Controlled or Controlling

A few days ago, a friend of mine posted an article from the Washington Post (Our anger is poisoning us . . .) about how our anger is poisoning us. After reading the article, I sat and thought a while about how ordinary anger has become is our daily lives and how shocked we are when someone is kind.

Are we wandering around just waiting for a spark?

 

As a society we jump to rage at the small affront and are numb to the major injustices or sins that are happening around us daily. We have no patience with those who act out of ignorance.

 

Our vocabulary related to anger has dramatically diminished, as has our ability to forgive. I believe these go hand in hand. As Christians, we are to try and follow Jesus in every part of our lives. This includes our emotions and how we express them. This is the hardest thing about being a follower of Jesus.

 

We must remember that Jesus did get angry. Jesus showed annoyance with his disciples when they didn’t understand what he was teaching. He got frustrated the crowd would not allow him to rest and he put Satan in his place in the desert. The most famous demonstration of anger by Jesus is at the temple when he drove the money changers out. Notice that Jesus reserves his rage for those who profane the house of God by using their trade to deny people access to God based on their income. Jesus’ rage or righteous anger was reserved for moments of injustice, especially injustice that was supported by the leadership and justified by the “laws.”

 

Just teaching them to pause a breath can help. 

Often as Christians we believe that we must suppress our anger and fear because it’s not nice. This is the opposite of what God calls us to as followers of Christ. God desires that we learn how to control these feelings so they appear in way that cause harm but in ways that can be channeled towards the betterment of all in our community. How have you learned to control your anger? What trick have you taught your children? Please share your techniques with us in the comment section.



Today’s Scripture: John 2:13-17

13The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.14In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” 17His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

Conversation Starters:
  • What cause you to be frustrated or annoyed? What causes you to get angry?
  • What is the difference between being angry and being frustrated?
  • How do you calm down when you are getting angry?
  • Talk about how stopping to breathe can help calm and focus us. In Genesis, God uses breath to move across the water and create order out of chaos. Can taking a deep breath calm the chaos in us so we can control our anger rather than being controlled by it?
  • How can use your anger to change the world around us?

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