By Niobe Rodriques

This week we are admonished in Ephesians 4:31 “All bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and reviling must be removed from you, along with all malice.” To say it Trini, ‘Done it with bad mind.’ Why? What is so wrong in remembering the wrong that someone has done to me? Why shouldn’t I tell someone else? I mean after all I’m hurt. Don’t my feelings count for something?

Well let’s take a look at the feelings listed in the verse. Bitterness is defined as “anger and disappointment at being treated unfairly; resentment”.

If you’re angry, why would the next feeling on the list be fury? Fury is “wild or violent anger”. Bitterness is anger on the inside. You are the one biting up yourself. You sit there brooding over what the person did, why they were wrong and you were right. You think about how they hurt you, why they said what they said, who they said it to and then it turns into violence. You think, “Nobody’s standing up for me. I have to stand up for myself. I must take matters into my own hands.”

Fury and bitterness are active and inactive words for anger but after these two, Paul adds anger. Paul, listen we get it, anger is bad. Why are you adding anger to the list? Anger is “a strong feeling of annoyance, displeasure, or hostility.” He’s going back to the feelings. Why? Nobody is furious all day. You will calm down and then something sets you off again and then you may hurt people close to you. You may shout at and revile the persons closest to you who were never part of your original reason for being angry.

When your anger does not have an outlet or a troubling situation is unresolved often you take it out on the people closest to you, causing a chain of hurt people hurting people. In the video this week No Grudge by Bj’orn Pierre we see it so clearly. A small thing becomes a big problem for one party resulting in an innocent victim being hurt. Isn’t that Jesus? We all find it extremely difficult to forgive others and because of that Jesus had to pay the price for our sins.

Let’s make no mistake—forgiveness is hard and love is not easy but it is a choice that we can make. Let us remember the love that the innocent victim had towards us, for us and see the potential hurt and damage we can cause by staying angry. Let our anger not hurt the innocent.

Stop taking poison vitamins

Every lil’ thing people do keeps on bothering you

Taking poison vitamins

Daily your dosage gets stronger

My brother I say that’s a poisonous life to live

Mindset to keep you like a slave

Malice would eat you from within It’s time to let go of the sin

And hold on to love

Hold on to God But don’t hold no grudge Hold on to love

Hold on to grace

Bad mind, jealousy have no place

Inside of us

Don’t hold no grudge

Hold on to love.