Anger

Last carryover blog.  After this, they'll all be new.

Do you ever get angry? What do you get mad about? One of the things that gets me the most angry is when somebody is being rude, unkind, unfair, or just plain evil to my wife. Some people like to think that anger is a bad thing. Some Christians and non-Christians that think they know what Christianity is will even tell you that anger is a sin. This certainly couldn't be the case though. Think about it. Aren't there some things that are worth being angry over? How about the sensless murder of a child, the rape of an innocent young woman, or the terror and horror of 9/11. If those things don't make you angry, then what are your priorities and where is your heart? I would argue that there is something wrong with you either medically or morally if those things didn't make you angry in some way.

So what is anger then? Anger is an emotion. It's an emotion exactly like happiness and sadness are emotions. Anger though, has a much a greater potential to be acted out in an intensely physical way than many other emotions though. So if anger itself is inherrently NOT evil, then it is the way we deal with that anger that can be. How do you deal with anger? Sometimes, that may depend on what it was that made you angry? If somebody wrongs you, do you lash back at them? Do you yell at them, hit them, steal from them, or worse? If you think that cursing somebody, punching somebody, stealling, or murder is wrong in normal circumstances, why would those suddenly become lawful, moral, and right just because somebody has done you wrong?

Ideas of justice can be very tricky. I don't think there is always a black and white stance is such areas. For example, if I came home, and I found somebody attacking my wife, or if somebody attacked us while we were out, I would not hesitate to use deadly force if need be because I believe in self defense and the defense of others when in immediate danger. If, however, God forbid, somebody were to hurt my wife or another loved one and there was nothing I could do about it at the time, then I would not be justified in going to find that person and killing him. At that point, it is no longer defense, but pre-meditated murder. Does that mean that the assailant does not deserve it? No. I believe that person would deserve it. Just like I believe people who hurt young children "deserve" to be hurt.

Here is the thing though. It is not my place to deal out that punishment, that "justice". That is why we have a government, with courts and a legal system. I in no way think that our system is perfect, and if I were the one making the rules, I would likely do things differently, but that is not my call. If were all allowed to serve out our own justice, we would live in a lawless anarchy, constantly living in fear. We would have no idea what the standards were, because everybody would have their own standards. How could that possibly be fair? "Fair" would not be defined, because true fairness requires a universal standard.

So long as we're on this side of forever, there will be things that make you angry because we live in an imperfect world. People will hurt you and others because they fail to attempt to look through the lens of your life, or they may be looking through a cloudy lens of their own. How you deal with that anger though, is always, and only up to YOU. So are you going to repay wrong for wrong, evil for evil, or are you going to find a healthy, good outlet for your anger?