Patient Parenting: Overcoming Anger in Your HomeSýnishorn

Day 3: Anger as Your Friend

As discussed yesterday, getting caught up in the sin-confess-sin-confess cycle is easy. We blow up at our children. Feel shame and guilt. Apologize and promise to do better. But then, in a few days, the same thing happens again.

"What am I missing?" you ask yourself. Yesterday we looked at our need to understand anger as our foe. As strange as it may sound, you may also be missing the understanding that anger can actually be a friend.

According to Dr. David Powlison, anger is "an active stance you take to oppose something you assess as important and wrong."

Anger, then, is like the red light on a car dashboard. It is an indicator that something is important and wrong. Rather than just looking at the light, we must address the engine problem.

Let's be clear. Our goal of becoming a patient parent does not mean we are emotionless, drifting along in some New Age detached state. If we hear our child tell us a defiant "No," and it doesn't cause some sort of reaction, that is a deficiency on our part. Or the husband who sits passively while his son disrespects his mother must also repent.

The anger we feel in the moment can help us see a problem and motivate us to act. As we evaluate our parenting, we must ask, "What problem is this anger pointing me to? What do I think is important and wrong?" While we are called to control the anger's expression, we can also channel the anger to come up with a plan to solve the problem.

You need to begin asking yourself what you will do to address the problem when it happens the next time. You know that it will happen again, right? The disobedience, sibling disagreement, or not having the homework ready will happen again! Children are children, after all.

After controlling its sinful expression, let that anger motivate you to attack the problem. This "red light" tells us something needs to change in our hearts, in our kids, or in our home environment.

The first area that God wants me to work on is my own heart. You and I can develop patience no matter what another person does. We see this example in Jesus when, wrongly accused and beaten, he bore it patiently. We are responsible for our actions and reactions. No one, not even our child, can make us sin.

As we realize that God is actively working to stretch our spiritual muscles and make us more patient, we will wake up and pray against the temptation of losing our temper. We will meditate on Scriptures that cause us to be more patient. And we will recognize the moment of pre-anger for what it is: a temptation. God promises that he will not give us a temptation beyond what we can bear. And with every temptation, there is a way out.

Prayer:

O Father, I have felt guilty about this part of my life for too long. But I have never focused my attention on it as a deadly cancer to destroy. It has injured my precious children, and I desire to repent. From this day forward, may I aggressively fight it. By the power of your Spirit, give me strength to overcome this foe. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.