What's in the Junk Drawer? - Sermon Transcript
A sermon preached by Rev. Mitchell Boone at First UMC, Dallas on January 12, 2025
We have a lot of expectations for our church as we enter into a new year. We carry those expectations with us, and they're heavy. Sometimes, they can weigh us down. Not only do we carry things with us into this new year collectively, as a church, but we also carry so much with us personally - the expectations we have for ourselves, our future, and our lives. We want it to matter. We want it to have significance. We carry with us also the pain from the past. We carry with us shame and disappointment.
Some of us, right now, are carrying grief with us as we move into a new year. Some of us are carrying bad relationships with us as we move into the new year. There is a lot that we carry around every day, every moment. We're carrying a lot. We're hauling it with us everywhere we go, into every room, into every situation, and into every community. We sleep next to it. We pick it up. We put it on. We carry it out into the world.
It reminds me, honestly, of the junk drawer that you have in your house. Ours is in the kitchen, naturally - seems like where it should be, right next to the silverware on our island. A few weeks ago, when I was hanging up the cheap Christmas lights (the ones you buy on sale, that you think's a great deal, but then, like the fifth time you plug them in, they burn out), I was looking for an extra light bulb because if you can replace just one, in theory, they're all going to light up again. They're all going to work magically. I knew deep down that three years ago or so, I put some extra light bulbs in that junk drawer.
So, I had to go into the kitchen, into the junk drawer, and try to find that extra light bulb - the solution to my problem. Well, the junk drawer at home is pure insanity. Here is an actual list of what's in our junk drawer: three pairs of scissors, an empty Altoids box, an old iPhone (I think it was an iPhone 4), five chargers, seven Lego pieces, scotch tape, 15 expired gift cards, very old bubble gum, a Kanye West CD, so many receipts, and 20 or 30 pens that I am pretty sure don't work very well.
No one creates a junk drawer on purpose. No one says, “Yes, this makes sense - my College Dropout CD is right next to this receipt from Whataburger in 2021.” But slowly, over time, we put all sorts of stuff in the drawer, and we shove more and more and more into the drawer. Often, this happens rather slowly, over time. We can't let go of it, but we don't want other people to see it, so we open the drawer, put it in there, and shut it. We'll deal with it later.
Here's the truth: our lives are a lot like a junk drawer. We shove stuff down. We take stuff on. We carry it around with us. Slowly, over time, we have accumulated so many things, so many habits, and so many ways of thinking that no longer serve us. But we are unaware or too exhausted to clean out the drawer of our lives - the drawer of our souls - and we slowly realize that, over time, this drawer is filled with things we no longer need to carry, because they are slowing us down, they are impeding us, and they are blocking us from experiencing God's grace from working in our lives.
Our new worship series, Weightless, asks this one question: what does flourishing look like in our lives? What does it look like for us to flourish? What does that mean? And how do we get there? How do we let go of all the things we carry that weigh us down?
Hebrews 12:1 (NRSVUE)
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.
How do we run the race that’s set before us? How do we put down the things that slow us down, distract us, or get in the way? This is the essence of our new series, Weightless. The truth is, folks, y'all are carrying some stuff, because I watch you do it.
Y'all are laboring around in life, hauling some unnecessary baggage. And, it's not serving you. The stuff you're carrying is holding you back from new opportunities, from seeing God in people or experiences, and from becoming the person God so desires you to become. So it seems like as good a time as any, as we start a new year, to examine what we carry around and how we can put it down.
The idea for the series Weightless - that we don't have to carry around all this stuff - is focused on this verse in Hebrews. How do we set it down? How should we shed the extra weight - the baggage weighing us down? How do we run the race that is before us? Each and every one of us has a race before us that we are called to run. My race isn't your race. Your race isn't your spouse's race. We all have a race in front of us that we are called to run with perseverance. So how do we do that?
Over the next three weeks, I’ll preach on the stuff I see you carrying. (Newsflash: I also carry it too.) We're going to examine the things that are weighing us down and what we do with those. Today, the thing - maybe the heaviest thing - that most of us are carrying is anger.
Y'all have some anger issues. You really do. And so do I. It's easy to be annoyed and angry with others - family, coworkers, neighbors, strangers who don't use a blinker while trying to exit 75, crossing three lanes of traffic when it's raining. It's easy to be angry with folks, be annoyed with folks, and be put off by others that get in our way.
But also, collectively, our society has anger issues. It's as if being angry and easily offended has become not only expected but necessary. In our social standing, the respect we seek from others depends on it - like we have to tell the world how angry we are. Obviously, it's in our politics. It's the lifeblood of our social media feeds. It's the essence of the 24/7 cable news cycle. Anger is such a powerful force in our world. It's easy to be angry, but we are also expected to live an angry life.
