Proverbs 27:3 A heavy weight

Stone is heavy and sand a burden,
    but a fool’s wrath is heavier than both.

Many of us have fond memories of happy times, walking in the sand near the sea. There are probably not too many of us that have ever experienced quicksand. Although the movies make it seem like it can keep sucking a human being down, science sites on the web say that you would only sink about waist deep and then stop. Of course, you'd need someone to help you out, but you wouldn't just keep going until you went under!
Wet sand, though, is awfully heavy. If you've helped a child build a sand castle, you know that the bucket of wet sand is really heavy....just as if you put stones in the bottom.

You may have read in the Bible about several large, heavy stones. One is in Genesis 39:1-3 . . . think how large a stone would need to be, to cover the mouth of a well! No wonder it took several men to move it.

Another is noted in the Gospels -- remember the stone that was rolled away when Christ arose? That one was so large that it covered the doorway to the tomb, and it took a mighty angel to move it.  

Solomon is saying here that a foolish person's wrath is as weighty, as heavy, as those stones, or wet sand. It can weigh him down, and it can destroy him and others around him. Today, wrath and anger are used interchangeably sometimes, but look at the difference in the Hebrew meanings:

                anger: ire, indignation, grief
                wrath: hot displeasure, furious, rage, poison

Kinda like wrath is anger on steroids, huh? A foolish person has a hot temper, and a quick-lighting fuse -- he boils over and his emotional outburst may turn quickly into actions that he will later regret. 

Do we sometimes excuse ourselves by saying, "Well, I have a quick temper, but I get over it just as quickly, and then forgive and forget."  Maybe we should work on omitting the first half (losing our temper) and concentrate on the second part (the forgive and forget part). 

James 1:19-20 has helped me many times:

¹⁹ My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, ²⁰ because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.

I want so badly to live the righteousness that He desires . . . don't you?

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