“Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly.” (Proverbs 14:29) We all know that people can be aggravating. They either won’t listen, listen and won’t respond, or respond and do the opposite. We must remember that we have acted the same way at times. I think the Lord uses difficult people in our life to accomplish many things, the greatest is to remind us of the patience He has shown us. When we see ourselves in the reaction of others, it will compel us to be patient.
Another work the Lord does in us through difficult people is that He teaches us how to deal with our frustrations when they reject us. The Lord doesn’t want us to be ‘reactionary’ in frustrating situations. We must not wear our feelings on our sleeves, or be so shallow that we do not give proper thought to our words. An illustration from early American politics will suffice to demonstrate this.
We are told that Thomas Jefferson had a meeting with President George Washington after he returned from France. During the meeting, the hostess offered Jefferson some coffee. When the coffee was served, Jefferson poured some of the coffee into his saucer. George Washington asked Jefferson, “Why did you do that?” Jefferson replied, “To cool off the coffee.”
Life is not always a path of ease. At times, we find ourselves in situations that give rise to frustrating emotions and desires to give others a ‘piece of our mind.’ Well, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, we need a saucer to cool our coffee off. Our spirit can boil at the drop of a hat and we must, as God’s children, learn the spiritual discipline for cooler heads to prevail. So, what is our saucer?
When we feel like venting or pouring forth our angry response, we need to understand that those type of reactions demonstrates our immaturity and shallow walk. Let us avail ourselves of the two saucers we can use to cool down our ‘coffee.’ The first is prayer. When we have talked to the Lord about the situation and sought His spiritual guidance, the law of love will rise to the top and bring our ‘coffee’ back to a palatable temperature. Being reactionary toward someone we have properly prayed for is hard.
The second saucer we have is time. Taking a pause to give our thoughts a break before answering helps to separate us from the emotive side of the situation. This will promote wisdom and understanding instead of defensiveness and impatience. We don’t have to be controlled or embarrassed by our foolish reactions if we’ll use the twin saucers of prayer and time.
Like Thomas Jefferson, let us learn to cool off our ‘coffee.’ Let us repent for causing others to stumble because of our unChristlike reactions. We can be a holy light and represent God’s mercy to others in pressure situations if we will… Use A Saucer!
