The Grands Letter

Dear Grands,

Ephesians 4:26-32, “Therefore, laying aside falsehood, SPEAK TRUTH EACH ONE of you WITH HIS NEIGHBOR, for we are members of one another.

26 BE ANGRY, AND yet DO NOT SIN; do not let the sun go down on your anger,

27 and do not give the devil an opportunity.

28 He who steals must steal no longer; but rather he must labor, performing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with one who has need.

29 Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear.

30 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by Whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

32 Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.”

If there is anyone who understands anger, it is a very little child. I have a picture of my daughter when she was quite young, holding a small booklet while a photographer attempted to take her picture. He took the little booklet from her hands and she began to cry. Since the booklet was not considered a vital part of the picture, he gave her the booklet and she stopped crying.

Sometimes I think of the early church as a little child. It whimpers and shows “bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander” – everything that belongs somewhere else if it belongs anywhere at all.

Salvation is vital! What’s more, it antedates baptism and church membership and teaching Sunday School. Certainly, the five or more prohibitions Paul lays before the Ephesian Church are as necessary today as they were in Paul’s day. That is not to say that everyone must be in spiritual lockstep with even the pastor. We are, however, to behave as adults, not as children, much less as babies. I’ve known people who got angry because someone was sitting in the seat he or she had marked as their own.

According to Paul, that grieves the Holy Spirit. True believers are to be kind,

tender-hearted, and forgiving of others. How else is He to prepare and use us “to the praise of His glory”?

Heartily in Christ Jesus,

(Dado III)

Gene L. Jeffries, Th.D.

Springdale, Arkansas 72764

United States of America

“We will never know that Christ is all we need until He becomes all that we have.” – Corrie ten Boom