“Somebody STOP me! “ It was a line in a Jim Carrie movie that we’ve heard in comedy routines, and in every day life. A more pertinent question is, “Why don’t you stop yourself?”
Society today seems all to willing to accept the premise that any perpetrator of bad behavior is simply a victim, and it’s all someone else’s fault. Excuses are offered to those who seem unable or unwilling to control themselves. Drug addicts are given clean needles, because they are victims The addiction made them do it!
I was recently a part of a program at a county youth detention center. It was heart-rending to see children who looked to be as young as eight or nine-years old, being detained as a result of sometimes heinous crimes. Others were there because no one, including themselves, could control them.
Singer Ray Charles once told the court that his drug addiction was not his fault- someone gave the stuff to him and showed him how to use it. Former D.C. Mayor Marion Barry, caught on tape using illegal drugs, exclaimed that the (woman) with him had ‘set him up‘. And on and on.
We also hear a lot about ‘anger management’ classes. Judges regularly sentence out -of -control miscreants to such classes. Strangely, I can’t seem to find any reports of success resulting from these classes. Could it be due to the fact that the person’s anger is not to blame, but that the root cause is their lack of self control? I can’t find any evidence of ‘self control’ classes.
My parents worked hard to instill self control within us. They often told us the we need to strive to be in control of ourselves at all times. “You will be under someone’s control throughout your life, so you should make sure that person is you“. A child throwing a tantrum in a store needs to be taught that being out of control has consequences. When a parent takes control of the child and physically forces him to comply, it has less effect than when the child is taught to keep himself under control.
Many of the youth who are placed in anger management classes need consistent discipline, with sure punishment for failure to be under control. I was taught that people who live lives out of control eventually end up in a place where their lives are totally controlled by someone else-prison; where someone else controls when you lie down, when you arise; when you eat and sleep, exercise and when you see your loved ones.
The newspaper regularly announces meetings of a multitude of ‘support groups’. I am certain this service helps many people to come to grips with whatever their problem is, but, my research reflects that they often help people avoid confronting and taking control of areas of their lives that lack personal discipline.
The Bible warns us that, in the last days (in which many people believe we are living), self control will be, well, out of control!
Second Timothy says, “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money..., disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited... Have nothing to do with them. Galatians lists self control as one of the Fruits of the Spirit.
That dire warning seems to clearly describe what is happening today. I try to heed it by avoiding people and situations that are out of control. And, I purpose practice self-control at all times.
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