SELF CONTROL

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SELF CONTROL

The Problem Of Blaming Others

You know you are not accepting personal responsibility if you do this one thing: blame others for your problems, life situation, hardships, character flaws, and just about everything and anything else. Rather than accepting the "blame" or responsibility for how your life is, you make excuses. Everything and anybody is to blame -- except you.

Blaming is nearly universal. It seems to be an essential part of human development. When language skills develop, one of the first practical things that can be done with them is to apply them to blame others for one's own misdeeds, and get them sanctioned or punished while one simply continues to engage in more of same.

To Blame is to hold another person or group responsible for perceived faults, be those faults real, imagined, or merely invented for perorative purposes. Blame is an act of censure, reproach, and often cases outright condemnation. Blame is used to place responsibility and accountability for faults on the blamed person or group. For some people, the first reaction to a problem is to find someone to blame. Blaming is a defense mechanism to avoid taking personal responsibility for the situation.

The blamer rapidly finds fault in the other person and criticizes them. Trying to find a solution to the problem is much better than looking for someone to blame. Blaming is a pattern in some families that keeps people from becoming closer. People who blame others or situations without taking responsibility for their contribution to the problem ever get the sense of satisfaction of growth. By refusing to see their own errors, they lose the opportunity to change the very aspects of themselves that keep them stuck.

The tendency for groups to blame others for their difficulties is so widespread that at times it seems almost universal. While we often do this as individuals, blaming others for our personal problems, it as members of groups that we excel in this accusatory trait. It is one of the major neurotic (i.e., skewed) reasons why we join groups. They often provide refuge for us with like-minded people who will agree with us that our problems are out there instead of within. If there is any perceived truth in our blame of a particular target, then we are often quick to place all the blame on that target. This excuses us from looking at ourselves. How convenient!

Verbal bashing is rarely seen as a trap. There is a sense of being on the side of justice, and the process of bashing seems to make one feel better (temporarily at least). Unfortunately, this process is no better than making oneself feel better by smoking, by drinking, or by another addictive behavior. Why? Essentially, bashing just releases steam without facing one's real issues beneath the anger. (A stage of blame is necessary, but is not effective when directed at people.)

In all likelihood, bashing will produce a painful backlash. Confirmed bashers will feel righteously indignant about the backlash and often trap themselves into more bashing. VERBAL BASHING IS A TRAP!

We Are As Healthy As We Are Ready To Take
Responsibility For Our Own Thoughts And Behaviors!

Maximum Blessing in Self Control

The Christian and the minister of The Gospel is responsible to control himself. Instructed by the Word of God, enlightened by the Spirit of God, we are to live responsibly for Christ. By so doing, we will pursue a course of minimal frustration and of maximum blessing. The challenge of the Christian life is responsible living. Self-control can bring stability to the individual, the family, and the nation.

The stable, self-controlled life of the Christian provides a contrast to the erratic, unstable age in which we live. As we approach the consummation of history, we see emotional and spiritual instability taking over the hearts of men. The unsettled nature of our time becomes obvious as we see men and women lose the willingness and then the ability to control themselves.

Paul tells Timothy in the third chapter of his second epistle to him that perilous times shall come in the last days. He gives a list of reasons for these perilous times:

“For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God” {2 Timothy 3: 2-3}

Here we have a list of the attitudes that will characterize many at the end of the age. One of them is distinguished by the word incontinent. In English, this word means “unable to contain oneself,” “the absence of self-control,” or “out of control.” In the original language, the word is akratos.

Note that to be incontinent is the opposite of being stable or of exercising self-control. The same root is used in both of these instances, but one means self-control and the other means the absence of self-control. The call to self-control, to personal stability, to the exercise of personal responsibility, is one of the imperatives of the successful Christian life.

The call to self-control reminds us of the nature of our relationship to God. Knowing that God is all-powerful and man finite, we might imagine that the obedient Christian becomes little more than a marionette, his arms and legs activated by strings from heaven and controlled by an unseen hand.

But the call to self-control defeats that notion. The believer conducts his life on the basis of instructions from the Lord, but he is not a thoughtless, unwilling puppet. The plan of God is accomplished in our world by the will of the believer responding affirmatively to the will of God as given in the Word. To say that the Holy Spirit controls us is a less-than-accurate description of the relationship between the believer and his Lord. It is rather true that He instructs us, He leads us, and we, by doing the will of God, perform heaven’s purposes.

All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you.