anger

01
Nov
2023

A Cool Spirit or a Hot Head

“Whoever restrains his words has knowledge,

And he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding.”

Proverbs 17:27

I just finished reading a book called “The Heart of Anger” by Lou Priolo. It is a very practical book for parents as they navigate the challenges of raising children. The challenge we as parents have in parenting is that we are proud and self-centered trying to rear a child that also is proud and self-centered. At the heart of this, there is a dire need for Christ, the Gospel, and the Bible.

If we do not see our need for a Savior, the Gospel, the Bible, and the assistance of the Holy Spirit we will be woefully lacking in our ability to raise children that are God fearing and respectful people.

Our verse from Proverbs is an outflow of a person that is dependent on Christ, the Gospel, the Bible, and the assistance of the Holy Spirit.  We cannot hope to have a cool spirit with restrained words, if we try to do this alone. Eventually, we will be like the volcano who ruptures and spews forth angry words of lava under all the pressure that is built up.

What must we do to keep our cool? This verse tells us we must have knowledge and be a man/woman of understanding. This tells me that we must be a thinking people rather than  emotional reactive people. In so many situations that occur, we react rather than act. When we react, we allow our emotions to “drive the train” of our actions. When we act, we allow our biblically sanctified thoughts to “drive the train.”

  1. Be in the Word and in prayer daily

We must daily be in the Word and in prayer, so that we can “renew our minds.” (Rom. 12:2) if we are thinking thoughts that are godly we will be able to have a godly action in the midst of the circumstance. What drives us to react with our emotions is our pride and selfishness. We feel like someone is threatening what we want, what we desire. If we angrily lash out at someone for something they say or do, or we inwardly seethe with distaste for the other person because of their words or actions then we know that we have acted out of selfishness and pride.

We need the Bible and prayer to daily biblically inform us of the kind of people that we are. We need the Bible and prayer to help us daily “Prepare our minds for action.” (I Peter 1:13).

  1. Evaluate your words, your tone, and your volume

“…he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding.” (Prov. 17:27). The cool spirited person knows what Scripture says about his speech. “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” (Prov. 15:1). This cool spirited person knows that it is sin to speak in a way that is not gentle, raises their voice, and inflicts verbal harm to their listener. This cool spirited man/woman does not let his pride/self-centeredness get in the way of the conversation, but rather seeks to understand the other person. This cool spirited person knows that blowing up or sulking during the conversation does not solve the problem, but rather escalates the problem.

  1. Seek to understand the other person not control them

If we blow up or sulk in the midst of the conversation, we are trying to control the other person or the situation so that we can get what we want. We are willing to sacrifice honoring God in this relationship on the altar of the idols of our hearts. We so desperately want what we want, that we are willing to yell, say unkind words, or sulk so that our idol can be worshipped. We are willing to sacrifice the relationship, so that we can satisfy our desire for control. If we desire to glorify God and represent Him well to all that we come in contact with, we will seek to understand them and what is happening in their hearts. The cool person’s desire is not to get what they want, but rather to glorify God.

  1. Glorify God and represent Him well

The other person may very well not be happy with us and what we did or what we said. We must evaluate our hearts and our motives and see if there is a “log in our eye” (Mt. 7:3) that must be removed. Then we must evaluate the “speck” (Mt. 7:3) that is in our friend’s eye. None of this can be done if we do not have a cool spirit.

It is easy to be a “Hot-tempered” (Prov. 29:22) person. The cool spirited person seeks to understand other people. Why does the cool spirited man want to understand others? He wants to glorify God. How does He keep a cool spirit? The cool spirited person knows that s/he needs Jesus, the Gospel, the bible, the Holy Spirit, and to deny themselves. We cannot be cool spirited if we do not deny ourselves.

The next time you encounter a disagreement with another person, remember that the cool spirited person comes from a desire to understand the other person, not to be understood. In order to do this, we must deny ourselves.

Posted by ddykema5@gmail.com in The Seasons of Motherhood, 0 comments
18
Oct
2023

Who Do You Worship?

“The crucible is for silver and the furnace is for gold,

And the Lord tests the hearts.”

Proverbs 17:3

 

We live in a day of imitation and knock-offs.  I saw my daughter last week-end and she had a bag that said “The Tote Bag” on it. I asked her what the story was behind it. She doesn’t normally carry a bag around with her. She said that it was the in thing now. She did admit that hers was an imitation because it didn’t have the designer’s name on it.

How do we know if something is imitation or a knock-off? There is usually something that will give us a clue that something is not the genuine thing. Our verse from Proverbs starts out by helping us to understand how we can identify pure silver and pure gold. It has to go through a test. The test is fire.

