of a 6th century monastery. What kind of sins can a person commit in a monastery? Well, the answer to that question is actually very simple. The same sins that we commit living in a family. Sins are never obvious to persons if they're living by themselves, living alone. Sins become visibly sinful when we have to rub against other sinners when we have to rub against other sinners closely and rub against other sinners regularly. People say, I never knew how selfish it was until I got married, or I never knew how selfish it was until I had kids. Well, the truth be told is that we've always been that selfish. We just never had an occasion to show it. We never had occasion for our pride to come out into the open or our sloth to come out into the open. It's only living in close proximity, living in close proximity on a regular basis, where there's no relief from the people with whom you're living in close proximity, that one's own inclinations become visible. We're on a journey in this early part of this year toward Resurrection Sunday, which is April the 20th. It seems like a long ways away, but it's really not that many more weeks away. And we've been considering this theme of the impossible problem of sin. And today we're going to consider another of the seven deadlies, and that is anger. Now why are we doing this? Why talk about sin? What are we after? Well, in order to prove that there is no human remedy. That's what my aim is. to impress the reality of sin out in the open, to impress it upon us all. And I don't know if you have occasion to talk to persons who are outside the faith and it comes up in conversation, you know, Jesus' death, come up, you know, He's a great example. That isn't why He died. He didn't die because He wanted to be an example. He died because there's no other remedy for sin than His death. You only have to know your sin well enough to know that. That there is no human remedy for it. God had to do something. And God in all of His infinite creativity concluded the only way to remedy this was the sacrifice of His own Son on the cross in our place. Today's text, which we're going to read a portion from Genesis 27 and also Hebrews 12, is among the most solemn in the Bible, I think. And part of the reason is because we're going to deal with the spiritual condition of a covenant son, Esau. This covenant son. That's what we are. We're sons and daughters of the covenant. We're members of the visible church of Jesus Christ. And for those of you that have children who are not yet teens or approaching teens, and as you have kids that are just now entering their teens, you kind of know this, you feel it. that at some point your children are going to leave the house and they're no longer going to be under your supervision. And then they can choose for themselves whether they want to follow the Lord Jesus Christ. And one of the issues that you have to navigate when you have adult kids is how much can I parent them when they're out of the house? You have to shift gears. If you have little kids, you don't quite understand that yet. That's coming. Esau was a son of the covenant. We can call him a son of the church. Esau, who was a member of the believing church in the Old Testament, dies outside of saving faith. Esau is only one generation away from his grandfather Abraham, the man to whom God had made this promise, both for himself, his family, and the world. Esau, Abraham's first covenant grandson. Esau, the son of his promised miracle child, Isaac, dies outside of the covenant. And anger plays a role in his departure from his faith. You've kind of got the hint as we were singing songs and reciting verses about anger that that's what we're going to deal with today. Let me read our text. I'm going to be also citing in this sermon from Genesis 25. I'm not going to read it here. So if you want to have your Bible open to Genesis 27, and then we'll be going to Hebrews 12 where Esau's name is mentioned again. We'll be working through these verses together. Listen now to God's inspired word. As soon as Isaac finished blessing Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out of the presence of Isaac, his father Esau, his brother, came in from his hunting. He also prepared delicious food and brought it to his father. And he said to his father, Let my father arise and eat his son's game, that you may bless me. His father Isaac said, Who are you? He answered, I am your son, your firstborn Esau. Then Isaac trembled very violently and said, Who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me? And I ate all of it before you came, and I have blessed him. Yes, and he shall be blessed. As soon as Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry and said to his father, Bless me, even me also, O my Father. Hear the anguish there. Now let me now move to the portion in Hebrews where the New Testament author mentions Esau's name. Strive for peace, he says, with everyone, and for holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God, and that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled. That no one is sexually immoral or unholy, like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal. For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no chance to repent, though he sought