OPEN HEAVENS FOR TEENS 6 NOVEMBER 2024 WEDNESDAY: CONTROL YOUR ANGER
5. Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations.
6. O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their selfwill they digged down a wall.
7. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel.
OPEN HEAVENS FOR TEENS 6 NOVEMBER 2024 MESSAGE
Angry people tend not to get a grip on their actions during heated arguments or after harbouring bitterness in their hearts towards people who offend them.
This was the situation of Simeon and Levi in today’s Bible reading. They were aggrieved about the rape of their sister, Dinah.
Shechem defiled Dinah and promised to marry her, but her brothers wouldn’t have that because virginity before marriage was honourable in Israel.
They pretended to agree with Shechem’s proposal, but they took their revenge when they convinced the men of the land to become circumcised.
As a result of this, their father, Jacob, pronounced curses on them on his deathbed.
My dear child, you should be careful how you react whenever you’re angry.
One of the ways I controlled my hot temper until God finally took it away from me was that anytime someone made me angry, I would count inwardly from 1 to 100.
Gradually, my mind would shift from the angry thoughts to the numbers I am counting until I become pacified.
OPEN HEAVENS FOR TEENS 6 NOVEMBER 2024
HYMN 56: NEARER, MY GOD TO THEE
1. Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer To Thee;
E’en Though It Be A Cross
That Raiseth Me,
Still All My Song Shall Be,
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer To Thee!
2. Though Like The Wanderer,
The Sun Gone Down,
Darkness Be Over Me,
My Rest A Stone,
Yet In My Dreams I’d Be
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer To Thee!
3. There Let The Way Appear
Steps Unto Heaven;
All That Thou Send’st To Me
In Mercy Given;
Angels To Beckon Me
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer To Thee!
4. Then With My Waking Thoughts
Bright With Thy Praise,
Out Of My Stony Griefs
Bethel I’ll Raise;
So By My Woes To Be
Nearer, My God, To Thee,
Nearer To Thee!
5. Or If On Joyful Wing
Cleaving The Sky,
Sun, Moon, And Stars Forgot,
Upward I Fly,
Still All My Song Shall Be,
Nearer, My God, To Thee;
Nearer To Thee!
Amen!!