills were developed, they were allowed to sulk and go into silence.

35:00 They were allowed to leave the situation and not bring the issues to resolution. They were allowed expressions of diverted aggression. They were allowed to express anger. And the unwritten rule was, 30 minutes, everything's forgotten.

35:18 Three hours, it's all forgiven. Business as usual, without ever having to deal righteously with the sinful expressions of anger. Humbling yourself, going to the person who's been harmed by the sulkiness, the angry words. It's just the unwritten rule in certain cultures and in certain families that that's the way we operate.

35:39 We forget and forgive, though no sin is acknowledged nor forgiveness extended. That is thoroughly unbiblical.

35:47 That's like a sinner sinning against God and saying, oh well, after half an hour, God's forgiven. I've forgotten in three hours, He's forgiven me. Where does the Bible say that? It says, if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive.

36:01 The Bible says, he that covers his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesses and forsakes shall obtain mercy. So you as a parent must seek to recognize and check the manifestations of sinful anger in your children. Those that they express before verbal skills are required. Those that they express after verbal skills are required.

Practical Counsel #4: Use Occasions of Anger to Press Spiritual Realities

36:22 And the fourth word of count, Use these occasions to press home spiritual realities. One of the most effective times to press home the reality of the wickedness of the human heart by nature is after anger has expressed itself in an unrighteous way. Because Galatians 5, 19-21, that speaks of the works of the flesh which are manifested. Sit your child down and say, now honey, why is it that you reacted?

36:57 That way. You didn't even have to think and plot and plan. It just came out. Why did it come out?

37:04 Because you have an evil, wicked heart. Out of the heart these things proceed. And it's a marvelous opportunity to press home the need of the Holy Spirit as the divine gift given through the Lord Jesus that they might begin to manifest the fruit of the Spirit which is love, joy, peace, long-suffering goodness, faithfulness of faith, meekness, and self-control. Use these occasions to press home the spiritual realities of the wickedness of their hearts, the need of the forgiveness of Christ, and the need of the power of the Spirit to give them grace to control the volatility of their anger when it would be expressed in sinful ways. Let me conclude so we do have our time for discussion as we...

Concluding Thoughts: Ward Law on Mastery of Passions and Temperament

37:57 leave this head of the passion of anger by quoting from one of the commentators on Proverbs. I wish these three volumes were still available, but I...

38:08 Alas, they are not. It's volume two of Ward Law commenting on Proverbs 16, 32. He writes, Seek then, brethren, this mastery, this mastery of the passions, the government of self. And in order to this attainment, keep in mind at once the need of divine grace and the sufficiency of it for every case, the need of it that we may not fail through self-sufficiency and the sufficiency of it that we may not find an apology in the strength of our passions and the quickness and excitability of our natural temperament for failing to gain the mastery of ourselves.

38:51 There are no passions so strong, no temperaments so excitable as to be beyond the power of divine grace to overcome. And that grace is promised in unqualified terms and therefore in every case to the full extent in which it can be required to all who ask for it. At the same time, let those of a more phlegmatic temperament, those of you who are not naturally given to tremendous temptations, to have sinful expressions, let those of a more phlegmatic temperament and less violent passions than others guard themselves against two things. Number one, mistaking in themselves the mere gentleness of constitutional temper for the operations of saving grace. You may have a child that is not naturally given to passionate outbursts of temper. And one of the marks of saving grace in that child may not be the controlling of the passion that would cause him to go kick the refrigerator, but to see him flush with holy anger. The rotten words the neighbor kids are using and coming to you saying, Mommy, Daddy, what can I do to stop it?

40:08 I don't want to hear those things. The mark of grace in such a child may not be subduing sinful passion of anger, but looking for the presence of holy passions of anger. You see that? And if you've got a wooden notion that constitutional sedateness of temperament equals grace, you'll be deceived about the state of your child, and you may deceive your child about his true state.

40:30 That's the point that Ward Law is making. And it's a valid point. So those of a more phlegmatic temperament, don't mistake mere gentleness of constitutional temperament for the operation of saving grace. Who said these old writers didn't know psychology?

40:48 This is sound biblical psychology. And being uncharitably severe on those whose temperament may be the opposite of their own. And instead of having been restrained and subdued by early training, may have been only further cherished in its touchiness and fiery violence by education and circumstances, and who may have actually overcome in themselves more than the more sedate persons have, although they have much more that yet remains to be subdued. I put it this way.

41:21 Some people only need ten ounces of grace to overcome their restraint, reaction to a given situation of provocation. Some people need ten tons of grace to overcome provocation in the same area. And a person who only needs ten ounces can very easily judge himself to be growing in grace because once a year he may only fall short of his ten ounces of grace twice. And the other man may fall short twice every day.