for it with tears." Well, the seven deadly sins are deadly precisely because they are so common. They're so ordinary. And therefore, they appear so unserious. That is, they appear so unserious to ourselves, which is why they're deadly. So let's consider this one here, anger. So I'm going to have three points here. Let me just give you the titles of these one at a time. The first is the unseen potency of anger. Hebrews 12 comes out of Genesis 25 and 27. The story in Genesis 25 is about the twin boys born to Isaac and Rebekah. But the Lord sent a prophecy to the mother, Rebekah, telling her that, and also therefore through Rebekah to Isaac, and surely it's not mentioned that she mentioned it to him, but surely she would have, that the boys, before the boys were born, that the younger one, the younger born son, would inherit the birthright and the blessing status, and not the firstborn. This status, this role and the wealth and power shall go not to the older, which is typical, but to the younger son who would be named Jacob. And God said, out of Jacob shall I bring the Messiah to bless the earth. Isaac and Rebekah knew this all of the lives, all the time while their children, the two boys, were living at home. But as you might remember, one of the systemic sins of the Abrahamic family was favoritism. And so Isaac favored Esau. Isaac liked him better than Jacob. But Esau seemed to reflect his father's values as well, his father's tastes, his interests, and I would add his father's lack of spirituality. You might say, well, Isaac lacked spirituality. Was Isaac a believer? Yes, he was a believer. Yeah, he was. I think it was a little dull in my opinion. Well, in Genesis 25, if you have your Bible and you have it open to 25, I'm not asking you to, but here's a verse you can look at. In verse 21, Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife because she was barren. The Lord answered his prayer and his wife Rebekah became pregnant. And so he prays. The Lord hears his prayer. And the very next verse, The babies jostled each other within her. Now, you have to realize, as you read Genesis 25 and 27, a whole lot of history skips over. These comments skip over. In this case, she became pregnant in verse 21, and roughly eight and a half months later, she now has this issue with this jostling going on in the womb. And she asks, why is this happening to me? And so, she inquired of the Lord. She inquired. Not her husband. And God revealed to her the destiny of these sons. Because of the sin of favoritism, as I observe it, Isaac would be blind to the purposes of God for the rest of his life. Isaac, in effect, would say to himself as he contemplated his favored son, Esau, that I think I can do better than God has decreed. In the very next verse, it says, when the boys grew up. No mention is mentioned of the earlier years. How old they were when they grew up, it's hard to know exactly. When they grew up, they would have been already young adults. I don't think they're teenagers here. I think they're probably closer to in their 30s, maybe early 40s, when this verse says, when the boys grew up. It says, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man dwelling in tents. Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob. What kind of man was Esau? Esau was a man's man, I would propose. A skillful hunter. Jacob was an inside man. Esau liked guns. Jacob liked books. Jacob drove a Prius probably. Esau drove a 4x4 truck with a bumper sticker on it that said, a man and his truck. It's a beautiful thing. And yet God determined that it would be Jacob, not Esau, to carry the blessing forward. So in v. 29 it says, once Jacob was cooking stew, Esau came in from the field and he was exhausted. And Esau said to Jacob, let me eat some of that red stew, for I am exhausted. And Jacob said, sell me your birthright now. Now you might ask, where is the anger here? How do you make a case for anger here? Well, as you remember from the reading in Hebrews 12, and I don't know exactly why the ESV has the root of anger in quotations. I don't know why, my other versions don't have that, but you noticed it, that the root of anger is there in quotations. And I want you to know that anger starts there. It starts first as a root. And as a root, it is unseen. As a root, it is underground, it is out of view. You can't see roots. That is until the plant bursts out of the ground and then you know there's something alive down there below the surface. The root is always there permeating, growing, but you don't know it's there until at some point it comes out. How then does anger begin? I would submit to you that anger begins small. It begins with an insignificant irritation. Anger begins with peevishness. It begins with irritability. It begins with a certain degree of spitefulness. Verse 32, I'm now reading in Genesis 25, Esau said, I'm about to die. Of what use will a birthright be to me? Now what is a birthright exactly? The firstborn son was a member of a family who automatically received birth privileges. That is of the father, mainly birth responsibilities of the father. The firstborn then became the head of the family after the father passed away. And that meant head over his widowed mother, head over his brothers, head over any