Category: anger

Stuff

Posted on by Susan Panzica

I heard a song recently that struck a chord with me. It wasn’t the tune which got me. In fact, when I first heard it, I was ready to dismiss the song as fluff, “gospel-lite”, not worthy of my attention. But the words convicted me deeply.
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Too often, I’m derailed by small things, things that are so trivial it’s embarrassing to admit I’m bothered by them, “stuff” as Francesca Battistelli calls them. In a world where people experience deep suffering, why do I allow these small matters to rob me of joy and peace?
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The Bible refers to small annoyances such as these as “little foxes that ruin vineyards.” Song of Sol 2:15
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Many small things have great impact.
• A poor widow donated two small coins and was honored for it.
• A young boy shared a lunch of two small fish and five loaves, and it was used to feed thousands.
• The mustard seed is the “smallest of all seeds on earth. Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants…” Mk. 4:31-32
• “The tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.” Jms 3:5
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Small things can have large consequences — negative ones or positive ones — depending upon our response to them. We’re given a choice: to just be irritated OR to allow God to use these irritations to shape our character like a file smooths a rough surface.
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This is the Stuff – Francesca Battistelli
I lost my keys in the great unknown
And call me please ‘Cuz I can’t find my phone
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This is the stuff that drives me crazy
This is the stuff that’s getting to me lately
In the middle of my little mess
I forget how big I’m blessed
This is the stuff that gets under my skin
But I gotta trust You know exactly what You’re doing
It might not be what I would choose
But this is the stuff You use
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So break me of impatience my frustrations
I’ve got a new appreciation
It’s not the end of the world

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HteoxWzAT8

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The Perfect Comeback

Posted on by Susan Panzica
I almost did it.
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Have you, like me, ever yearned for a perfect comeback to someone discourteous, but couldn’t think of a thing until hours later, and only then after mulling over all possible options for hours?
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Today, I almost had my moment.
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Of course, it’s a dicey situation, isn’t it? What if that person walks into my office tomorrow or my church on Sunday, not to mention the fact that I represent Jesus who is always with me. But today, as I muttered to my steering wheel, it came to me. The perfect comeback. And I almost had the opportunity to express it.
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Here’s how it all went down:
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I met my husband and son at the Post Office needing to renew our three passports. The clerk, Ann, had just taken their mug shots photos and seemed a little annoyed that she had to stay in the chilly lobby to take yet another one. [OK, I get that.]
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My husband’s joke, “Can I get a different background?” was met by stony silence. No smile, headshake, or even an acknowledgement that he had spoken, despite the chuckles of other patrons stamping their letters nearby.
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After my quick headshot, we returned to her station to proceed with the paperwork. Tony reminded her to process my son’s application first because he needed to leave quickly. Her steely-eyed glare was almost as cold as her reply, “I heard you the first time.” Ouch, that was a little harsh, but giving her the benefit of the doubt, my husband can have a tendency to make sure things are done “right.” [Luv ya, hon ;D]
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As she continued to process the many papers, photos, and payments, her attitude continued to deteriorate from abrupt to curt to downright churlish.
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Tony and I walked away mumbling to each other about her. My photo horrified me. For the next 10 years, I will be identified by a ghastly auburn slash of bang bisecting my forehead. Come on, I’m a girl, you’re a girl, can’t you clue me in before you snap?
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But later I had to return to mail the applications with a “traceable delivery method” and I would have my chance. At least I thought I would. Here’s how I had it worked out in my head:
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“Hi, again. Are you having a bad day today? Because I’d like to pray for you.” [genuine sweet smile]
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“Hmmmpphhh…”
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“But if you’re just ordinarily surly, I’ll pray differently for you. [wink, not so genuine huge sweet smile] Thank you so much. Have a great day.”
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When I returned to the scene of the crime, alas, at clerk Ann’s counter stood Charles; Ann nowhere to be seen, perhaps gone for the day. The momentary disappointment that I wouldn’t get my chance for the perfect comeback was partnered with a flood of relief that I couldn’t share that perfect comeback.

