Love is not easily angered

Love is not easily angered. Seems like this one is also a difficult one for me. I have found that by going through these attributes of love I have been challenged each day as I write. God's Word has a way of doing this. My own spiritual growth program has been to take each day's topic and focus on that one attribute. One problem in a busy day is to stop long enough to focus on that one thing. You really have to almost write it down and glance at it from time to time in order to remember that you are to focus on it often. The real victory for me is that by doing this I have grown so much in the past two weeks by simply practicing these things each day. Also I have even heard a comment or two around the office that the folks there have sensed something different. So to God be the glory...great things His word does!

Today's subject is that Love is not easily angered. Now let's face it....it is easy to be angered in a typical day. Either by circumstances that occur or people that interrupt or intercede into our perfect plan for the day. They mess up our agenda. I think it would be great to say that I am never angered. Or perhaps to say it is difficult for me to lose my temper and become angry. By saying that one should not be easily angered is to say that maybe it's ok if you become angry when you are challenged repeatedly to the point that you finally lose it. I mentioned yesterday that I can only recall one instance where Christ was angry and that was when He wrecked the temple. All other recordings of His life on earth never mention that He became angry. How about God? Did He finally have enough and destroy the world with a flood? Was He angry or was He only doing what justice called for? How about when He sentenced the children of Israel to wander in the desert for forty years? Was He angry when He put the sins of the world on His only Son? I am not sure I can answer this but I can say that He was very patient before He finally disciplined our wayward world.

Now back to you and me. Are we easily angered? Do we lash out at the tiniest insult or challenge to our agenda? What causes us to become angry? Is it from frustration or stress? Do we take out our frustrations on others (more than likely those closest too us?) Is it because of self-centerdness that we become angry? So many reasons may exist but it is clear in God's Word that He desires that we be slow to anger. Again the Proverbs say that we should be quick to listen and slow to speak. Anger has a difficult time getting a foothold if we are slow to speak. If we think about our words and the impact they may have on those around us. Also and probably most important is if we think about how God feels about us despite our weaknesses, our imperfection, etc.....we would know that He loves us so much in spite of us. If we were to but learn to love others as God loves us it would be very difficult to lose our temper and become angry with others.

I will throw out one more question....a heavy one. Do we treat others like we treat God? In other words to be angry with others may be the very way we treat God? This is scary. Do I treat others as I treat God? Do I become angry and frustrated with God when things don't go the way I want them to? When I don't seem to have enough money or whatever am I angry with God? Perhaps if we really concentrated on God's blessings we receive and show Him the proper love and respect that He is due, then we might just treat others with love, patience and kindness. Some difficult questions that only we can answer with some real soul searching.