other unmarried daughters in the family. He took over the responsibility of the family. He was given power over the family. He was also given the family wealth primarily in service of executing the responsibilities of the firstborn. And I might also say in the case of Isaac's family, the family, the responsibilities of the birthright would have to include their spiritual lives. It would have to include their spiritual lives that the value and the money that he would receive would be to encourage their spiritual lives, not just encourage their financial prosperity. Esau says in exasperation, if I die, what good will this power and wealth get me? And so Jacob said, swear it to me now. So Esau swore it to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. Wow. One commentator observes this. He says, in a rash, impulsive, short-sighted fit of impatience, he agrees to hand over the entire responsibility and privilege for one bowl of soup. I would submit to you we can observe here the very beginnings of anger. Anger doesn't start in a colossal, catastrophic mass murder. It's connected. It doesn't start there. Anger doesn't start in an all-out brawl, even though it's connected. Anger starts by a peevish irritation that I would submit to you goes unchallenged. We talk about church discipline. If you want to scale back church discipline, church discipline begins with me. Self-discipline. Self-challenge. Esau, his whole life, his irritations, his short temper had never been challenged. He never challenged it himself. His parents never challenged it. He comes in hungry, grouchy, cantankerous, irritable, cranky. You know anyone like that? Kind of on edge all the time. And so what do they do with him? They just stay out of his way. What happens if I challenge him? You're going to pay a price for it. Okay. What are the consequences if you don't pay a price for it? I'm about to die, says Esau. Really? You saw you've not eaten in three hours, maybe four hours, maybe five hours, you come in hungry and you say, I am about to die, really? It's a bit of an exaggeration. I think anger tends toward that. His grouchy irritability becomes out of control, kind of a bull. china shop, the household of Isaac and Rebekah's strategy toward Esau for his whole life had been just give him some room, let him calm down on his own, and he'll be back to his old self. Rather than to say, you know, that's really unacceptable. You've got to get control of that. It's going to destroy you. I doubt whether Isaac or Rebekah ever said that to him. Or maybe They said it one or two times to him in the course of his lifetime, but they paid such a severe price for it, they said, I'm not doing that anymore. This is the life disrupting root of anger. It is unseen, but it's always present and very powerful as soon as it erupts. Now consider some other phrases for this from the wisdom books, from Proverbs and from Ecclesiastes. Proverbs 14 refers to a quick-tempered man. Proverbs 15 and 22 refer to a hot-tempered man. Proverbs 21 refers to an ill-tempered woman. Men don't have a corner on anger. Sometimes it happens with women too. Anger is a human problem. Ecclesiastes refers to one easily or quickly angered or provoked. These words speak of anger, but anger for the most part goes unnoticed until you notice it. And this blow up. seemed so extreme when this one little thing took place, but very likely there have been other irritations under the surface that had been comets simmering until it boils over. Let me read a comment to you about Esau. It's from Alexander White, who's a, I think he's like a 19th century Puritan. Very, very insightful. He has a series of books on the characters of the Bible, and this is what he says about Esau. This request by Jacob, the request, sell me your birthright. It was not the first time he asked Esau. No man sells his birthright on the spot. He who sells his birthright sells it many times in his heart before he actually takes it so openly to the market. He belittles it. He despises it. He cheapens it. At any rate, to himself, long before he sells it so cheaply to another. No man and no woman fails or falls in that fatal way without having prepared their fall for themselves in their hearts long before. Esau had shown his contempt for his birthright a thousand times and in a thousand ways before now. Everybody knew Esau's birthright was for sale. if anybody cared to bid for it. Isaac knew it. Rebekah knew it. Jacob knew. And Jacob had for a long time been eyeing his brother for a fit opportunity. It had for a long time been marrow to Jacob's bones to hear Esau jesting so openly about his birthright over his venison, over his wine. Jesting and being jested about the covenant blessing and covenant responsibility. And here's the conversation this man imagines that went on in the tent between the brothers. As much as you are able to eat, Esau, anything else you like to name, to boot only, say that you'll toss me today your worthless birthright, said Jacob. Take it, be welcome to it, said Esau. As much good it may do you, it has never been worth a haunch of good venison to me. You may have it, and my oath on it, on the spot, for a good dish at once. Be quick of your smoking pottage. Take it, and let me be done with it. Take