{"id":6479,"date":"2020-06-11T20:44:48","date_gmt":"2020-06-11T10:44:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/?p=6479"},"modified":"2020-06-11T20:44:51","modified_gmt":"2020-06-11T10:44:51","slug":"put-off-anger-put-on-patience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/put-off-anger-put-on-patience\/","title":{"rendered":"Put Off Anger, Put on Patience"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

The New Man: Part 1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Myrna Ishak<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Picture\nthis \u2013 you\u2019re seven-ish years old, sitting on the floor while your school\nteacher reads a book aloud. Something about a boy living in a peach. The carpet\nis scratchy and it makes your legs itch; why do you even have to sit here \u2013 the\nlunch bell rings! <\/em>Your train of thought is cut short as you, and about\ntwenty other children, scramble madly outside. You make a beeline for your\nfavourite playground spot, systematically dodging and weaving between those in\nyour way. You clutch your lunch tightly to your chest \u2013 a ham sandwich, an apple,\nand a bag of Cheetos-equivalent chips. This isn\u2019t working, the thronging crowd\nof students isn\u2019t even close to dispersing. So, you take a short cut. It\u2019s a\nrisky move, running past the principal\u2019s office when no one\u2019s supposed to be\nindoors, but really, when is she ever<\/em> actually in her office?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnd where\ndo you think you\u2019re<\/em> going?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your heart\nsinks as you turn to face the voice\u2019s source. Her face is pinched, arms\ncrossed, and you feel like a bug under a microscope. To make a long story\nshort, you\u2019ve earned a detention. But so what if you were indoors? You were\njust passing by \u2013 how else were you supposed to get outside with enough time to\nenjoy your lunch? Your sheepishness and embarrassment are replaced by another\nfeeling and you see red. Time slows down. An orange blur flies through the air,\ncolliding with Mrs Jones\u2019 back as she walks away from of you. Her brown jacket\nis now pelleted with orange cheese dust where the individual Cheetos made\ncontact, and your single detention has suddenly turned into several.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over a\ndecade later, I can finally look back at this memory with some amusement. It\ncomes as no surprise that anger has been confirmed to temporarily impact\ncognition and the way we process external stimuli. I\u2019m sure everyone has a\nsimilar story where anger has caused rash behaviour, as Solomon so frankly\nstates:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor anger rests in the bosom of senseless men<\/em>\u201d \u2013 Ecc 7:9<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To put it simply, anger is an emotional state often secondary to a perceived threat. We know it is an inevitable feeling as a range of Biblical figures, from Cain to Jesus, encounter it \u2013 but what separates the passion that would cause a man to slaughter his own brother and that which drove our Lord to overturn vendors\u2019 tables in the temple? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Motive and\nresult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anger is\nonly justified<\/strong> if its root cause is love of God. If my anger is\ntriggered by my<\/em> desire for self-preservation, driven by my <\/em>ego,\nor in defence of my<\/em> values or beliefs \u2013 it is unjustified<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And what becomes of unjustified anger? There are essentially only a few ways this can go:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. My anger is aggressive<\/strong> \u2013 I hurt those who hurt me, be it\nverbally, physically, or with Cheetos. Choose your weapon.<\/li>
  2. My anger is assertive<\/strong> \u2013 I call out those who hurt me and hold\nthem accountable.<\/li>
  3. My anger is passive<\/strong> \u2013 I redirect my anger through other\nmediums; I ignore, I feign disinterest, I manipulate.<\/li>
  4. My anger is suppressed<\/strong> \u2013 I\u2019m fine, really! The rejection I\nsuffered will only gnaw at my insides until it evolves into bitterness and\nmalice; maybe it\u2019ll even impact my physical health. But I really am just fine<\/em>.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cAn angry man digs up strife, but a furious man digs up sins<\/em>\u201d \u2013 Proverbs 29:22<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    HH Pope Shenouda III suggests a beautifully practical strategy for dealing with anger:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    1. Avoid circumstances known to provoke your anger \u2013 <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cDo not be a companion to an angry man and do not associate with a quick-tempered friend, lest you learn his ways and receive a snare for your soul\u201d<\/em> – Proverbs 22:27-28<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    2. Do not make decisions, be it by thought, word, or action, during a time of anger \u2013 <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cHe who refrains from uttering a harsh word is intelligent, and a longsuffering man has discernment<\/em>\u201d \u2013 Proverbs 17:29<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    3. And finally, take off the old man and put on the new<\/strong> \u2013 put off anger and put on patience. Confess the weaknesses that may have caused you to sin in anger, and train yourself to adopt a disposition of love, long-suffering, and self control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cBut now, you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, and put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him \u2026<\/em>\u201d \u2013 Colossians 3:8-10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    The New Man: Part 1 By Myrna Ishak Picture this \u2013 you\u2019re seven-ish years old, sitting on the floor while your school teacher reads a book aloud. Something about a boy living in a peach. The carpet is scratchy and it makes your legs itch; why do you even have to sit here \u2013 the … Continue reading “Put Off Anger, Put on Patience”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6480,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[340,80],"class_list":["post-6479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-new-man","tag-patience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6479"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6481,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6479\/revisions\/6481"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}