So, whether it's personal, cultural, or collective, being angry and holding on to anger has become a significant spiritual issue for us. Our text this morning in Ephesians addresses this.
Ephesias 4:25-32 (NRSVUE)
So then, putting away falsehood, let each of you speak the truth with your neighbor, for we are members of one another. Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not make room for the devil. Those who steal must give up stealing; rather, let them labor, doing good work with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy. Let no evil talk come out of your mouths but only what is good for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption. Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.
There's no doubt that reading Ephesians is a wonderful ride. At the heart of the book is the pursuit of unity within a very diverse community. It's important to note that Ephesus is on the western edge of modern-day Turkey, right on the coast of the Mediterranean. When the church was planted, there was a multicultural, pluralistic society. The church was born out of Gentiles, or Greeks, who had converted and brought their own backgrounds, worldviews, beliefs, and opinions. They were beginning to welcome Jews who had converted to Christianity as well.
So, the author of Ephesians - probably not Paul, but someone who was directly impacted by Paul's writing - is writing to the church in Ephesus to explain to them how unity can be achieved within the community or congregation, and why it is so essential if the church is going to maximize its impact and change the world.
Our text this morning starts in a very contradictory form. Verse 26 says: “Be angry, be angry, but do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger.” Essentially, be angry, but don’t be that angry. Be angry, but keep it in check.
Here's the truth: anger is a good thing. It's a healthy emotion. It is a valid feeling - a necessary ingredient in spurring social change. Anger can be a spiritual response, a divine tool. We see Jesus get angry in the Gospels - Jesus flipping over tables in the temple, making a cord and whipping animals to scatter them from the courtyard. Jesus gets angry. Jesus gets angry at a fig tree. Jesus gets angry with the Pharisees. Jesus is okay with being angry.
Anger is a fruitful, helpful emotion. I would be more concerned, actually, if someone told me, “I never get angry,” versus someone who told me, “I think I have an anger issue.” The number one red flag in premarital counseling for me is when a couple comes to my office and says, “We never fight.” “You never fight?” “No, we love each other so much we never fight.” That’s a problem. It’s a problem because it means we are cutting ourselves off from feeling a very natural and real emotion, stuffing it down and pretending like things don’t bother us.
Anger is a very good, productive thing, and there are things we should be angry about - injustices in the world, the pain and harm someone has caused us or someone we love. The realities of life should, at times, provoke anger. So yes, Ephesians is right: be angry.
But, be careful. Be careful with your anger because anger can move from a helpful and, at times, necessary tool to an addiction. When this happens, it becomes dangerous. When anger finds a foothold - if it becomes rooted in our lives - we have a problem. This is the truth found in Ephesians 4:31: “Put away all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice.” We are called to set that stuff aside.
This idea is centered in what we see in the earlier portion of the text, when the author says, “Be angry, but don’t let the sun go down on your anger.” Now, we often attribute this saying to, “Don’t go to bed mad,” especially when discussing a relationship or how we are to interact with our spouse or partner. It’s helpful, but that’s not the essence of what the author is saying. The author is trying to make a point that the longer anger exists in your life - and the more comfortable you become with anger taking root in your life - the easier it is for you to experience it as a default emotion.
It’s like house guests. How many of us had house guests over the holidays? You know, the first night - it’s awesome. It’s great. Love seeing family. Family is amazing. So good to see them. It’s easy. The next night - it’s good. It’s fine. It’s still pretty easy. The third night - we’re having to force some family time, manufacture some core memories for everyone, and create some new holiday rituals that we forget about the next year we get together. By the fourth night, though, you’re like, “When are you leaving?” By the fifth night, you’re ready to kill someone. You know what I’m talking about?
That’s what anger is when it overstays its welcome - when it becomes a permanent way for us to see the world. We can’t let anger move into our lives. We can’t let it stay. We must guard against it because when it stays too long, it becomes not a helpful emotion but a default emotion. We get angry at this person or situation. Then, we get angry at that person or situation, and then this person and this person and this person. Before we know it, we don’t know why we’re angry at everyone.
We take it all, shove it into the drawer, and say, “We’ll deal with it later.” It builds up, builds up, and builds up until we can’t help but wake up angry every single day. The junk drawer of our soul becomes so full of things, people, and problems that we don’t even know what’s in there. We carry around this anger. We don’t even notice it. We aren’t even aware of it. But it begins to eat away at our soul.
It can rob us of God’s joy - that gift of joy that is ours because of Christ. It can stunt our ability to experience God’s grace in our lives and extend forgiveness to others like we have been forgiven. The truth is that most of us are carrying around anger today, and it is weighing us down.
