Anger is an emotion that can take you to places you’ll forever regret visiting. It will also make you say things you wish you could retract. Anger takes you to a place where rationale and any sort of clear thinking goes out the window. It has no brakes and nothing to guide it to a safe place when it enters that danger zone. Anger rises like a tide that sweeps up anything that gets in its path. It can be the breaker of many things – including relationships, esteem, and even lives.
Although anger is a basic emotion like happiness, sadness and fear, anger needs some guidelines and boundaries, or it will erupt and devour anything in its trail. We will get angry at various moments in our lives which is perfectly natural, but the danger lies in its frequency and intensity. If you find yourself getting angry more often or you start to become violent, you have a problem, and it’s time to seek help.
Anger can sometimes sneak up on you. You may be having a great day. You woke up on the right side of the bed, you’re coffee turned out just great, your kids were ready on time without having to be reminded, you drive off and just as you are getting on the highway, someone cuts you off and you have to swerve to keep from running in to another vehicle. All of a sudden – anger swoops in! You feel it rise inside of you like a volcano and next thing you know fiery words spew out of your mouth.
Anger has become such a progressive issue in our society that they have developed classes you can take to help manage it. Sometimes anger is associated with disorders like manic episodes, some of it may be motivated by stress, and sometimes it can be attributed to other medical conditions, such as menopause or chronic pain. But anger can also arise from deep-seated unresolved issues in your life, and small mishaps can trigger it. These issues need to be brought to the surface and resolved or else you will find that minor things will trigger your anger and bring it to a boiling point rather quickly.
The Bible tells us that we will get angry, but we are to “sin not.” But, what does that really mean? Anger becomes sinful when it is not directed to a good end and it produces bad effects, whether in words or actions. When we get angry, we need to stop and hold our tongue because what may proceed out of our mouth can do irreparable damage. I know it’s hard to hold back when we are angry, but we must work at this. After we have calmed down, we need to assess the driving force behind our anger. If we really understood the damage anger can do, we would make a concerted effort to get our anger under control. Uncontrolled anger tears down and destroys.
Anger in its proper perspective, can motivate us to do good and help others who are in need or are being oppressed. It can help us stand for what is right. But, since we understand that there is also a destructive power in uncontrolled anger, we must not let it go unchecked and we must make a determined effort to not allow it to get out of control in our lives. Yes, we understand that we will get angry at times, but we have to control it so that it does not control us. If we find that we cannot constrain it, we need to seek help. This month let us pray that the Lord helps us “bridle our tongue” when we are about to unleash our anger on ourselves or others. We will pray that the Lord helps us direct and guide our anger to do something beneficial.