it, and let me hear about it no more. And Esau did eat and drink and rose up and went his way. A quick-tempered man does foolish things. You know, I don't know whether or not you yourself have a, one of the seven deadly sins might be more inclined toward anger. But you know if you struggle with anger, I do, A lot of rash stuff happens when that thing just below the surface pops open. This is true. A quick-tempered man does foolish things. The unseen potency of anger. Number two, the effects and consequences of anger. Now, I'm going to go to Hebrews, so you can look in your notes in your bulletin for the verse, but it's Hebrews 12. And in verse 17, I'm reading here now, for you know that afterwards when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected for he found no chance to repent, though he sought for it with tears. This little verse follows the content of Genesis 25, where he sold his birthright And in Genesis 27, Jacob tricked Esau out of his blessing. Now, before I say, well, let me just read this. I have it in my notes here. In Genesis 27, verse one, when Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that he could not see, he called Esau, his older son, and said to him, my son. And he answered, here am I. And he said to him, behold, I am old, and I do not know the day of my death. Now then take your weapons, your quiver and your bow and go out to the field and hunt game for me and prepare for me delicious food such as I love and bring it to me so that I may eat and my soul may bless you before I die. Of course, you know the story here. Rebecca was in the tent as well. Overheard this exchange between Isaac and Esau. And she then concocted a plan to deceive her husband so that the blessing goes to her son Jacob. Of course, Rebecca is operating from the knowledge that it was God's will to give this whole thing over to Jacob. rather than to appeal to Isaac with the knowledge that he knows came to them, and reasoning with him, which he probably did in the past, to no avail, realized that if the decree was going to be fulfilled, she would have to take matters into her own hand. And I am not commending that. Just saying that to you. I think she did wrong here. Even though I know that God was behind this and God was fulfilling His purpose here through her deception of her husband, I in no way am commending that. It's not an end justifies the means sort of thing that the Bible is commending. Now what does it mean to be the blessing? The blessing is kind of a prophecy. When Isaac gives the blessing to Jacob, thinking that it's for Esau, there's a lot of things that are now gonna be a part of Jacob's destiny. And they are, it's irrevocable. So once it happens, it can't be taken back. And nevertheless, when it all happens, Esau walks in just after Jacob leaves. Now I'm gonna read from Genesis 27, verse 41. So if you're flipping back and forth, that's what I'm doing here too. After Esau realized that the blessing had been passed irrevocably to his brother Jacob, he says this, verse 41, now Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him. And Esau said to himself, the days of mourning for my father are approaching. Then I will kill my brother. Now, let me just make a couple of comments about this phrase here. You know, much that happens in the Bible has happened because of anger. In envy and anger, Cain murdered his brother Abel. In anger, Moses broke the tablets, as you recall. In anger, Moses strikes the rock rather than speak to the rock as God had commanded him. In anger, Jonah refused to obey the call of God to go and preach in Nineveh. In one of the sources that I was reading for the seven deadly sins, this author who is a pastor, asked a policeman, what causes you most fear in your work as a policeman? Think about that. I'm not going to ask you to tell me what you think. If you're a police officer, this is rhetorical. He asked the policeman, what is the thing you fear the most? And the policeman answered this, my greatest fear is anger. The policeman did not mention burglaries or muggings or embezzlements. And the officer said, there, nobody has really anything against anybody. He says, the bloodiest crimes are usually domestic. Crimes of passion, as they are now called. The policeman said, when anger is the cause of a crime, things get horrible and terribly bloody. Let me ask, is all anger bad, wrong, or sinful? Well, the answer is no. There is anger that is righteous anger. Martin Luther extolled righteous anger as the engine that drove him on to some of his best work. He said, I never work better than when I am inspired by anger. Of course, I think he's thinking about the cause of Christ in those instances. Jesus walked into the temple and got angry, overturning the money tables and so forth, motivated by zeal. There is a place for this sort of anger. There's a place in the lives of godly Christians for anger. I read recently about a woman whose husband had just up and left her without a word of warning, had been married two years, and all of a sudden he was gone. The minister asked her, are you angry? I think you certainly have a right to be angry. She said, no, I'm not. I'm just hurt. The minister was puzzled. Not angry? I think you certainly have a right to be angry, maybe