The crucible is a vessel in a refining fire, a place where precious substances are tested, purified, and strengthened. The silver is tested in the fire to see if it truly is silver, and then as the silver is heated all of the impurities are melted out of the pure silver. The same thing happens for gold. As the gold is heated, the impurities are melted off and all that is left is the gold.

Our lives are no different. We all experience trials, challenges, difficulties, circumstances, events, or a stimuli in our lives. God allows these events to happen in our lives reveal what is in our hearts. These trials are meant to test us to see what is truly in our hearts.

There are really only 2 responses in our lives when a circumstance happens. There may seem to be a wide variety of responses, but in the end each and every response boils down to 2 different responses.

  1. We worship God and trust in His sovereignty. When we do this we will experience peace, hope, and joy even though we don’t understand what is happening because we are trusting in God’s perfect plan. As the trials are happening in our lives and we choose to trust God, the things in our lives that are not important or that are getting in the way of us worshipping God will slowly come to the surface and we can choose to surrender those to God so that we are more like Christ or we can choose to hold onto those things, which would put us into the 2nd
  2. We worship ourselves. Now I know that no one would ever say that they worship themselves. That would be preposterous. We might say of someone else though that they are proud or selfish. Who do you think they are worshipping as a proud and selfish person? What does this look like in the crucible, the test, the furnace, the fire, the challenge, the trial? The person may say or think things like, “What did I do to deserve this?” “This isn’t fair.” “What was God thinking?” These people become devastated by the tests that come into their lives. They can’t get out of bed because life just isn’t fair. They can’t do their normal daily responsibilities of life because they are so distraught by the trial in their lives. They are so self-focused that every little thing in life that happens pushes them over the edge. They are depressed or anxious or full of fear or angry because the trial that came into their life is not how they planned their life, and this thing is out of their control. This test that God sent is revealing exactly what is in the person’s heart. It is revealing who they worship.

So there question is who are you worshipping? If you are not sure who you are worshipping, check your responses to the trials that happen in your life. Do you become angry, depressed, anxious, or full of fear when life gets hard? Or do you seek the Lord in the midst of a trial and trust in His providential care over your life, no matter how hard the test is?

Is it wrong to go to the Lord and pour out your heart to Him when life gets hard? No, it isn’t. We need to walk in faith and trust in God, not in doubt, fear, anger, despair or anxiety.

Who do you worship? As you go through trials, the genuineness of your faith will be revealed and demonstrate who you are worshipping. What does the crucible reveal about the genuineness of your worship?

Posted by ddykema5@gmail.com in The Seasons of Motherhood, 0 comments
23
Aug
2023

Life or Brokenness

“A soft answer turns away wrath,

But a harsh word stirs up anger.

The tongue of the wise commends knowledge,

But the mouths of fools pour out folly.

A gentle tongue is a tree of life,

But perverseness in it breaks the spirit.”

Proverbs 15:1, 2, 4

The tongue is often the topic of Proverbs. Proverbs 15 starts off reminding us that the tongue is a powerful instrument. James likens the tongue in Chapter 3 to a horse’s bridle, a ship’s rudder, and a fire. These things seem so small and yet they are powerful instruments. A horse’s bridle weighs about 2 pounds, and a horse weighs 900 to 1200 pounds. A ship’s rudder is about 1/100 the size of the boat. A fire starts with just a spark, but can cause catastrophic damage.

Small things that control big things.

The tongue is about 3 inches. Yet, its power is great. James says the tongue is as powerful as a bridle, a rudder, and a fire. Proverbs says that the tongue can turn away wrath, stir up anger, break a spirit, or be like a tree of life. The tongue has great power.

The tongue does not have a mind and a will of its own. Rather, a tongue only does what our brain and our hearts tells it to do. If we are eating an ice cream cone, our brains tell our tongues to lick. If our brain is telling our tongues to speak words of kindness or harsh words, then that is what will come out.

The tongue is a vehicle or an instrument that is controlled by our brains. Let’s see what Jesus had to say about this topic.

“The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” (Luke 6:45).

If you ever wonder what is in someone’s heart, listen to what they say. If you ever wonder what a person values, listen to their words. Our verses in Proverbs tell us though that we should not just listen to their words, but we must also listen to how they say their words. What is the tone of voice that is used in spilling forth words?

Will Jesus hold us accountable for not just our words, but also for our tone of voice when we say the words? It seems like our Proverbs verse would say, “Yes.”

Have you had a conversation with someone and what you heard and what their tone said did not match? Which will you more likely believe? The words or the tone? I think we would all agree that we would listen to the tone of a person’s voice along with their words, but hold with more weight their tone. Have you ever been dismissed by someone when you asked them, “Why are you so angry?” And their reply to you was, “I’m not angry.” Yet, their tone would indicate otherwise.