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In the movie, You’ve Got Mail, Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) longs to hurl a perfect comeback to her adversary, Joe Fox (Tom Hanks). Only when she finally does, it came with the realization that her words left her feeling worse for having said them. “Do you ever feel like you’ve become the worst version of yourself? That a Pandora’s Box of all the secret hateful parts — your arrogance, your spite, your condescension — has sprung open. Someone provokes you, and instead of just smiling and moving on, you zing them. I didn’t get any satisfaction from it,” she types, “I just felt mean. When you say the thing you mean to say at the moment you mean to say it, remorse inevitably follows.” I knew I’d feel the same way.
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So, what is the perfect comeback? It is to come back to the Lord and allow Him take care of any consequences my “adversary” deserves. I spent half my day invisibly tethered to a mean-spirited postal worker. What a waste of time and energy.
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Instead, I decided to honestly pray for her. You never know why God puts certain people in your path, and it may be that I’m the only one praying for her. For the next 10 years, my bifurcated forehead photo will serve as a reminder, not just to pray for Ann and others like her, but to keep turning the other cheek, going the second mile, and loving the unlovely, for as Jesus said, “If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? …In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.” Mt. 5:46-48 MSG



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I Hate Chipmunks!

Posted on by Susan Panzica
In September and October, you walk our front pathway at your peril. We have the most aggressive acorns you’ve ever seen, or felt. Honestly. The dents they render to a car’s hood or roof are nothing compared to the bumps they produce on your noggin.

Then in the spring, I tackle the unhappy chore of removing of hundreds of tiny oak trees sprouting in my garden. So this week, I decided to pre-empt those suckers and rid the garden of them before taking root. Not as easy as I thought. Like giant pistachios, they had already split and many a root sprouted, burrowed firmly in the soil.

Although there were hundreds, maybe thousands, most were on the surface, fairly easy to dig up, but here and there I uncovered clusters of acorns hidden in the stone wall, under the branches of low bushes, concealed among the stalks.



Then I found it – the Mother Lode, the Cave of Wonders, the Pirate’s Booty. No way was this pile the result of falling acorns. This was a secret stash, a stockpile surreptitiously buried in some clandestine plot. This was the resident chipmunks’ winter preparations.


The outward appearances of these adorable little furballs belie their true identity – hideously destructive varmints. They burrow holes in the soil, loosen the supporting rocks, and now hoard potentially damaging future oak trees.

I didn’t see any chipmunks as I was working. No, they save their activities for when no one is around to witness their detrimental deeds. But the evidence of their handiwork is apparent.


Of course this got me thinking….

These acorns are like the barbed comments that people fling our way. And they hurt, not a bruise on the head, but on the heart. Zingers that find our soft spot, and embed themselves. If we let them take root, they will grow and fester and bear bitter resentful fruit. The longer the root remains, the stronger it gets and the harder it is to remove. It is easy to narrow our eyes at the perpetrator, to retaliate, to judge. But Scripture tells us:


… make sure there is no root among you that produces such bitter poison. Deut. 29:18
See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. Heb. 12:15

After wasting useless minutes fuming at these critters, I realized –
             they are just doing what chipmunks do.
All my anger isn’t going to make them more sensitive.


I can’t change them, but I can change my root structure:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in Him, rooted and built up in Him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. Col. 2:6-7


Instead of hating the chipmunks, I have a choice.
And with those whose comments dent my soul, I have a choice.
I can let them fester, develop bitter roots, and ultimately poison me. Or I can respond as Jesus did. “Father, forgive them. Those chipmunks just don’t know what they’re doing.” Well, a loose paraphrase, but you get the idea.

I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Eph. 3:16-19

Do You See What I See?

Posted on by Susan Panzica
Betsy, as promised, here’s the story…

At training camp last week, I entered the primitive shower stall ever-so-gently, trying not to waken my sleeping cabin-mates. And there it was. A cricket on the floor of the stall. Shudder!!

Have I ever mentioned – I have a thing about crickets. I absolutely LOATHE them. If they stay outdoors in their proper habitat, I can manage, barely. But should they dare to enter MY habitat, they become an endangered species.

It all goes back to the summer of ’79. A rainy summer it was, that first year my friends and I rented a summer cottage (think – converted garage) in the Hamptons. By summer’s end, we had enough of the rain, especially since it brought crickets and their incessant chirping inside. I learned to ferret out their hideaways, anticipate their jumping trajectory, and have my flip-flop poised, ready to trounce. I became a serial cricket-murderer.

