What does the Bible say about being passive-aggressive?

It is important to notice the exact force of the word rendered "lying"; and the connection will help in its apprehension. In verse 23 the apostle, speaking of the new man, which these believers were said to have put on, tells us that "after God" it was "created in righteousness and true holiness," or, literally, holiness of the truth. All falsehood, therefore, is entirely excluded - could have, indeed, no connection with, or part in, this new creation of God. Hence the apostle proceeds, "Wherefore putting away lying" - which belonged to the old man which had been put off (v. 22) - "speak every man truth (the characteristic of the new man, together with righteousness) with his neighbour: for we are members one of another." Comprehending this, it will be readily perceived, what has been pointed out by a well-known translator, that "lying," or "falsehood," means "everything that has the character and nature of falsehood. It is abstract: what has this quality, not merely the act of lying." This should be much remembered, inasmuch as, in its application, it might search many of us who might not be betrayed into telling positive untruths. According to the above interpretation, a look, a gesture, demeanour, ambiguity of speech, evasion, compliments, and many other things, might fall under this sense of lying. In other words, the new man could only find expression in what is according to God, and in what, therefore, is marked by righteousness and holiness of the truth. The Christian so walking and so governed would be very real and very devoted; for he would be walking in the power of the Holy Ghost, and consequently have no object but Christ. (See vv. 20, 21.) Remark also the ground on which Paul urges the exhortation - "We are members one of another." To remember this would be a guard against any temptation to "lying," by showing us the character of such a sin against our brethren, bound up as they are with us in such intimate and indissoluble relationships. It may be added for the sake of any who have only the common translation at hand, that verses 22, 24, should be rendered "your having put off … the old man," and "having put on the new." It is regarded as having been done, through the acceptance of death with Christ, and through having been raised with Him, which is' a very different thing from being exhorted to do it.

(Vv. 14, 15). In contrast with the wise man, there are those who allow bitter envy and strife in their hearts. The evil, as ever, commences in the heart; and envy in the heart leads to boasting, and boasting to lying against the truth. How often the envious man will seek to hide his jealousy by protesting that he has no rancour in his heart, but is only resisting evil and standing for the truth. If, under the pretence of exposing some evil and telling a brother the plain truth for his good, we deliberately say things that are offensive, we may be perfectly sure that malice in the heart is behind our offensive words. How often have the most malicious words been excused by quoting the scripture, “Open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend.” How few would be able to quote the words that immediately precede, and that would warn us that we should not use this scripture lightly, for they ask the question, “Who is able to stand before envy?” (Prov. 27:4-6).

If we find ourselves in a position where we feel morally bound to raise our voices, let us pray earnestly that we may be able to do it in a way similar to Paul. "When I saw … I said to Peter …" Our tendency always is to launch our complaints into the ear of someone other than the culprit himself. Notice, for instance, in Mark 2, that when the Pharisees object to the action of Jesus they complain to His disciples (ver. 16), and when to the action of His disciples, they complain to the Lord (vers. 23, 24). We shall do well to make it a rule, when remonstrance is needed, to make our remonstrance directly to the person concerned, rather than behind his back.

"Debate thy cause with thy neighbor himself; and discover not a secret to another; lest he that hears it put thee to shame, and thine infamy turn not away." How guarded must be the doors of our lips! Now that disagreement, discord, ill-feeling has come between neighbors, is it to be settled by spreading it elsewhere? Let us have grace and honest courage of heart to face our neighbor in a spirit of meekness and true concern, that a proper understanding may be obtained. How painful the innumerable cases of offense that have never been settled, but only aggravated, by selfish, thoughtless gossip, when a word of simple apology might have dismissed it forever!

The Lord says plainly, ‘But if thy brother sin against thee, go, reprove him between thee and him alone. If he hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother’ (Matt. 18:15). The Lord says, ‘go’ and that is what we must do. There is nothing here about writing to the brother or taking the matter up with him from a distance.

The words ‘reprove him between thee and him alone’ are also important. We are not to broadcast what has happened, or to seek to rally others to ‘our cause.’ Such actions are most unhelpful. There is to be a private face to face meeting between the two brothers concerned, with no others present. The sin involved is to be made clear and the fact that real damage has been done to their relationship. It should also be apparent by the spirit in which the whole matter is taken up that one really does want to ‘gain’ one’s brother and is ready to forgive what has been done. This is not something done only because the Lord says it must be done. There is a genuine desire that the relationship may be restored and to that end things are pursued prayerfully in dependence on the Lord and in the grace that He supplies.

