Grief

Is There A Place For Anger In My Life?

by Janice S Ramkissoon 
07/12/24
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“In your anger do not sin”

(Eph. 4:26)

Because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires, James 1:19 tells us to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry. Ephesians 4:26-27 lets us know that while there is a place for anger, it should never be used as a licence to sin.

I’ve been hearing from various psychologists that,‘The body keeps the score.’ However, Dr. John Delony is the one who drove it home to me. Through his Radio show, I am learning a lot about myself and I can now testify to the reality of that in my own life.

Both my husband and I have experienced more of the ‘In sickness’ part of the marriage vows than we’ve experienced the ‘In health’ part. Whether directly or indirectly, most of it traces back to things of our childhood that were never dealt with. We are most certainly aware now that the body does keep score of unprocessed grief.

Unfortunately, we didn’t know we needed pre-marital counselling. What counselling? We never heard of it! I’m a country girl who grew up with my grandparents! Talking to our pastor, youth leader or the elderly folks in the community was the extent of counselling. We couldn’t afford it, even if we had knowledge it existed.

Now knowing what it is, we are aware that most of what we are now dealing with would have been highlighted during pre-marital counselling. We would then have had the opportunity to deal with our issues, individually, before getting married and prioritising marriage counselling in the early stages of our marriage.

Not being aware of the consequences of our negative childhood experiences, we both walked into marriage unaware of the potential damage to our relationship to each other, future children and everyone we would later be doing life with.

It now causes emotional and mental pain which is now manifesting itself through some of the physical ailments. Some of that hinders us from having the kind of experience we anticipated when we got married.  That does bring about some anger when I realise the root of the problem.

Nevertheless, what was meant to destroy us, we have given to God and we can now start to see it turning around for good as that lack in our lives finds us hungry and thirsting for His Word. And as we seek after righteousness, we are finding that His Word truly is alive (Heb. 4:12). It really does what it says in 2 Tim. 3:16, and is therefore helping us to pursue holiness.

I am still angry 

Ephesians 4:26 says, ‘“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.'

My understanding of that first part is that it is an expectation that I will become angry from time to time, hence the caution, ‘In your anger do not sin.’ There is also an understanding that I should not prolong that period of anger or it will give the devil a foothold.

In order not to give the devil a foothold we are told in verses 31 and 32 to do the following:

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

Naming the feeling/emotion:

I have learned that I must name the thing that cause the feeling of anger, so I began listing them. I am working through that process of bringing what’s hidden into the light and realising that it does have a root and many triggers.

The Root of my anger

I am angry because of the absence of my parents and that anger was growing from childhood, without me having knowledge of it. It was destroying me from within and I was simply unaware. So, learning that, I wanted to know the answer to: “Why am I angry?”

End of Part 1

Continue reading Part 2 ~ Bringing To Light What's In The Dark