41:53 But the only reason he doesn't fall short a hundred times is he's got five hundred pounds of grace working on him. But he needs two tons to overcome. So when there isn't two tons, he falls.

42:05 Don't judge by a false standard. Don't judge by the standard of your own heart and your own struggles. Don't make unwise judgments with regard to your children. Don't flatten them all out as though God scrambled them together with the same raw materials in this area of their innate predisposition to have both righteous and sinful expressions of anger no two children coming out of the same womb with the same father and mother are the same in this area.

Discussion and Parental Wisdom

42:39 Pray that God will give us wisdom and grace in this crucial area. Well, we've got six minutes for discussion. I'm going to stop God helping me. One of the sisters got on my conscience about running over and I said I'm going to do my best so I know she's watching to see if I'm going to bring forth fruits neat for repentance.

42:59 And I've got right here on my notes watch the clock! Watch the clock! Watch the clock! It's in point right there, you see.

43:05 So I'm trying to bring forth fruits neat for repentance. But when you have a volatile spirit, you see, you get away from your notes and you get caught up in what you're saying and you've got a clock there and people going like this and notes there and you still forget. So, questions? Comments?

44:31 Yes.

44:33 Yes. It's a very, very good observation that just the point that Mrs. Berry has made is that if we observe in our children that there are certain times when they're more vulnerable to the outbursts of passions of anger and unable to control them, should we not then, as much as lies within our power, structure what they're doing, where they're doing it, and with whom they're doing it so as not to provide unnecessary provocation to that sin? And I say, amen.

45:04 We must seek to do that because our Heavenly Father knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust and He deals with us wisely. And the whole biblical doctrine of how we deal with ourselves, if we know that certain situations make us more vulnerable to the sinful passion of anger or passions of sinful anger and outburst of it, we should, if at all possible, avoid that. However, the one caution I would put there, Cynthia, is that we ought not to be so concerned to do that that we don't allow some situations where they're stressed out and vulnerable because they're not going to be able to avoid all those things in the real world.

45:42 So we must strike the proper balance there of while they are developing a biblical concept and hopefully a psyche that in common grace or in prevenient grace or maybe under the dynamics of special grace is coming to maturity in self-control, there may need to be more external manipulation of the circumstances, but not so much as to insulate them from the real world into which they're going to go when whether they like it or not, whether they're tired and stressed out, they're still going to have to go in and have the boss give them some bad news or give them a nasty job. Well, we must train them on the mastery of the Spirit even when they are stressed out and part of that may be after we have externally structured the framework, give them an opportunity to see if they've caught hold and have them come and say, Mommy, I just feel that anything I do with my brother, with my sister, we're going to end up having a fight. Is it all right if I go to my room and read? I think that'd be the better thing for me to do. Well, now it's showing that they're beginning not running from a situation and not dealing with an outburst of sinful anger, but they're learning how to avoid, if at all possible, in a righteous way that which unnecessarily provokes them.

47:05 So I'd say yes, but with the caution not so to overdo it that we leave them unprepared. As one of the parents recently said to me that there was a situation where the kids were fighting and he told the kids, he said, look, I'm not going to be around for the rest of your life to sort out all your things and unless someone has really been guilty of something where it's very clear that one of you is wrong and needs to be disciplined, you sort that issue out because in life we have to sort things out. And I happen to mention that's why when those things got out of hand, my mother would come in and one of us would say, well, he started, she started, it makes no difference. It's obvious there's a fight and there's never a fight unless two people are guilty.

47:47 Someone started, someone responded wrongly, so you're both going to get it. And they both got it. It was immaterial who started it. When it got to the place where we were both out of control, then we were both wrong, so she may have got the first one who started it first.

48:00 It made no difference. We're both going to get it. If you killed her and can't, she might hear something off in the other room. You kids sort that out.

48:06 If it's not sorted out in two minutes, I'm coming in, you're all going to get it. And there are times when there was just like the old woman in the shoe. She beat all her kids and put them to bed. My mother would just go through and we'd all get it because we hadn't heeded the general warning.

48:20 There was a general purging and it did us good. We'd be so sweet for the next few days. She could hardly live with us and we didn't go around doing anything fair. I only had 33% of the guilt and I got 70.

48:33 Ah, it's ludicrous. Ludicrous.

48:39 You have been listening to How Not to Foul Up the Training of Your Children by Pastor Albert N. Martin. These cassettes are distributed by the Trinity Book Service. If you would like a free listing of other audio cassettes and books, please call us at 1-800-722-3584.

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