[by the way, one of the kids at training camp told me that when he first heard the term serial murderer, he wondered why anyone would want to kill cereal. But I digress, sorry]

Now toward summer’s end, I developed a fierce case of bronchitis. When my friend, Donna, went out for the evening, I rested on the couch in the living room. Delirious with fever, not quite awake or asleep, but somewhere in between, I see it. Sitting on the coffee table beside my bed. Staring at me with its hideous eyes. Antennae quivering. A giant, white albino cricket. And I do mean giant – it was the exact length and width of the coffee table. Frozen under my sheets, I sense it poised, waiting to pounce at my slightest movement. My lungs constrict as I ponder its possible trajectory.


Ah! Lights flash in the driveway. A car door thud, followed by the crush of gravel underfoot. The screen door creaks and Donna enters the room. Courageously, I shout a warning, “LOOK OUT FOR THE CRICKET!” Baffled, she asks, “What cricket?”


What cricket??? Is she blind?


My arm pointing to the offender, I shriek, “THE GIANT ALBINO CRICKET ON THE COFFEE TABLE!” And then with a huff, I turn my back to both Donna and the cricket.


In my mind’s eye, I saw both Donna and the imaginary cricket, so I pose the question:

How can she miss what I can see so clearly?


Which, in my illustration-grappling mind, translates to “Why doesn’t everyone see things my way?”


Ok, so that time, it was a fever-induced hallucination. But there’s many a time that subconsciously we picture ourselves as “the smartest person in the room,” so why isn’t everyone listening to ME? And though we may not say it, we wonder – Can’t you see my brilliant wisdom?? Can’t you see the situation or the solution as clearly as I do?


Be it is a colleague at the office, a fellow team member with a differing leadership style, someone in our circle of friends or a family member, somewhere along the line, it is certain that we will encounter a thorn in flesh, and when we do, we need to get over ourselves.



When I have that prideful attitude, I’m wrong even if I’m right. In his letter to the Phillipians, Paul says it this way:


If you’ve gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if His love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care— then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.


Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.







Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever…

The Christian life is not a “my way or the highway” life. Before insisting on our way, we need to consider others better than ourselves. Who knows? God used a donkey to speak to a prophet. Imagine what can He do with me when I set aside my own agenda.

Climate Change

Posted on by Susan Panzica

Yesterday, a patient entered our office declaring, “It’s so hot outside.” Hmmmm… It’s January in New Jersey, how can it be considered “hot”?? Well, at 55 degrees, it was sweltering and came close to setting a record.    

But the same 55 degrees in August would be considered frigid.

Now today it’s down to 35 degrees, a cold snap compared to yesterday, but compared to the 10 degree temperatures we suffered in December, today’s 35 degrees would be considered downright balmy.
This thing is – 55 degrees is 55 degrees.
Period.
If it’s been cold, 55 feels like a heat wave, but if it’s been warm, 55 feels chilly.

It only seems to be cold or warm because of our feelings. The temperature is what it is, but we respond to it differently based upon how we feel at any given moment.

And our feelings are subjective. They are influenced by people around us, circumstances that we can or cannot control, health issues, the slow driver in front of us, the pants that no longer zipper up, the song that reminds us of something we want to forget, hormones (or as Beth Moore says “haaar-mones, ladies”).

How we feel about something doesn’t necessarily reveal the truth of a matter.

One day, my husband can ask, “Are you ready?” and I’ll say, “Just a minute, hon, gotta grab my bag.”

And another day, same question, same 3 words, but I’ll bite his head off. “What do you mean – am I ready? Who do you think you are anyway, the time-dictator? You’re always criticizing how long it takes me to do things. You don’t always have to wait for me. Sometimes, I’m ready on time. Do you think I try to make you wait? This is how long it takes me to get ready, so just hold your horses. Now I gotta grab my tissues and makeup. You made me cry. Thanks a lot.”

Same question. Two different responses depending on how I was feeling.

Our feelings change like the weather, up and down. (Sometimes even because of the weather, right?) And how we feel changes how we perceive things.

But there is something that never changes.

Jesus.

He is who He is – unchanging, fixed, the same yesterday, today and forever. Our temperature may change, but His truth remains the same.

When we are upset or depressed, we must evaluate our feelings against the barometer of God’s Word. What is really the truth? How I feel? Or what God says?

