“‘Be angry and do not sin’: do not let the sun go down on your wrath” (Psalm 4:4 quoted in Ephesians 4:26).

“Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, … and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice” (Eph 4:31).

Well, which is it?  Is it ok to get angry, or not?

Numerous times “the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel.”  Even Jesus got angry.  In Mark 3, a man with a withered hand met Jesus in the synagogue.  Jesus asked the rabbis whether it was lawful to heal on the Sabbath, but they didn’t answer Him.  “And when He had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts,” He restored the man’s hand.

God gave us emotions.  That includes anger.  So, being angry is not in and of itself a bad thing.  It’s ok to get angry.  If the cause is something that grieves the Lord.  And as long as anger doesn’t get us.  That’s the “don’t let the sun go down” part.

When you hold onto anger, it eventually comes out your mouth.  That’s why He says to put away the evil speaking, because ill-will and trouble get connected to it – i.e., speaking “with malice.”

Between “be angry” and “put away anger” He says, “Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.  And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God.”  It’s all connected.  “Death and life are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21).  Words spoken in anger cause trouble.  For the hearer and the speaker. If “to be angry, or not to be angry” is the question, the answer is the last sentence of the section — “be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you” (Eph 4:32).