So, which comes first; a politician who speaks and acts in ways that get you angry and upset, or a propensity to be angry and upset within yourself before that politician came along?
The truth is that another person never makes us angry. They can’t. They do not control our thinking. They cannot force their thoughts to be our thoughts. They cannot put evil into our mind and make us mad. They have no power over our consciousness.
Anger is a reaction, commonly of pride, self-righteousness, ego, self-indignation, envy, jealousy, and so on. Even in the face of injustice, anger is a choice, not a requirement.
As children of God, we each can respond to any situation, no matter how wrong it appears, with dominion, sound reasoning, calm perspective and words that help and heal. We do not have to let our thinking get lost in blind anger. We can respond with love that improves the situation for everyone.
So, be angry no more! You don’t have to be. You can choose to love instead.
What the world needs now is not more anger, but more love. Lead the way….
Thank you Evan for this important reminder to love love Love! And if the political situations look worse o u r remedy is to let God’s spiritual and powerful law control and govern the situation. In reality there is no other law than God’s which is able to reighn supremely. Endless thanks to God for Christian Science!♡
Nice thought. Thank you!
Thanks, Evan. When we take God’s point of view, we don’t see a mortal, whether someone appears as a politician, relative, friend, or stranger. We see the pure, innocent, undefiled child of God. The error they appear to be expressing is always separate from them. It is no more part of them than a mathematical mistake is part of the math fact it is falsely representing. Do we get angry at a mathematical mistake? Then we don’t need to get angry over anger! It’s no part of us either!
Amen
Evan your insights are so helpful and so well expressed. Which came first the politician or my anger?
I’ve seen anger as a mental wound that never healed and became an angry wound..But as you point out I can choose to heal that wound.
In the Old Testament it says “Choose ye this day whom you choose to serve”. If I choose to serve love ( give and blessed others) I will heal wounds of the past.. then I can live in the present debt free ( anger free ).
I am a bystander observing the world and I can let it be a world of God’s creating..
Thank you John. A timely, daily reminder for me to remember in many situations.
One of the main things I’ve taken from SV is the lesson that error attached to personality is what we must see as the human lie. Thank you Evan and all for helping me see and understand the Spiritual truth about mankind. Gods work is forever unfolding…❣️
Hymn p 253
“And o’re earth’s troubled, angry “SEE”
I see Christ walk,
And come to me, and TENDERLY,
DIVINELY TALK. “
Thanks, M. This is wonderful….I pray with this hymn everyday. I love the next part….”
Thus Truth engrounds me on the rock,
Upon Life’s shore,
‘Gainst which the winds and waves can shock,
Oh, nevermore.”
Thank you Evan. Your post brought to mind a saying I’ve heard every now and then. “You can’t get there from here.”; which for me when applied spiritually is that you are unlikely to get to a peaceful mind through a angry reaction. To me This saying means that we can’t force something to its rightful conclusion. Something that is right will fit perfectly without force. For me I know when it is right when I basically am following the path which allows things to happen in their natural course governed by God. In extreme cases afterwards I;ve realized that there is simply no way that the particular situation could workout except by divine providence and allowing God to direct.
Merci beaucoup
“Seeing” God’s government is the message to me.
Thank you, Evan.
I’m so grateful for Christian Science which teaches us how to change thought to realize only God governs. What a joy it is when confronted with lies of mortal suggestions to turn from a lie by changing the channel in thought through prayer to perceive the Truth of God’s abundant Good as the ever-present Truth. It’s so wonderful we have such helpful resources like SV, our Bible Lesson, and our periodicals to turn to.
Enjoying the inspirations of this article:
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/29wk6sldhei?s=e
Thank you Evan for sharing this message of how to get a more spiritual perspective on handling anger and how to change our thought to a better view of our world. Knowing that we are always under the loving government of divine Love and all dearly loved by our Father Mother helps keep a clearer view of our own true identity and the identity of each one of us!
Thanks to Angie for the helpful article. Am sharing the Spiritview and article with a friend today!
Thanks for every ones sharing. Love the insights of each contributor!
There seems to be so much anger and misunderstanding and the thought “choose to love instead” (thank you, Evan) is so needed today more than ever. I believe our perspective either helps heal or inflames, by giving credence to mortal mind.
Are we really Listening to which politicians and parties want to look Forward or look backward, bring God back into our society or take God and religion away and put in a system that makes mortal government into a god?
Who is promoting peace and order, who is promoting violence and mayhem or letting it enrage and divide even further, by not denouncing it.
Who is looking towards the Positive, rather than blaming others and trying to knock down, rather than build up. The decision is ours.
Anger is mortal mind’s way of trying to bully it’s way into power. Are we letting this anger fester, become our guiding force, taking away our happiness or are we looking forward to a God-filled future of Love and harmony, working together for peace, where everyone is Truly (in Truth) one universal family of loving each other as God created us to be?
Well said Carol.
I agree Evan and thank you1. More Love not hate.
This is more helpful than words can express.
Thank you
This is beautiful! Thanks, Evan. I am so grateful to know that I don’t have the propensity to be angry and upset. I have the inclination to be calm and peaceful.
Evan’s comments today reminded me of a popular song when I was growing up What the World Needs Now is Love some of the lyrics being
“What the world needs now is love, sweet love
It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of
What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
No not just for some but for everyone.”