True peace is not found in positive thinking, in absence of conflict, or in good feelings. In fact, true peace is found in spite of them. (Philippians 4:6,7)

And speaking of personal climate change, Ron Hutchcraft wrote a wonderful story about how our temperature affects those around us.

http://www.hutchcraft.com/a-word-with-you/your-personal-power/changing-the-climate-6010

His conclusion:
It’s easy to complain about how things are in your family, or how they are at work or how they are at church or at school. But complaining won’t change a thing. Neither will condemning or criticizing or preaching. What is needed where you are is someone who will be what they wish others would be – to lead by contagious example. To step out from a climate that is negative or nasty or stressed or prideful or selfish, and to challenge it, not by their words, but by their actions. Decide how you wish everyone would be in your situation, and then start being it yourself!


Over time, one person can have amazing power to change the atmosphere and to improve the climate. In the places God has put you, why don’t you be the one who quietly leads everyone else to something better? Don’t wait for someone else to change. You have the power to start changing the climate in your personal world.


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How can you be a climate-changer? What would it take? 

Susan

The Princess and The Pea

Posted on by Susan Panzica
It was there. I knew it. I just couldn’t find it.

Every step I took told me there was something sharp under my foot. I took off my slipper. I took off my sock. I shook them out. I put on my sock. I put on my slipper. I took a step. Arrrgh! Still there! Over and over, I repeated this on-off-on procedure until I discovered a tiny,but sharp pebble deeply embedded in the fleecy fur of the slipper. I felt like the storybook princess who felt a tiny pea buried under her many mattresses. Something so small disturbed her terribly.

This tiny stone irritated my foot and annoyed me greatly. How about when a piece of sand gets in your eye? It rubs and scratches and grates against the delicate tissue causing redness, tears and ultimately destruction if it is not removed.

A few (quite a few!) years ago, I was on a retreat with several friends. Nancy, Neil and I were walking, and I had trouble with the stairs due to an old injury to my right knee. At 16 years old, I had surgery on the knee after a bad fall that chipped part of the back of the kneecap (among other things). The surgery removed the chips and repaired the ligaments & tendons, but the surgeon did not smooth the back of the kneecap, as he should have. Consequently, the knee was (and is – despite 2 additional surgeries) a “constant source of irritation”. When I explained my knee trouble to Nancy & Neil, I mentioned those words “constant source of irritation”. Immediately, Nancy turned to Neil with a smile (or should I say smirk) and said, “Neil, you are a constant source of irritation!”
We have laughed about this for years since. But if you have someone, or something, in your life that is a constant source of irritation, it usually is not a laughing matter. Just the sight of that person can raise all sorts of emotions. Just the reminder of that situation can cause physical responses such as tightening of the muscles, headaches… do I need to go on?

But take that very same grain of sand, that source of irritation to the eye, place it in an oyster, and something magical happens. When that irritant is caught inside the oyster’s shell, the oyster starts to secrete a substance called nacre. This substance coats the irritant and encapsulates it. According to Wikipedia, “Nacre, also known as mother of pearl, is strong, resilient, and iridescent. This substance is called “mother of pearl” because it is literally the “mother”, or creator, of true pearls.” What begins as an irritating annoyance is transformed. The insignificant grain of sand has become a valuable pearl.
What is important to note is the fact that the irritant in the eye is exactly the same as the one in the oyster. What is different is the response! Scripture is clear that God allows tribulations in our lives (John 16:33). Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” The phrase, “you will have trouble” is sandwiched between “you may have peace” and “take heart. I have overcome the world!”.

Whatever is your “constant source of irritation” can be transformed into a valuable pearl if you respond as the oyster. Won’t you be “strong, resilient and iridescent” (reflecting the light!)? Would you receive your irritation as the beginning of a beautiful transformation in your life? Will you recognize that God allowed this person or situation to be close to you for your benefit, so that you can be transformed? And take note – there would be no valuable pearl without that annoying irritant!

In the fable, the princess was troubled by a small matter. In real life, you are a princess (1 Peter 2:9) You are a daughter of the King. Do not let yourself be troubled by what really is a small matter compared to our kingdom, our eternity! Allow that nuisance to bring about transformation – Christlikeness – the most precious, priceless, valuable quality you could ever possess.

Susan