even angry at God. I mean, you kept your marriage vows and he did not? No, no, just hurt. And the minister reflecting on that conversation began to thought, he thought this, I decided then and there that depression is often the result of anger turned inward. A different kind of expression of anger, not the blow up, but the turn inward, where you don't, on the outside, you are under control, but on the inside, it's eating you alive. What do you do when you've been wronged badly? What do you do when you've been taken advantage of, are now facing financial collapse because of someone else's crimes against you? We can see the bitter resentment like Esau and then plan attack, or we can remember Jesus, who on the cross said, Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit. Peter picking up on that language, speaking about injustice, calls the church to entrust himself to the one who judges justly. We must never take acts of vengeance in our own hands. God says vengeance is mine, it's not ours. Even in the face of gross injustice, The anger that comes from it ought to be given to God as a gift to Him. Praying, God, help me. I'm furious. And being able to say that. It's okay to say that. He's big enough that He can hear that from you. Anger in our hands, even righteous indignation in our own hands is very, very dangerous. Anger does tend to drive us. It tends to drive us, but most of the time, not in the way that it drove Jesus. If we're not careful with our anger, it could turn in on ourselves, and it becomes bitterness. Now in your text, in the passage, I think this is very, very interesting. The Hebrews passage, where the Hebrews author says, strive for peace for everyone, and for holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. I'm gonna come back to this verse in a minute, but at the end of it, it says, see to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God, and that no root of bitterness spring up and causes trouble. And by it, many become defiled. Now if you in your home have an anger problem, you need to address it. I'm going to tell you how in a minute. But this verse is reminding you. One of the ways in which you can poison your children is to give yourself a pass with anger. Look at that language. By it, many become defiled. The person, that's not referring to the angry person. That's referring to the people living with the angry person. The person in close proximity to the angry person. You cannot be angry and it not affect people. People closest to you are gonna be affected, and it's not gonna be a favorable influence. See, the whole point of this sermon series is to be reminded that there is no solution, no human solution for sin, except by the grace of God. That's why we're here, by the way. That we can be reminded of the grace of God. We can sing about it. We can draw it near to us. In fact, let's go to the remedy. The unseen potency of anger, one, the effects and consequence of anger, two, the remedy for anger. Notice verse 15, the author says, see to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God. The NIV says, see to it that no one misses the grace of God. The Christian who has fallen in anger must not approach this problem in a sort of nonchalant way, eh, no big deal, it is a big deal. We cannot give ourselves a pass on any of these sins. They're deadly because we overlook them. We think very little of them. But they will destroy us. They're deadly. This one is too. It says, see to it. See that it gets done. Don't relax. Don't be cool about your anger. Take action. Take it in hand. See to it that no one comes short of or fails to obtain or misses the grace of God. The idea here is that it's possible to see the grace of God. It's possible to know intellectually the grace of God. It's possible to define the grace of God, illustrate it, to know where you can find it in your systematic theology and recite it, and still fail to obtain it. See, you know, in a church like ours where we value doctrinal truth and doctrinal accumulation, we shouldn't assume that knowing something is the automatic transfer of it actually entering into our lives. That's what this verse is saying. Don't miss it. Don't let yourself fall short of it. Don't fail to obtain it is what he's saying here. The person with anger needs the grace of God to fill him and to saturate him. Notice this verse says that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau. Now if you're reading in the ESV, that's what that says. But if you have an NIV, it says godless Esau. Another version would be a totally worldly person like Esau. One other version says, watch out for the Esau syndrome, trading away God's lifelong gift in order to satisfy short-term appetite. Esau was a full man, but he was not full of God. He was God-less. He was full of many things, but it was not God and not eternity and not heaven. Eternal things were never a part of Esau's thinking. By that alone, he was disqualified for being the future patriarch. Anger can be the great excuser, says one man. Anger encourages excuse making. It encourages dodging and responsibility. One man tells a story of a Vancouver hockey player who maimed and nearly paralyzed a fellow hockey player on the rink. And when he appeared in public to apologize, he said, I'm sorry for what happened. And the commentator heard that. And the author who's writing about this said, hmm. I find that interesting that he did not say something that this pastor thought he should say. He did not say, I'm sorry for what I did. The author's commentary says, we actually don't do things, they just happen. Anger gets the better of us. We just lose it. We have a greater sympathy for the perpetrator who shrugs it off his shoulders and says, well, yeah, it was anger, I'm sorry. Anger has a way of excusing us from responsibility. Anger is the great excuser. Notice, Esau says, is he not rightly called Jacob, for he has cheated me these two times? He took away my birthright, he says. Back into it. