Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group Leader podcast. This weekly conversation is designed to equip and resource youth to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practice the spiritual rhythms, and changes the world together. Welcome, Life Group leaders to our Life Group leader podcast. We are here looking at our series overview for losing it, overcoming the grip of anger.
This is gonna be a great series to really propel us into the fall, God's doing so many great things. There's so much to celebrate. This is gonna be such a fun season together. I mean, just within the series, we've got new root groups that are launching out.
We've got deep dives, theology of mission of God happening in, we've got Kate Geiger, how is study the Bible. There's so many great things happening in this fall, so much that we have to have Eric Geiger come in and kick off the series overview with us. Life Group leaders, I am so thankful for you, the way you invest in your group and shepherd your people. Am I excited to talk about the fall?
Yeah, it's gonna be a great season, man. Can't wait to see what God's gonna do. I love this topic. We're talking about losing it, overcoming the grip of anger, something that we all experience in varying different levels and degrees and our relationships in lots of different places.
Just talk to us about why, why is this an important series, why do we need to study God's word in relationship to anger? So first, when I began preparing the series, I really sensed God wanting teaching to address the real life issue of anger. I mean, if you just Google Age of Outrage or Rise of Anger, you will see that unrighteous anger is on the rise. Even Road Rage reports in LA have skyrocketed in the last 10 years.
I got some stories from now on. I should be doing it. Living in LA for five, just the first weekend that we moved down here in 2004, gripping Northern California, moved down here, coming to the West Side, 405, Santa Monica Boulevard, a guy comes out of his car, bumper traffic, gets a crowbar, weighs it, and we had thought, what have we done? We've moved from the utopian Bay Area to have a so-cha.
We love it here, but it is true. Yeah, and it's definitely, the reports have gone up every single year for the last year. So it's on the rise in Southern California. If you Google the phrase Age of Outrage, it's been coined by sociologists over the last several years.
So we live in an angry and an increasingly angry culture. And how do we as Christians stand out? We are not to be consumed by man's anger or unrighteous anger. So I definitely, since I want to take the truth of God's word and apply it to an issue that people wrestle with and that is all around us.
But during the sermon prep time, I just really enjoyed seeing the distinction between man's anger and God's anger. And there's some great truths that we find in scripture, the difference between the two, that we should be angry, but that should be the righteous anger, not man's unrighteous anger. So I'm excited about what God will teach us about himself and about what to do with the right anger. And then also, sometimes, I mean, I sadly have seen this even my own life where something can start as righteous anger, but if you don't express it the right way, it becomes unrighteous anger that destroys you, that eats your soul with bitterness.
And so we're going to walk through it. I'll look forward to walking through a couple of weeks with the life you bleeders. But I really believe God's going to do significant work in our hearts during the teaching series. It's much more than just about anger management.
It's going to be how to manage your anger. No, no, in fact, it's going to be a much deeper cut on anger than perhaps you would think. So you may hit a couple of weeks. Let's walk through it.
We've got five weeks in the series. Let's set the silight as many as you'd like to. Let me hand real quickly, because I think this will be helpful for leaders. So the first week, we're going to talk about loving and holy anger, which is God's anger.
So OK, anger is not the opposite of love. In difference is the opposite of love. So as a dad, I love my children. And because I love my children, there's times I get angry.
I'm talking about the good kind of anger. Anger when something is trying to hurt my kids. I remember when Eden, my oldest, had pandas, which was a neurological struggle she had as a child, that I was angry at pandas. That's the acronym for the disease.
Because it was hurting my daughter. And so God is angry at sin while he loves sinners. He's angry at sin. And we're going to see, we have to really understand what a loving and holy anger is.
So that's the first week, which we're going to look at. That guy's anger is towards what destroys us. So it's towards the sin. And ultimately, it was poured out on Jesus on the cross.
But it's a solution for us. There's a solution. So God doesn't sweep his anger under the rug. He addresses his anger, his anger against sin.
But it's actually addressed in Jesus and not addressed in us. So we're going to look at what some theologians say is the central passage of the Bible, which is Romans 3, 21, through 26. It will be an ugly weekend. So the series will really begin with an understanding of God's anger.
That's week one. Week two, it will be the passage in James 1, verse 19, through 20, which is man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. And really leading the people to evaluate their anger, leading us all to evaluate our anger. How do we know when it's the good kind?