Now some of the results are pressed upon them. "Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour, for we are members one of another." (Ver. 25.) As they had learnt the truth in Jesus, the shame of falsehood was the more manifest. What is the ground that we have here? We are too apt to take falsehood rather upon the human basis of honour. Many a man would not do it on moral grounds; or he would be too proud to tell a lie; and he that had a certain sense of the fear of God before his eyes, would not do it, because it was a practical denial of God. It is as good as saying that God does not hear. So that whether you look at a mere man in his natural pride, or at a godly man, like a Jew, there you have the grounds on which many would act. But this is not enough for a Christian. It is of great importance for our souls, not only that we should walk well and righteously, but that the motive, character, and extent, should be according to God too. Not only is this exhortation necessary, but there is that coupled with it which we rarely think of in our intercourse one with another: we are here exhorted to speak truth every man with his neighbour, "for we are members one of another." It is looking at Christians only. None but such are members evidently. He wants to connect with Christ the most common duty, which we are in danger of putting upon a lower basis, and the ground he takes is this: — that it is as preposterous and uncomely for a Christian not to tell the plain simple truth to a brother Christian, as for a man to deceive himself. They are part of ourselves. "We are members one of another." Do we realize this? If we did, what would be the effects? Assuredly, one would be perfect plainness in dealing with that which is wrong; another would be a real, hearty desire to set right those who are wrong. It is evident that we could not wish to injure ourselves. And if I regard another as a part of myself, I ought to act towards them accordingly. In the same way, also, we ought to feel what is contrary to God in another. And as one would greatly desire if awakened to feel one's own sin, to go to God about it, and have our souls set right there, so it should be in having to do one with another. The deeper realizing of this truth would give a stronger desire for the well-being of our fellow-Christians. And yet if it is to be in accordance with God's glory, it is not merely that we should judge what is wrong, but that we should seek to get what is right and according to God. We are apt, where persons have been, for instance, put away from fellowship, to think only of getting rid of the evil; but do we find this where the membership one of another is felt and owned in the presence of God? Even where it comes to the extreme degree of so dealing with one whom we had believed to be a member of the body of Christ, the end of all discipline is to remove the evil, in order that that which is of Christ may shine forth.

"Be ye angry and sin not; let not the sun go down upon your wrath." (Ver. 26.) I take this to be a most important and holy intimation for our souls. There is a notion often that it is wrong for a Christian ever to feel displeased or angry; this and other Scriptures show it may be right. But we must take care what the source, as well as the character, of the anger is. If it is merely about something that affects self, and it therefore takes the form of vindictiveness, this is of course beyond a doubt contrary to all that is of Christ. We find in Him (Mark 3) that He looked round about upon certain persons with anger, showing clearly He had the strongest feeling about that which was contrary to God. It was not merely that He denounced the thing, but the people who were guilty of it. I find the same analogy in the epistles. We are told not only to cleave to that which is good, but to abhor that which is evil. Man's thought is that it is not for a Christian to judge and to be angry with what is wrong. The word of God tells us there are certain things we ought to judge and others we ought not. I am not to judge what is unseen; I am to judge positive, known evil. There we have plainly and clearly the line drawn by God. You will find that men say, if you speak strongly about the wrong of this thing or that, you are uncharitable. But not so; it is real charity to denounce it, not to let it pass. True love as to this consists in always having the feelings of God about what comes before us. That is the one question. What God has fellowship with, we can have fellowship with; and what God hates, we are not to love or allow. But we must take care that we are in the intelligence of God's mind. "Be ye angry and sin not." There is the greatest possible danger of sinning if you are angry, and therefore is this added. The simple emotion of anger toward one who has sinned may and ought to be a holy feeling; it is provided it rests there. Thus it is felt in God's presence. But how am I to know that I am not sinning in my anger? "Let not the sun go down upon your wrath." If there is irritation kept up in the spirit, impatience, dislike, or scorn betrayed, who cannot see that it is not of God? When the sun goes down, it is a time either for your peaceful communion with God, or your indulgence of resentment away from Him. Therefore it is added, "Neither give place to the devil." (Ver. 27.) Where there is the nursing of wrath or the keeping up of grievances in the mind, Satan easily comes in and is not easily dislodged.

In these exhortations, as in the doctrine of the epistle, there is no notion of bettering the nature of man. A new nature is shown to belong to the Christian: Christ is his life. The practical aim follows that this should be exercised and manifested.

