It is to a man’s honor to avoid strife,
but every fool is quick to quarrel.
—Proverbs 20:3
He stormed into the convenience store and started dressing me down because my front left tire was on the stripe next to a handicapped parking space. I responded in kind: told him he was rude, unworthy of the badge he was wearing, needed to take a course in sensitivity training—and threw the usual at him, “Why don’t you spend your time and taxpayers’ money going after the real criminals?”
As soon as I said it, I wished I hadn’t. “A fool gives full vent to anger, but a wise person quietly holds it back” (Prv 29:11).
“The fruit of the Spirit is . . . gentleness and self-control” (Gal 5:22, 23).
All we achieve by heated response is
to make ourselves the equal of the offender.