Whoever guards his mouth preserves his life; he who opens wide his lips comes to ruin. 

Proverbs 13:3

for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. 

James 1:20

With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue will break a bone. 

Proverbs 25:15

Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare. 

Proverbs 22:24-25

Today I want to talk to any of you mamas who may struggle with anger. This is something that is really common ( I don’t want to say normal) and I believe it is because we were never taught ways to cope or deal with our anger until… we had our own children, we had trials, or we had our own temptations! Motherhood is very unique in the sense that there are a lot of changes at once. Maybe you never struggled with anger until you became a mother, when sleep was sparse, or you had multiple children with one is teething, struggling with sleep or navigating anger themselves. It’s important to know that anger is not a sin. It is a God given emotion! It becomes a sin when it opens the gates for us to fall into other sins.

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil. 

Ephesians 4:26-27

Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah 

Psalm 4:4

These verses tell us exactly what we need to do. We can be angry but we are not to sin. Go ponder for a moment, sit on your bed if you need and be silent.

Anger can manifest itself in so many ways! Maybe you yell, maybe how you say things is unkind. Remember though, anger can be good! Jesus himself was angry when He saw people were selling items in His Fathers house! Moses was angry when he came down with the 10 Commandments from Mt.Sinai was angry when he saw the Israelites worshipping the golden calf they had made. Both of these are righteous anger! However, do we really have righteous anger when our child prefers a green sippy cup over the yellow? It likely is not a Godly response to flip tables (like Jesus) or throw something onto the ground (like Moses did with the stone tablets) in these kinds of situations.

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; 

James 1:19

Recently, I have found that I was not living out James 1:19. I got into a pattern of being snippy. The things I was saying were kind but how I was saying things was unkind. I believe as mothers it is vital that we saturate ourselves in God’s Word every.single.day! We should pray His word over ourselves day and night because each day will have its challenges. Therefore, we need to be diligent about taking off our flesh! If we don’t, how easy is it for our flesh to take over?! We have the opportunity to use our tongue to bless or curse others

From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. 

James 3:10

Ginger Hubbard did an incredible podcast entitled Help for Angry Parents. You can listen on Apple or Spotify! I’ll be pulling some things from her podcast but I’d highly recommend you listen, even if this isn’t something you necessarily struggle with currently. Ginger addresses a question from a mom who says as a child, she grew up in an angry household and her parents were abusive. As Ginger responded to this mothers question, she said something so powerful! We are not defined by our parents’ sins and we do not need to be slaves to our own past sins or the sins of others! Amen! Maybe you grew up in a home where screaming and yelling was common but as believers who walk in the Spirit, we do not have to repeat that! The Holy Spirit is our Helper, He leads us in Truth and we are made new. He can empower us to live differently!

As I mentioned, this is something I myself have been working on! Mainly I have been focusing on controlling my tone and my tongue. Some questions I have been reflecting on are

• When I am angry, what is the sin I gravitate towards?
• Am I using my tongue to speak life or death?

When I find that I am getting frustrated, I tend to find something to do with my hands. I notice that if I sit and let my mind run, it does not help. So, Jordan knows that if I quietly get up and go to the laundry room, that is me trying to cool off. Of course, there are situations where you physically cannot get up and walk away. I think we can glean a lot of wisdom from Psalm 4:4 when it says to be silent. It’s hard to hear you need to be quiet. We live in such a feminist society where we are told to not be quiet and to say what we need to say. However, this is not what God is calling us to do. Of course, there is a time and place for us to speak up but let us learn when we also need to be quiet. If you are in a situation where you find yourself getting frustrated, don’t be a babbling fool. Remove yourself from the situation (if you can) and learn to be quiet. Find out what your “triggers” may be and make a plan for what you will do. If you need to, ponder the verses below!

The wise of heart will receive commandments, but a babbling fool will come to ruin. 

Proverbs 10:8

The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.

Proverbs 10:11

Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes. 

Proverbs 26:4-5

A fool gives full vent to his spirit, but a wise man quietly holds it back. 

Proverbs 29:11

If you find your children are tempting you to become angry, ask yourself how you can remove yourself and keep them safe. It is totally ok to say “ mommy is feeling frustrated and I am going to remove myself so I am not tempted to sin”. Perhaps we don’t even need to remove ourselves. Maybe we need to just have a different viewpoint of our children. Take a moment to look at their little hands and feet. How could we have such anger toward a beautiful gift God has given to us? They are not our enemy. They may, however, remind us just how sinful we are and how much we need Jesus.  If I cannot remove myself, I will just close my eyes. With Jordan in a busy season, I am home most of the time with the kids, while also managing work, homeschool and taking care of the home. All of that has required me to rely on the Lord like I never have before…BUT my Spirit has never been as filled as it is now! When I close my eyes, I am not seeing what is frustrating me. It helps me, in a way, remove myself from this world and the whole purpose is to focus on eternity. Then I take a moment to picture Jesus on the cross. What is something you could meditate on that humbles you or puts the fear of God in you? When picturing Jesus on the cross, I am reminded of all of MY sins that He has paid for and how could I have so much anger towards someone or something when Jesus paid it all for me?

Another thing that helps me is I do not go a day without praying fervently over myself. Recently, a friend and I set alarms in our phone for every hour and we put scripture in the description of the alarm so that when it went off, we would read and pray that specific passage! Usually these verses have to do with the tongue. If you want some homework, go find all the verses in the Bible that talk about the tongue.  The book of James is an incredible book to read as a mother as well as Colossians 3- it tells us what to put ON and what to put OFF. Allow God’s word to transform your heart. If you need to, put your hands on your head or lips and pray “Lord help me to have a meek tongue”, “Help me to have a gentle and quiet spirit”

Our children should know us to have a gentle voice and touch. They shouldn’t be scared of us but rather hear our voice and come running into our arms. We are designed to be tender, soft, and gentle- that is precious to God. Being loud, boastful, and angry grieves the Father. In fact it is so contrary to the fruit of the Spirit. How different are we from the world if we cave? Memorize these verses – today! Can we act like our lives depend on the Word? Because IT DOES! Don’t do anything else until you memorize these verses. Put them on a sticky note. Stop listening to music. Listen to the Bible. We need to be intentional about consuming Truth! Listen to Streetlights (an audio Bible) on Apple or Spotify instead of the regular music you listen to. I love listening to the book of Proverbs!

A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

Proverbs 15:1

What if we lived out this verse? What would our lives look like? Maybe we are dealing with a child who is acting out and in a fit of anger. Why do we think the appropriate response is to do the same right back at them? This is not productive. A soft answer turns away wrath. How beautiful would it be to be in public, remain self controlled, provide a soft answer to an upset child and a stranger acknowledge how we handled the situation and we can turn around and give God all the glory?? Let us be like Daniel as he gave God all the glory as he interpreted the King’s dreams. Let us have a humble approach with our tongue!