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, Esau. He didn't take it away. You sold it to him. You need to own it. Esau didn't. The author says, see to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God. What is the grace of God? The grace of God is God's anger against sin on the cross. It is God's anger against your sins and mine upon Jesus. Every time we look at the cross, we are seeing God's anger upon our sins of anger. It is God's anger upon Jesus who bore our sins of anger away. The cross is designed to fill us with God and His grace and His mercy and His kindness. So when we look at the cross, we really look, we ought to see ourselves at our worst, our most angry, murderous selves. The cross is the window to see just how much God had to do and was willing to do and delighted to do to spare us from the wrath of His anger. And surely you have felt the feeling of, from time to time, when somebody says something to you, you feel like popping him. Or when somebody says something to you, you feel like saying, oh man, I'd love to have a two-by-four right now. Well, these were all done to Jesus. He was slapped. The hairs of his face were plucked out of his face. While he wore the crown of thorns, he was beaten over the head with the stick that he was holding. Have you ever been embarrassed by somebody hoping they also would be publicly humiliated? This is what Matthew says. They stripped Jesus and put a scarlet robe on Jesus. Then they twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on the head of Jesus. They put a staff in His right hand, knelt in front of Him and mocked Him. Hail, King of the Jews, they said. They spit on Him. They took the staff and struck Him on the head again and again. After they had mocked Him, they took off the robe and put His own clothes on Him. Then they led Him away to be crucified." Why? Because that's what we deserve. But He did that to spare us of that. See to it. See to it until you see it. See to it until you begin to see the grace of God more and more. See to it in such a way that you guide it. You take it into yourself. You direct it. You apply it to those particular areas where you know the grace of God is most necessary for your life. Until more and more, the fullness of God is what comes out when you're insulted. The fullness of joy comes out when you're scorned. The fullness of gladness for His mercy to you is the knee-jerk reaction to insults. See to it that you do not miss the grace of God for yourself. Well, lastly, number four. Very quickly. The ongoing opportunities. And there are many. Verse 14, strive for peace with everyone and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. You've heard people say this. Church would be a great place were it not for the people. But you need people. And one of the reasons why you need people is because they are sinners. So are you. And it's only in proximity with other people that you begin to discover not their sins, but your own. Not their pride, but your own. Not their anger, but your own. So every opportunity when a Christian crosses you, and it might have already happened this morning. It might happen before you leave here. Be an opportunity for you to go to this verse and say, okay, where do I need to apply the grace of God to me? That doesn't mean you have to, you stay silent. You might need to go and talk to that person. But you don't talk to them in anger. You talk to them full of God, full of mercy, full of patience, full of joy, full of love for them. Guilty, vile, and helpless we, spotless Lamb of God was He. Full atonement, can it be? Hallelujah. What a Savior. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this great Savior. who saw to it that the grace of God would reach us. And this instruction now is to remind us to avail ourselves of it. To do so again and again. There will be an occasion even this afternoon to do this. Somebody is going to do something or say something that will hurt us. Lord, let us leave this building filled with the grace of God. Filled with it. Enjoying it. Reveling in it. Grateful for it. never getting over it. And in the course of being filled with God, we love people, sometimes love people that we have to say something to, but we love them in our saying it. We love them in our responses. Lord, we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ for doing what only the triune God could do. We thank you that we have been made to be the beneficiaries of the grace of God. Help us to revel in it joyfully, and we thank you in Jesus' name, amen.