Quick-Triggered Temper

It is written in the scriptural record that the Lord God gave man dominion over all the earth.⁴³ But subduing the earth loses much of its meaning unless we also subdue ourselves, our appetites, our anger. In many respects the measure of a man is the measure of the things that make him angry. The striking without thinking, the hasty ill—timed act or utterance are all part of the measure of a man. As one physician said of himself: “My life is in the hands of any fool who makes me lose my temper.” But any fool who loses his temper takes not only his own life in his hands, but the life of others also.

Those who, for example, drive in anger are a menace to all mankind. (It would be interesting to know, and appalling also, how many highway accidents have occurred because of anger, because of the hateful heated spirit of retaliation, the cutting in, the crowding over, despite all danger, to show people and put them in their place.) Injury and violent death in many forms are often the outcome of unreasoning anger, and a man who lets loose his quick—triggered temper with fists or weapons or words is likely to have a lifetime to regret his lack of self—control. He may sever a friendship; he may break a marriage; he may ruin a home; he may injure or destroy a life by this ill—timed temper.

No doubt all of us have been guilty of anger, and no doubt there is such a thing as righteous wrath—things we should be angry at. But blind, unreasoning anger can be a fury of destructive force—to ourselves and to others also. In the words of William Penn, “Every stroke our fury strikes is sure to hit ourselves at last.” Anger is a boomerang.

Suppose the Lord God were to strike out at us as we would strike out at someone else who happens to try our temper. If He should lash out at us as we are sometimes tempted to lash out at others, we should be chastened in a way we wouldn’t forget—for surely most of us must have tried His patience many times.

There are those who would question, as a practical matter, the concept that the Saviour uttered in the Sermon on the Mount: that the “meek . . . shall inherit the earth.”—but to see peace and love and respect and so much else that is priceless and precious destroyed by unrighteous, unreasoning anger, gives much more meaning to the kind of meekness the Saviour must have had in mind. We shall never have a satisfactory dominion over ourselves or over anything else until we learn to control our tempers.