My Emotional Behavior

But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.”  1 Kings 3:26

When I get short-tempered at work, I can usually keep my behavior in check well enough that my emotions don’t spill out into my words and actions. Even though I may sometimes feel like it, I don’t routinely yell at patients. At home too, where I’m unfortunately more comfortable saying angry things, I’m learning to control my tongue. My wife knows me well enough however, that even if I’m not saying something rude, she can tell when I’m mad. She says it’s not what I say, but rather, it’s how I say it. Apparently, my emotions leach out into my words, even when I feel I’m controlling them. I don’t have to obey my emotions – I choose my behavior – but still, my emotions really want to control my behavior.

This is, I think, what happened in today’s passage. In the story, two women shared a dwelling place, both delivering infants within a few days of each other. Unfortunately, one of the infants died during the night. In her grief and despair, the mother of the dead infant switched the babies, claiming the live one as her own. When the dispute was brought before King Solomon, he called for a sword to divide the living child in two, giving half to each woman. The true mother of the living infant objected, while grieving mother agreed. This, of course, proved the identity of the real mother.

Perhaps the grieving mother was a monster prior to the loss of her child. We’re not given much information about her previous life except that she was a prostitute. I doubt though, that she routinely murdered infants. I think that the death of her infant was a tragic accident and that in her grief, her emotions took control of her behavior and suddenly, she was fine with killing the other baby. Misery loves company and so, to lessen her grief, she endorsed the death of another child.

We’ve all known those people whose behavior is completely dictated by their emotions. When they’re happy, they treat others well. When they’re unhappy, they lash out continuously at everyone around them. They don’t have to act this way, but they’ve allowed their emotions to control their behavior so often that they don’t really know how not to do it. Like any behavior, emotional behavior becomes a habit that is difficult to interrupt. We are, however, responsible for our words and actions, and we don’t have to allow our emotions to control our lives. In fact, the Christian life means learning to say “no” to how we want to act, so that we may act as we should. We cannot always control our emotions, but we do decide if we follow those emotions or if we follow Christ.