4:26
“In your anger do not sin” comes from the Septuagint version of Psalm 4:4. The Hebrew Bible for Psalm 4:4 has “Tremble and do not sin”. So what it is saying is that we feel emotions of anger, but we are not to act on them. We sometimes think that we should never have any feelings of anger, this is not true, and is not realistic. We will feel anger, sometimes this will be justified, and at other times will not be. But anger is a dangerous emotion if we let it control us. “Do not let the sun go down on your anger”. Anger can lead to bad actions either impulsively, or if we let anger fester within us. So we are to deal with any anger that we have.
4:27
“Do not give the devil a foothold”. This could be referring back to the previous verse, or to what he is about to say, and both are relevant. If we act impulsively out of anger, or if we let it fester within us, then that gives the devil the opportunity to work in our lives. We can never blame sin on the devil (that was tried in the Garden of Eden without success!), but he will take opportunity afforded by our sin. When we sin we open ourselves up to demonic activity. This is not in the demon possession category, but just in “normal” life. Sin is always destructive.
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