I didn’t know about Christian Science then, but it seemed like a nice idea. Now I understand that “love sweet love” is here and it is for everyone – it is the omnipotent, omnipresent, omniactive, omniscient divine Love that is God. Fear can be viewed as a linchpin of anger and as 1John tells us ” There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear:” and thus anger must fall into its native nothingness.
Thank you Evan!
While I value every topic and lesson shared daily, there are times when your choice of words and insight make me want to jump for joy. This is one of those times.
As a rule, I do not spend time looking in my past but I must say my glorious journey deeper and deeper into understanding Christian Science has been a blessing indeed. You see, I did let anger over other people’s behavior get the best of me and wasted many precious moments…
But now I choose to
“Lead the way”with LOVE….
Thank you all❣️❣️
Thank you Evan for these valuable questions. In My. (First Church of CS’t and Miscellany) Eddy says re her politics “I hv none, in reality, other than to help support a righteous govt; to love God supremely, and my neighbor as myself.” Later she says “The peace and prosperity of a people largely depends on the morals of their leaders and equity of their laws.” She loved Pres. Lincoln and had pictures of him in her home. She had an etching of Lincoln reading the Emancipation Proclamation. Interestingly, Lincoln’s daughter-in-law, 2 grand daughters and a great grand daughter all became CS’s.
When Judge Hanna asked Eddy if it wd be all right for him to become involved w the Prohibition Party, Eddy, who was a longtime supporter of prohibition said, “There is more present good done by being in the midst of error and neutralizing the old w the new. The old bottles of dishonesty in politicians needs emptying, and it needs yr purpose poured into it, purpose to accomplish the most good for the least member. If you are now firmly rooted and grounded in Christ, Truth…you can do more good by occasionally working among politicians than to taking yrself away from them.” I love that.
Thank you, Cathryn. I love hearing MBE’s perspective. It is very helpful. It helps me with my job too, when I feel as though I’m surrounded by those that don’t yet know that we are 100% spiritual- immortal, and perfect children of God. Hearing how important it is for me to be there, confirming Truth and loving “the way” Jesus did- and to work to see them as God’s sees them. So wonderful! Thank you my friend for your interesting additions!
What thoughtful comments. Thanks to all and especially Carol. You expressed my thoughts perfectly! The link to the very profound article is greatly appreciated. I have shared the article and will be reading it again and again.
This is true unless you can’t stop crying.
Some other reasons for anger are frustration, a feeling of helplessness, of seeing great wrongs being committed, over and over again, which I think is what is happening with the riots we are seeing around the country.
Even so, anger is a destructive emotion.
What you said Evan is so true: “As children of God, we each can respond to any situation, no matter how wrong it appears, with dominion, sound reasoning, calm perspective and words that help and heal. We do not have to let our thinking get lost in blind anger. We can respond with a love that improves the situation for everyone.” We rise in the strength of Spirit.
We are all doing the best we can and we can’t change on a dime. “Day by day the manna fell.” Until an angry person reaches the goal of harmony, we need to help them and have compassion on them, criticism is as inadequate as being angry. If people would look for the cause of the anger instead of judging others, Christianity would be much better understood. Even Jesus overturned the tables of the money changers because they made his Father’s house a den of thieves. Remember, Jesus love good and HATED iniquity.
I’ve learned about anger from a wonderful teacher. She has taught me how to “see” anger-which has been so helpful to me- I will share. When we hold onto anger it is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to be affected. If you look at the word- malign it malignant-like a cancer. The word malign- evil in nature or effect. When we hold on to anger… contempt for another, it is like a disease or dis ease in the mind and body. Of course as CStist we affirm that there is no disease in God’s Life and Mind does not create disease.
From human footsteps or for those who don’t yet know the Truth it is a practical idea to see anger for what it is- dis ease (disharmony) towards the one that holds onto it. As CStist we have so many tools to deal with disharmony. We are all on our way- spirit ward- and I am so very grateful. I am so grateful for Evans posts and everyone comments. Love this forum. Thank you!
I was taught that if I have a strong reaction to something done or said that I need to look at my consciousness and see what I am holding as true, agreeing with my adversary in some way, which is behind this strong reaction. It was always hard at first to do this but finding the ‘hook’ in me led to freedom. The erroneous idea often disappears when exposed to the light of the truth- the lie must be replaced with the truth. usually the same error being revealed again again.
I feel with our political situation in this country we are watching erroneous ideas coming forward to be dissolved. thank you
Any claim of discord comes to us simply because our identity is the exact reverse of what the claim seems to be. There is an interesting statement about Jesus healing the woman with an issue of blood where Mrs. Eddy says that “…he neither held her error by affinity nor by infirmity, for it was detected and dismissed” (Unity of Good 57:15-16). This means that we neither soak up the impressions of mortal mind because we are in sympathy with them, nor are we taking on the infirmities of others. I think this is important to remember, when people care deeply about what is going on around them, want to help, and yet can allow their sensitivity to take in the mortal pictures that are presented. Our Mind being God, we cannot take in the lie “by affinity nor by infirmity.”
“It is Truth’s knowledge of Its own infinitude that forbids the genuine existence of even a claim to error.” (No and Yes 30:18)