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Last week I lost my cool. I blew my stack. I lost the plot. I spat the dummy.
I'm not normally given to such outbursts as the one that occurred last Friday but that young driver deserved to be confronted and challenged for the way he put at risk the lives of my wife, my daughter and two of my granddaughters.
How he managed to rush his car between me and the driver diagonally in front of me in the adjoining lane I have no idea. He would probably put it down to his own brilliant driving. I put it down to angels watching out for us!! Even though he raced away from what had to be a very near tragedy, I caught up with him at the next set of traffic lights.
At that moment the urge to wind down my window and "give him a serve" won the day…and I did. His window was already down so I unloaded my anger. "Hey mate, you'd have to be the village idiot, right? The way you cut across me back at that round-a-bout was just plain stupid. If you want to kill yourself, go right ahead. But leave me and my family out of your death wish!!" (or words to that effect!!)
I could tell by the look on his face that he knew he was in the wrong. He pretended I wasn't there. But his lady friend in the passenger seat was not prepared to let my accusation go unchallenged. At first she pretended she couldn't hear but then let go with her own anger expressed as how dare I talk to her/them like that. About then the lights turned green, my face stayed red and we went our separate ways.
As the afternoon wore on (and right up this moment), I found myself mentally rehearsing the whole scene again and again. Questions arose more rapidly than I could go manage. "What had that episode achieved?" "Was I justified to react as I did?" "Did such a response on my part compromise my Christian convictions?" "What kind of example had I given to my two granddaughters?" "Was this 'righteous anger' and appropriate to the occasion?"
I guess this episode calls into question the relationship between one's Christian confession and the emotion of anger. What are the implications when a Christian reacts angrily in a set of circumstances and immediately feels a sense of guilt and/or shame because we have been taught that it is wrong for a follower of Jesus to get angry?
I need to dig into this issue some more because I want to be authentic in my life as a believer.