Our tongues hold great power not just with what we say, but also with how we say it. Our tongues can do great harm and also provide great healing.

Our tongue betrays our desires. Our tongues are a window to what our hearts are wanting. They say that the eyes are the window to the soul. The tongue is the window to your desires, to your heart, to what you worship. If you are worshipping what you want, then your tongue and the tone of voice you use to express your thoughts will betray what you are worshipping.

In the midst of a heated argument with another person, are you really interested in what the other person has to say and what they want? Or are you interested in what you want and how you can get your way and your point across? As we verbally assault each other, we show how foolish we are and we break the other person’s spirit or others that may be verbal casualties to our knock down drag out tongue thrashing.

The Bible is so clear in helping us to see what our sin does to other people. It also helps us to see what our sin does to us.

Have you been guilty of speaking in a way that leaves verbal casualties in your wake? Have you ever thought that “they will get over it?” It’s in the past and I don’t need to seek forgiveness for what I have said or how I have said it. Proverbs 15:4 says that our tongues can break a spirit. If we break a window with our ball, do we need to seek restitution? Then why do we think that our words or our tones don’t need to be forgiven?

How many people are carrying around a great weight of grief and pain over words that have been spoken in a tone that was not gentle? Those words and those tones are a weight. Confession and seeking forgiveness goes a long way at bringing restoration to relationships. Broken relationships bring great pain to everyone involved. These broken relationships were caused by a careless tongue, but a gentle tongue could restore that relationship and cause it to grow and flourish like a tree of life.

As one of the Pastors in my life said, “It’s always your turn.” In other words, if you have caused harm to another because of your words or your tone, go ask for forgiveness and bring healing to that relationship. If you have been harmed by another’s words or tone, go and let them know the pain they have caused you. Maybe they don’t even know the pain they have caused.

Will your tongue bring life or brokenness?

Posted by ddykema5@gmail.com in The Seasons of Motherhood, 0 comments
17
Feb
2021
Think about what you think about

Think about what you think about

Last week, I wrote about Scripture memorization and the transformation that it has had in my life. The transformation that has taken place is not that I can better remember where I laid my glasses, rather it has made an alteration in my thinking.

Do you ever stop to think about you’re are thinking about?

What do you think about? Have you ever taken stock in even those fleeting thoughts that are hardly even perceptible, and yet they are? I know it seems like a strange question to wonder if you have thought about what you think about, but our thoughts impact every aspect of our lives whether we realize it or not.

Let’s consider a few things that we all at some point or other have thought. “That’s not fair.” I know we have all thought this one. Someone else gets recognition and you worked just as hard. It may have even been your hard work that this person received accolades for and there was no acknowledgement of you. What about the friends that are disrespectful to you and say things that are not true, and your actions toward them have been nothing but kind and honorable. Have we thought, “That’s not fair?” Or even “what did I do to deserve this?”

I am sure many of us have thought, “This is so hard. I can’t do this.” Whatever the obstacle is in front of us, it appears to be too difficult. It takes too much effort. Whether it is the challenging friendship, the difficult child (or puppy right now in my caseJ), a difficult spouse, or a grueling job. The list could go on, but there are many things in life that feel so overwhelming and we think, “I can’t do this.”

As we allow ourselves to think these thoughts repeatedly, they begin to impact our emotions. Our emotions begin to be a byproduct of our thoughts. Again, this is not something that we are even aware of.

What are we feeling when we experience the “That’s not fair” thought? If someone else receives recognition that we should receive, we might experience anger. What is at the root of that anger? We wanted the recognition, but what is at the root of us wanting the recognition? We feel like we deserve it. Rather than being happy for the other person that received the recognition, we want our fair share.

What about when you are in a “discussion” with someone and you begin to feel angry because they do not see your point of view on things. What is it you are thinking: “I just want them to understand what I am saying. I want them to see my point of view. I want them to agree with me. I just want to be heard.” When the other person does not see things our way, we get angry.  Did you ever stop to think about what they are trying to say? See their point of view? Actually listen to them and seek to understand with more clarity? That anger you are experiencing is rooted in you wanting your way.

When things are harder than you thought they should be and these circumstances that you are confronted with seem too hard, what are you thinking? “I can’t do this. Why are things not going the way I thought they should be?” These thoughts can lead to feelings of anxiety or depression.

So what are you thinking? What do you need to do? When you experience an emotion, you need to evaluate it. What are you thinking? What are you wanting?

Take some time to evaluate what you are thinking and what you are wanting. Begin to evaluate these emotions, and trace them back to your thoughts.

“As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” (Prov. 23:7).

Posted by ddykema5@gmail.com in The Seasons of Motherhood, 0 comments