“I'm a little teapot, short and stout. Here is my handle; here is my spout. When I get all steamed up, hear me shout. Tip me over and pour me out!”
It seems I have been a teapot (cracked though I may be) all week; not because I was teaching the song, but because I have been boiling mad all week.
And I hate being this angry.
While some of my anger had to do with righteous indignation over a situation, other causes were just things not going how I thought they should. The thing about anger, however, is once it gets a foothold, it seems to keep getting hotter … and hotter … and hotter - until the teapot is shouting; screaming to be released. Had I truly been a teapot this week, there would have been several days when steam would have been pouring out of my ears.
As Christians in a world that grows in evil each day, it is so easy to become angry if we do not take care. While we perceive a sense of injustice or righteous indignation gives us a green light to be angry, we shouldn't use that as an excuse to let that anger spill over causing us to sin. And many, many times, it does exactly that. I will admit, I've had to repent every day this week. While we can argue that Jesus himself was angry when he drove the money changers from the temple, He didn't sin against them. He prayed for them. He prayed for the Pharisees who constantly sought to catch Him in a verbal trap. He held no malice against the man who drove the nails into His hands and feet. He prayed for those who condemned Him to die on a cross.
Yet, when we get angry, we can't pray for those who we perceive have done us or a loved one an injustice. While we may say with our mouth, “Lord, help them,” we secretly wish all the fires of hell upon their head. Come on and admit it; we have all been there. We have all wished for some calamity to fall on them so we can sit back in judgment and say, “Yep, you reap what you sew.” And we laugh internally satisfied to finally see justice done.
However, being a Christian, that should not be how we react to insults, injustice, or any kind of anger. Ephesians 4:26 instructs us to not sin in our anger; nor let the sun go down while we are still angry. And it is so very easy to sin when our blood is boiling mad. The best thing to do is to leave the situation to God. Is He not the author and Creator of us? Is He not big enough to solve any problem?
The best thing to do for someone who has injured you for whatever reason is to follow Proverbs 25:21-22, “If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; for in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head, and the Lord will reward you.” It's the only way to take the teapot from the fire.
From a Cracked Pot

