Anger is a universal problem. I have observed it in the primitive cannibals in Irian Jaya, uncivilized Indians in the remote jungles of Brazil, illiterate people in tiny villages deep in the forest of Zaire, my playmates when I was a child, in my parents, church members, pastors, highly educated people, the very rich, people in government, and yes, even in myself. Call it what you will: mad, angry, frustrated, annoyed, perturbed, ticked off–all of these words represent a form of anger.
You cannot decide to be angry. You can take elaborate precautions to avoid being angry. But, alas, sooner or later, anger underneath your skin is triggered by a memory, someone’s behavior, a conversation, a phone call, or a letter. It can cause your heart to beat faster, make you sweat, tense up your muscles, foul up your digestive system, alter the way you think, dictate how you act, and trigger negative words from your mouth.
There seems to be universal agreement that anger must be tamed. Yet there is vast disagreement over the cause and the cure.
I have been aware of anger within me as far back as I can remember. Usually I could ignore it, express it safely to people like my parents, swallow it, or work it off in various activities like tennis or basketball.
The first time that I was conscious that I could not manage my anger occurred in my late twenties. At that time, I had a boss who kept me riled up most of the day, a wife who persisted in frustrating me by doing things her way rather than my way, and a tiny toddler who irritated me constantly by simply wanting my attention when I didn’t want to give it. These three people backed me into a corner. They didn’t even know it.
They forced me to face up to the fact that there was something in me that was activated by them and turned me into a person who said things I was sorry for, did things that I regretted, thought things that frightened me, and caused my body (heart, stomach, and muscles) to malfunction.
The solution came for me when I was convinced that I was helpless and needed to be saved from myself. The Bible described my condition exactly: “Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it” (Romans 7:20).
This sentence sums up what almost everyone says when they come to counseling with an anger problem: “My anger is a normal and justifiable response to the way I was treated.”
No one inquires about the possibility of anger being a sin in his or her heart. That word has almost disappeared from their vocabulary. These people seek relief from restlessness, nervousness or anxiety. Their buzzwords are “stressed out” or “burned out.” They are disturbed about their relationships with their spouses, children, other family members, social contacts or people at work or church. People admit anger reluctantly. If they do admit it, they are quick to justify it.
Individuals do come to seek advice when they are the recipients of someone else’s anger. For example, a wife will talk to me about her husband: “When in a good mood, Ted is a pleasant person to be around, but if you catch him when he’s mad–look out. I can tell his mood by the way he shuts the door. If he nearly breaks the window in slamming it, I brace myself for his first complaint.”
And come it will, followed by others. “Why don’t you make those kids keep their bicycles out of the driveway?” “Turn off that TV. There’s racket enough around here without that thing adding to it!” “Women drivers! They should it be kept off the highways after 3:00 in the afternoon!”
It is my observation that almost everyone resists calling any kind of anger “sin.” Multitudes of people (including me) have faced up to problems such as drinking, swearing, or stealing as sin and now it’s behind us. It’s been dealt with.
Dealing with anger is different. You can be completely and totally repentant over your anger. Confession leads to welcome relief from tension. I suspect that most people experience some anger every week. You think you have dealt with it, and it shows up again.
I have observed that one difficulty in dealing with anger is the wide range of intensity with which it can be expressed. On the one end, there is such extreme anger that it leads to violent physical abuse or even murder. We have no difficulty recognizing such anger as sin. But, on the other end of the continuum, is anger that is so mild as to be almost unnoticeable. This “annoyance level” of anger is easy to ignore; for example, mild frustration at a child who won’t make his bed, at a nearly empty gas tank in the car, at a traffic light, or at an impolite clerk.
You can compare anger to the flow of contaminated water into a tub. A wide-open faucet yields the same kind of water as a dripping faucet. One drop at a time will gradually fill a tub if the drain hole is plugged. It may take weeks to fill the tub with contaminated water, but eventually there will come a time when one more drop will make the water spill over the top. All that water came from the same polluted source.
Extreme anger is easy to recognize and impossible to ignore. The body pumps adrenaline into the bloodstream, causing the heartbeat to accelerate, the blood pressure to rise, the mouth to become dry, the muscles to become tense, the mental faculties to become alert, and the emotions to become disturbed.
A drop of anger is not as easy to recognize. To put it another way, it is easy to ignore. Bodily changes are hardly noticeable, but the effects are cumulative. The symptoms are anxiety, restlessness or tension. These drops of anger build up in the body. Eventually, one more incident (major or minor), and anger spills over the top. I listen to people who are puzzled over certain responses that surprise themselves:
“I heard myself screaming at the children to come into the house.”
“I was so mad I actually hit her. It was over which tie I should wear.”
“He lives a thousand miles away. At times, when someone mentions his name, I am fully consumed with anger in a matter of seconds.”