Three C’s for Overcoming Anger Issues

Anger is an emotion that the American Psychological Association characterizes as “antagonism toward someone or something you feel has deliberately done you wrong.” As a response to trauma inflicted by abuse or injustice, possible miscommunication, failed expectation, or unintended circumstances, anger’s presence in our lives can be telling.

Let’s explore the roots of anger issues, what Bible truth reveals, and identify life-giving sources and strategies that will free us from anger’s control.

Anger Issues: The Show and Tell

Anger can be either righteous or unrighteous, depending on a host of factors, but especially depending on what drives it. While it is a common human response to events, circumstances, and often, people, we always retain choice in how to respond to situations that trigger anger. Our decisions vary in consequence, which can either be beneficial or detrimental.

Like other emotions, anger shouldn’t lead us, but rather it should indicate deeper issues requiring attention and follow-up. It can serve us well by revealing underlying issues that need resolution and healing.

For example, when righteous anger is acknowledged and expressed as a part of healthy communication, it can disentangle convoluted human interactions because it exposes areas for growth. Righteous anger that is well-communicated can facilitate understanding between parties by ushering clarity. It reveals what was previously unseen or unknown. Healthy anger management can strengthen the authenticity of relationships through vulnerability and transparency.

However, when allowed to simmer, unrighteous anger can become explosive and injurious. When permitted to linger, it clouds perception and confuses communication.

Such issues distort our vision, often causing us to misinterpret other people’s actions (however well-meaning) as divisive. When unchecked and unresolved, anger becomes unrighteous and deludes us into justifying our own hurtful words and behaviors.

Sometimes, we are aware of anger issues. It may surface on occasions when interacting with family at celebrations or mournful gatherings. Anger may be the result of an ongoing stressor, such as a frustrating commute in traffic, or being dismissed and overlooked in the workplace.

Anger that we are aware of can be managed, but stowaway anger we don’t know is onboard can be potentially disruptive. When covert anger is triggered and results in an unhealthy response, we need to humble ourselves before God, the Judge of All the Earth, and make use of the ordinary means of grace that He supplies. The following section offers Scriptural strategies for navigating and overcoming anger issues.

The Difference a Day Makes

Even though we will feel unrighteous anger, God doesn’t want us to nurture it. We must surrender it to Jesus.

Come to Me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is comfortable, and My burden is light. – Matthew 11:28

Stewing in anger over an extended period can potentially cause damage in a variety of areas.

• It creates mental distress and destroys peace.
• It hinders effective communication essential to healthy relationships.
• It manifests physical symptoms of dis-ease in the body’s organs and systems.

“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry. – Ephesians 4:26

Be Angry?

Letting go of anger doesn’t invalidate your feelings or the legitimacy of your personal experience. Neither does it mean everything in your life and relationships will be neatly packaged once you give your anger to the One who heals. Trusting Him enables you to move forward in fruitful encounters and continuing lessons, with God, others, and the counselors He places in your path.

Submitting our angry emotions and the circumstances that sparked them doesn’t mean we won’t get angry. We will, and there are times when we should. Anger can be motivational when it prompts us to stand up against what angers God and wounds humanity.

One circumstance in which anger becomes sinful is when we hang onto the anger and shun the power of God to heal and deliver. When we proudly exalt our anger and elevate it higher than God, we glorify anger instead, making it lord. Anger is a cruel dictator that enslaves us when we choose to wallow in it.

Do not be eager in your spirit to be angry, For anger resides in the heart of fools. – Ecclesiastes 7:9

Our anger-inciting experiences are often legitimate, but when anger causes us to meditate on how we have been wronged more than the God who sustains, we shift the power focus onto what should be under our feet. Entertaining anger beyond what God allows anger to govern our thoughts, emotions, and actions.

And do not give the devil a foothold. – Ephesians 4:27

We always have the choice of how to respond. We can surrender to the Lord, work through the issue to forgive, and uproot whatever has given rise to the fruit of unrighteous anger. In doing so, we shift our focus from triggers and trauma effects onto our Savior Jesus Christ, embracing His Lordship over the false freedom of unrighteous anger.

For by You I can run at a troop of warriors; And by my God, I can leap over a wall. – Psalms 18:29

Three C’s for Healing from Anger Issues

Connection

God is fully aware of your emotion and the storms in your life that have fueled the anger within. He knows if your anger is righteous or unrighteous. You can decide, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to refuse the burden of corrosive anger. God invites you to bring it to Him and walk through a process designed to heal.

Giving emotional and mental real estate in your active memory, rehashing unnecessarily, only serves to give place to the devil. It makes it possible for the spiritual, physical, emotional, and mental parts of your being to rehearse pain and decay while living in agony.

However, this is not God’s design for spiritual and emotional wellness. We know that everyone experiences challenges, but we can choose to respond differently than what culture prescribes.

• Instead of getting even, we can entrust vengeance and mercy to the One who sees, knows, and holds all.
• We can choose to have an honest conversation, where safe, applicable, and appropriate, with the one(s) with whom we are angry.
• We can take godly and mature responsibility for our own feelings, recognizing that we don’t have to be controlled by the enemy.

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. – James 1:19

Community

A faith community is essential for disciples seeking to live in obedience to Christ. This interdependence with others in the Body of Christ is designed to support, strengthen, and sharpen us.

As iron sharpens iron, So one person sharpens another. – Proverbs 27:17

James highlights interdependence as a companion to the effective prayer that God answers (5:16). Authenticity and wise transparency in relationships with trusted others promote healing for our anger.

In these faith circles, truth-telling in love refocuses the soul’s myopia and distortions that anger creates. It takes the Holy Spirit and solid, honest people who are concerned about your soul to speak the truth, in love. Godly wisdom works to build and change you in a way that honors God. Such relationships are rare, but worth cultivating with those He sends into your life.

Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. – Ephesians 4:15

Counsel

Underlying traumas may not evidence anger issues until triggered, but support is available to you. Therapy provides space to unlearn reactions while modeling techniques for communication about difficult matters, including those that have fostered an unhealthy allegiance to anger.

In tandem with one of the professionals at our office, you can expect to uproot anger that has seeded thought and evolved into destructive behavioral patterns. Therapy can yield multiple benefits for you to heal from past and present anger, releasing you into the promise of a healed and hopeful future.

Reach out today. Schedule an appointment. Your new beginning awaits.