Y'all Better Be Glad I'm Saved!

Salvation Haiku:

They'd better be glad

I'm saved! Or else I would have

removed my earrings.

~ Harriet Hairston

I've come to learn that many people get Christianity confused with cowardice; meekness with weakness. Just this week three people offered me the distinct opportunity to smack the taste out of their mouths...but for the Holy Spirit within me, I would have. He arrests me when my fists start balling up. He becomes a filter when my thought process degenerates to a tempting desire to show how many combinations of expletives I can combine in one sentence. Inside, I'm hopping mad, but on the outside, my countenance is calm and collected.

You know what? I want to be Jesus for just ONE DAY. Let me have His power when people start mistaking my kindness for weakness! Oh...you want to take me for granted and try to run me over? Here...let me take back my oxygen for a couple of seconds! What's wrong? Why are you turning blue? Oh, you can't respond because you can't breathe? My bad!

If I had been Jesus...ooo-wee! I would have called EVERY angel to the scene of the crime. I would have done a divine bait and switch to put Judas on the cross instead of me. I don't even think I would have bothered being born. I would have just ripped my way through a cloud and stepped out on the scene! I would have bullied and judged and condemned every person that rejected me! But what would that solve?

Seriously, though, here's the thing: Jesus had more power in His eyelash than the people that orchestrated His murder on that cross. I want to give way to my anger at the smallest infraction or libel against my character. Jesus, the Son of God, was SET UP to be MURDERED...and He responded with love.

He didn't have to go through all that, but He knew if He gave back what was given to Him, crazy people like me 2009 years later wouldn't be able to blog about how they wanted to smack the taste out of someone's mouth, but the Spirit of the living God arrested them and showed them a better way.

Besides, His Word states that anger resides in the bosoms of fools. Since my mama didn't raise one, I'll continue to calm myself down and replace thoughts of assault and battery (or at least a good tongue lashing) with love, forgiveness and strength under control.

What about you? How do you control your temper? Does it always work?

Take it Personal!

"I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left." ~ Margaret Thatcher

Within identities and personalities, there is bound to be disagreements and conflict. Friction focused in the right direction leaves so much room for growth and development. However, there are those who remove the constructive nature of conflict and reduce themselves to engaging in mere argument. What's the difference? It's subtle but absolutely crucial. Conflict leads to growth and resolution. Argument is void of any kind of constructive qualities.

Sometimes a discussion can start out as conflict and degenerate into an argument. At other times, it can start as an argument and graduate to becoming a conflict. Here are some warning signs that a conflict has turned into an argument:

• One or both parties have lost sight of the original point of their discussion.
• One or both parties resort to cursing or using expletives during the course of the conversation.
• One or both parties begins to engage in a personal attack upon one another.

My mama used to tell me that it takes two fools to fight...just don't be one of them. Conflict causes iron to sharpen iron. If I'm taking things personally because my character has been attacked, then that's even better. It means the argument presented by the other side has reduced itself to NOTHING. Either way, I've made up my mind that every conflict I engage in will sharpen me more and more...even the ones that attack me personally.