And how do we know when it's the bad kind? There are things we should be angry about. We should be angry at unrighteousness, thriving in a culture. We should be angry at people being oppressed.
We should be angry at those. That's a good anger. How do we decipher between good anger and bad anger, between righteous anger and unrighteousness? I want to ask you so many questions.
We're going to go through so many questions. The emotion of anger, is it the response, the fruit of the anger that will lead you to evaluate? OK. Let's talk about the duration.
Like how long do you let go? Yeah. Some is what's it come from? Yeah.
Does it come from God's name being defamed or your name being defamed? And so the source, the duration, the expression, even a righteous anger can turn unrighteous if it's expressed wrongly. So we'll talk about all of those in week two. I think it will be helpful for people.
And then week three, man, I really learned a lot walking through this. So there was a season when I first became a Christian where there was a lot of talk about not suppressing anger, because if you suppress anger, it will eat you up on the inside. And that's completely true. So there was the pin on swung and a lot of people were expressing anger.
It was kind of like get it out. A lot of psychologists would say, and counselors, let it out, let your anger out. Well, now research over the last decade has shown if you express anger, it actually makes you more angry. So suppressing anger is not good.
Suppressing anger is bad for you. Expressing anger, though, isn't healthy either. So what do we do? If you can't suppress and you can't express, what do we do?
And we're going to talk in week three that the answer really is to address, to not automatically express or suppress, but to address it. And then week four will be some practical ways to overcome anger. And then week five will be this is going to be exciting, because it's going to be an outreach weekend. How does anger, the right kind of anger, fuel a love for our cities?
So how do I love where I am where guys place me? And yet at the same time be angry at what destroys people around me. So loving my community and being angered at the same time, we're going to look at a passage in chair in my chapter 29. I love this passage so much.
It's actually going to bridge us to our next season series, which is the book of Daniel, because it's the same time period. But we're going to do an outreach weekend on week five, because we want to love our communities and be angered at what destroys people within our communities. So there's a connection there, right? To an anger and compassion.
Yes. Because God loves me and loves you, there's things he hates. So sometimes people coin, hate is the opposite of love. It's not the opposite of love.
Because God loves you so much, there's things he hates that are threatening to destroy you. And because we love our cities, there's things that we should be angered about that destroy our cities. So that we find. I love it.
I just love the through line of where this is leading us towards. This is about a mission response. That's not anger management. It's not a therapeutic.
This is how we're going to conquer anger within us. It's recognizing it, the birthplace of it, and then the expression of it. There's a righteous way to outward. So this is a compassionate intermission.
So as you mentioned, it's such a timely message for us right now. There's so many different reasons why we're trapped and angered. It's all around us. I knew it was time we started doing the sermon prep.
And then as I've been in the tax and spending time with the Lord, I've become more excited about the teaching series that's going to be more full than I first thought. It was going to be. It's going to hit anger. But it's also going to hit the good parts of anger.
And how to address, not suppress, how to love my cities. There's a lot of layers to a full study of anger and structure. Really good. It's going to be a great series.
As we mentioned from the top, there's going on here. This is going to be a real fruitful season with new group starting that I believe we can in here, extended prayer, outreach weekend. What time leaders to be on the ground with your group to be leading these discussions and not just leading them through an ethereal discussion, but leading them to action. Outreach weekend.
That's going to be a big thing for us life groups to look at how we're going to respond individually, collectively to the servant series. So man, we're looking forward to it. Can't wait to jump in with you all together. Eric, mind if you want to pray for our life reporters as we wrap this up.
And then we'll hop into the week by week overview. We'll be getting back to that rhythm of these coming out every Friday. But why don't you praise out as we close up the series overview. Guy, thank you for these leaders.
I pray that you would shepherd them as they shepherd the people that they are serving. We're given wisdom. Give them compassion and grace for the people in their groups. Lord, I ask that you bless each leader or they're juggling so many things from work responsibilities to family responsibilities to lead in a group.
And so Lord, I pray your energy would fill them, your wisdom and your strength would fill them. Lord, bless them for their obedience for how they are serving your people and your name I pray. Amen. All right, like the leaders, we'll thank you for you.
We'll catch you back on this next time.