Do you have a right to be angry?                 

Read: Psalm 4 NLT – Psalm 4 – For the choir director: A – Bible Gateway

“And “don’t sin by letting anger control you.” Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, or anger gives a foothold to the devil.” Ephesians 4:26-27 NLT

Do you have a right to be angry? Perhaps you do. But your right to be angry is always to be on based on when righteousness and justice are not being done. When sin against you or your neighbor is going unpunished, or when society accepts leniency over justice for violent crimes you and I have a right to be angry. But what are we to do with that anger, that righteous anger?

The Bible gives us two answers as to what to do with our anger. The apostle Paul tells the church in Ephesus not to let anger control us. It is very easy to be angered at someone who has done us wrong, by gossip, false accusations, even physical assaults in our total innocence. Keeping that anger under control is not easy, but extremely difficult to do. Yet, Paul instructs us not to let it control us, and also not to go to bed angry. His reasoning is it gives the devil a foothold into our lives in an area he can control by feeding that anger with his lies.

King David gives us the same advice in Psalm 4, “Don’t sin by letting anger control you. Think about it overnight and remain silent.” (Ps.4:4 nlt) In a sense, David is telling us to give it over to the Lord. Other Bible translations say, ‘Meditate in your heart upon your bed.’ The idea is to think deeply about your anger and bring God into the conversation.

The world today gives us countless justifiable reasons to be angry. Christians need a watchful eye as Satan, and his demons will look for any opportunity to turn even justifiable anger for his use if we do not give it over to the Lord.