So, how do we know if anger has overstayed its welcome? How do we know if anger has become a default emotion for us? Maybe the first thing you think of when you experience a situation is a negative response. Maybe criticism is your first offering, your first contribution, your default response to everything that happens around you. You feel irritable and impatient with the world. You seek confirmation in your anger - like you prefer going out to lunch with someone to complain about someone else. That’s just me? You stop seeing others as complex, complicated, messy, beloved children of God; instead, you see them one-dimensionally, clearly, plainly, and most often negatively. If this is how you are living, if this is true for you, anger may have found a home in your heart.
The author of Ephesians knows this. It’s a good and healthy thing to experience anger. But when it becomes a default, primary lens through which we see the world, it impacts us. The question we should have is: what do we do about it? The author says in verse 32: “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted or compassionate, and forgive one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.” This is the antidote. This promotes healing. This restores our soul when anger has found a place in our life.
It’s easy to roll your eyes at that and think, “Yada, yada, yada, be kind, be compassionate, be forgiving.” Sure, we’ll try to practice that. It seems really generic and overly simplistic. However, the author of Ephesians uses these words in a very technical way. For example, kindness in Greek is chrēstotēs or chrēstos, a winemaking term. You know when you drink a big, bold red wine, like a cabernet sauvignon? If you open that bottle right when it was bottled, it’s bold and bright and punches you in the face - the tannins are everywhere. But if you wait - if you age that wine 10, 20, 30 years - when you open it up, it’s chilled and mellow, approachable, enjoyable, drinkable. Chrēstos is what they would call that wine that has aged. This is what the author is saying: chill out. Be enjoyable. Be approachable. Add to the community.
The author goes on to say that compassion - or tenderheartedness - is necessary if we are going to live a life where we are not angry. Now, “compassion” is essentially “passion” - connected to the Latin word that means struggle or suffering - and “com” meaning “with.” So, we are called to struggle with individuals. Practice empathy.
I'll give you an example from when I was a pastor in Lone Oak, Texas, a town of about 500 between Emory and Greenville on Highway 69. One of the best cheeseburgers in the entire state is in that grocery store. It was one of the best years of my ministry, but one Sunday, I preached a sermon with two sentences about white privilege. Well, that's five sentences too many for some folks in East Texas. So after worship, when we shook hands, I had an individual in his early 60s yell at me. And he didn't stop, which made me angry. Then I stewed on it for a really long time.
Now, to his credit, he reached out and took me to breakfast at the same grocery store because it also had a really good breakfast - great sausage and biscuits. So he took me to the grocery store for breakfast, and I was angry, and he was angry, and we were just being angry at each other. But about halfway through the conversation, I found out that the night before he heard that sermon, he had just learned that his brother had been diagnosed with terminal cancer.
Often, folks are angry at us - are mad at us - and it has nothing to do with us. We can have compassion for individuals who display anger towards us. That doesn't mean forgiving it quickly or assuming it didn't mean anything. I was still angry, and it's not cool to yell at me after church on Sunday, so don't yell at me after worship. But if we can begin to offer compassion to individuals, we can begin to decode or diffuse anger in our own lives, leading to real forgiveness.
As complex and complicated as that is, forgiveness is essentially letting go of the power others have over us and how they influence or make us feel a certain way. So, maybe forgiveness is simply chilling out. Maybe forgiveness is setting up boundaries and not letting someone hurt us again. Maybe forgiveness is seeking reconciliation and being very direct in that.
However, regardless of how we experience forgiveness in our lives, it is the one thing that can begin to deteriorate and crumble the walls that anger puts around our souls. We cannot live our lives with anger as our default emotion. We get there by recognizing that whatever forgiveness we can offer others is only based on God's forgiveness and grace, which is first offered to us.
So, as we move into a new year, there are plenty of things that are going to weigh us down - plenty of things that we're going to carry with us into this new year. Let's do our best to let go of anger. Let us set it down. Think about how much more time, energy, and productivity we will experience if we simply set anger down. What would our lives look like? What would our homes look like? What would our community look like? We can only begin to imagine what God will do with folks who set their anger aside. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, amen.
Discussion Questions
What "junk" do you feel you've been carrying in your own life- habits, emotions, or ways of thinking - that no longer serve you? How might these things be weighing you down spiritually or emotionally?
Mitchell mentions that anger can be productive and even necessary at times. Can you think of a time when your anger led to positive change or action? How can we balance righteous anger with the caution to not let it become our default emotion?
Hebrews 12:1 encourages us to "lay aside every weight." What practical steps can you take to "lay aside" anger in your life, especially when it feels justified or deeply rooted?
Mitchell suggests that compassion and forgiveness are key to overcoming anger. What challenges do you face when trying to forgive or show compassion, especially to those who have hurt or wronged you? How might these acts bring healing to your relationships?
Consider the question posed in the sermon: What would your life look like if you set aside anger and the baggage that weighs you down? How might this change your interactions with others, your spiritual journey, and your sense of purpose?