Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Tuesday January 29, 2008

The scriptures tell us that the loss of hope is devastating in that humans usually become mere automatons sans the elixir of hope. Solomon wrote:

"Hope deferred maketh the heart sick."

There are myriads of clichés with the purpose of helping us to hope when there is no apparent reason to hope. A few miracles along the path of human history give to us the outside chance that at least one such miracle may be on our list and thus we keeping trucking along in spite of financial loss, marital abandonment or even a long lingering look at the face of death itself.

A friend facing a horrible circumstance told me one time of his hope. In my ignorance I pointed out that his hope was founded on a false premise. He turned to me and with mere beginning of a tear he said, "Larry, even a false hope is better than no hope." Think about this answer for a while.

With such a sober opening you can imagine my joy when I read an article by Ernest Harburg, PhD. who works with the University of Michigan's School of Public Health and Psychology Dept. Professor Harburg through exhaustive research has increased my hope for a long and healthful life.

Here's why.

The good professor states that couples who express anger (euphemism for argue/fight) may outlive those who suppress anger. Professor Harburg points out that this formula only works if both parties are adept at expressing anger. He writes, "If you bury your anger, and you brood on it and don't try to resolve the problem, then you're both in trouble."

In his experiment couples who suppressed their anger experienced a death at near twice the rate of those couples who let her rip, let the chips fall where they may.

The findings seem to intimate that a good old fashioned, quickly over marital brawl, is better for your health than the situation where you keep quiet and do a slow, boiling, pouting. Men are in my opinion worse about being quiet while "she" is in hearing distance and then voicing their frustration to innocent listeners.

The article points out that both parties must argue, express their anger or just plain fight in a fair manner. No, "You’re just like your mother" or "Mom warned me not to marry you" stuff.

This article greatly encouraged me, for based on the findings of this study, the Great Blonde and yours truly may well be on the way to physically living forever. Paul commented on this in Ephesians 4:26 "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:"

The verse means to deal with the problem and get on with loving and living, hopefully if you learn to fight correctly, a long living. Like I said, Joyce and I are on track for a long life.

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2008 Use with credit. (No need to FWD this to Joyce).

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