Verse 25. To the general exhortation expressed in the preceding verse there now succeed a variety of special admonitions, bearing on those points in which the every-day intercourse of life would present opportunities of adorning the doctrine of God. Lying, which is the natural though vain resource of the old man, in his ignorance of God, is to be utterly renounced by those who are begotten of the truth, and whose calling is to know no man after the flesh. Moreover, a new and powerful motive to the exercise of practical sincerity and truthfulness is provided by the doctrine of the unity of the body. "We are members one of another." To deceive a Christian is to wrong oneself. As to the origin of falsehood, it is of Satanic, parentage (John 8:44), and has its resting-place in that heart which, having been once seduced from the way of holiness and truth, is become deceitful above all things. Lying is both an instrument of selfishness and a confession of personal wretchedness. No happy spirit can ever be a false one. Being the instinctive refuge of a defiled conscience, it should have no place in the heart that has been sprinkled from an evil conscience by the precious blood of Jesus. Falsehood and faith stand in an essential antagonism. Faith feeds on truth, because it trusts in God; while it is the absence of that trust that gives to a lie its power over the human soul. There is no guile in the heart that is made manifest to God.

Verse 26. "Be ye angry," etc. Anger is allowable in a believer, but must not be suffered to become a settled feeling. It rests only in the bosom of fools (Ecc. 7:9). But the wisdom which is of God is peaceable (James 3:17). There is a holy indignation, which may be excited by the spectacle of shameless evil, and which is far removed from private animosity. Jesus knew this feeling (Luke 13:15), and knew it as we cannot know it; for in Him it was excited by the contact of His own intrinsic holiness with those deep workings of human wickedness, the springs of which lay clearly open to His view, while hypocrisy threw over them her unavailing mask. But personal anger is a very different thing. Provocation may, no doubt, abound, and flesh is weak. And He who has borne unupbraiding witness to its weakness seems, by the limited toleration which His Spirit here allows to the feeling of anger in a Christian, to be rather making a merciful concession to our infirmity, than to approve the sentiment itself. As a rule, it is better to pacify it in another, than to yield to it ourselves (Matt. 5:9). When harboured as a lasting sentiment, it is sin; and in its results is nigher to cursing than to blessing (Gen. 49:6-7. Cp. Matt. 18:35). The grace in which we personally stand should be the law of our conduct towards others. Love is never angry long, and cannot work evil to his neighbour. It is not easily provoked (Rom. 13:10; 1 Cor. 13:5). While evil of every kind is to be perfectly abhorred, men are always to be loved in God (Matt. 5:44). Vengeance belongs to Him, and not to us (Rom. 12:19). Our anger, therefore, should be slowly kindled, and soon quenched; for the wrath of man works not the righteousness of God (James 1:20).

(V. 26). We are to beware of sinning through anger. There is such a thing as being rightly angry, but such anger is indignation against evil, not against the evil-doer, and behind such anger there is grief on account of the evil. Thus we read of the Lord that He looked on the wicked leaders of the synagogue “with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts” (Mark 3:5). The anger of the flesh ever has self in view; it is not grief on account of evil, but resentment against one that has been offensive. This fleshly anger against the evildoer will only lead to bitterness that occupies the soul with thoughts of revenge. The one entertaining such thoughts finds himself continually fretting, and in this sense lets the sun go down upon his wrath. Anger against evil will lead to grief that finds its resource in turning to God, where the soul finds rest.

The apostle proceeds to details: falsehood (meaning more than lying actions as well as words) is to be put off; truth is to be spoken, for we are members one of another. The motive stated is an exalted one: I am not merely to scorn falsehood from a sense of honour, which an upright man of the world may do, but I am a member of the same body with my brother; if I act or speak falsely to him, I do so to myself, and more solemn still, to Christ. Anger is to be watched, that sin may not result, and that the devil may have no place. Anger in the sense of indignation against unrighteousness and iniquity, is all well and of God — we find God often angry in the Old Testament and Christ moved with anger in the New — but our hearts are treacherous, and we have to watch it.

Verse 26. We see here in the acting of the new man that there may be such a thing as being angry (for example, Christ in the case of the man who had the withered hand, Mark 3:5); it is then indignation against evil. (See 2 Cor. 7:11.) If it is the anger of the new man on account of evil, then, as soon as the evil is removed, the soul returns to its rest; but if anger lasts, then there is bitterness, and the soul not being able to return into its rest, evil is shewn to be there; for this reason it is said, "Let not the sun go down upon your wrath."