Anger Management

There's a lot of talk about anger and hostility this week in light of the tragic shootings at Virginia Tech. In fact, I plan to speak about anger on Sunday morning at church. Anger is an amazing animal. I picture anger as a wild animal that makes it's way to our back door. We feed it and then we act shocked that it keeps coming back. Unfortunately, it's still a wild animal. (I realize that there is such a thing as righteous anger, but stay with me) Anger shows up early in the Bible. We are introduced to anger in the midst of the story of Cain and Abel. Abel gets good marks from God. Cain gets a failing grade. If we slow down long enough to digest the story we will notice that Cain also gets some great council from God. God tells Cain to beware of his sinful anger. My paraphrased version is this - either you will master it or it will master you. Here's where anger tends to go wrong. When we are angry (even when it is righteous anger) it is really hard to remember God's advice. Usually, we are too busy nursing our feelings and rehearsing the justification for our anger. In fact, one of the best strategies for mastering our anger is to step back and take a look at it for what it really is, gain clarity on what our next steps should be...and then starve it to death.