When They're Driving You Crazy

     Some people chew really loudly. Other people have one of those voices that drives you crazy. Let's not even talk about nail-biting, leaving clothes in the dryer, taking your stuff without asking, and leaving the remote buried somewhere in the couch cushions. The more you get to know people, the more they can make you want to beat your head against a wall.
     Did you know that there is actually a disorder label for people who can't stand certain sounds? It's called Misophonia. Personally, I can't wait for the disorder label I can use to justify eating pounds of chocolate and gallons of coffee.
     In his book The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis addressed how Satan can use our tendency to get easily bothered by the little habits of others, like leaving the toilet seat up, to cause us to sin against them. When you think about it, it makes a whole lot of sense. The book is a series of letters from a senior demon to an apprentice. Their correspondence is about ruining the life of the apprentice's human 'patient.' The older wiser one said, "When two humans have lived together for many years it usually happens that each has tones of voice and expressions of face which are almost unendurably irritating to the other. Work on that. Bring fully into the consciousness of your patient that particular lift of his mother's eyebrows which he learned to dislike in the nursery, and let him think how much he dislikes it. Let him assume that she knows how annoying it is and does it to annoy--if you know your job he will not notice the immense improbability of the assumption. And, of course, never let him suspect that he has tones and looks which similarly annoy her" (13).
     Do you have siblings? I can tell what you might be thinking. Pastor Jason, you don't know my brother. He really does annoy me on purpose. He gets a sick little pleasure out of making me want to tear my hair out. Are there people like this? Yes. I'll grant you that. But, in your situation is it not possible there are things that annoy him about you that cause him to antagonize?
     The Bible makes it clear that we are very good at picking out the faults of others and very bad at noticing our own. Jesus talked about this in his Sermon on the Mount. One person tries to criticize someone else for something petty and small while failing to see how horrible he or she is behaving themself (Mt. 7:1-6).
     How can we avoid getting stuck in this trap of Satan? First, we must realize that our Enemy loves nothing better than seeing people set against one another for any reason whatsoever. He is the sower of discord. He hates it when Christians dwell together in unity. Secondly, we must develop the ability to honestly and lovingly talk to each other about what annoys us. If we wait till whatever it is has driven us half-mad over the course of several weeks we will probably blow up at them instead of addressing it calmly. Finally, we have to force ourselves to admit that for everything someone does to annoy us (whether on purpose or unintentionally) there is probably at least one thing we do that frustrates them to no end. We can't expect others to work on their habits if we aren't willing to work on ours.
     So, the next time your mom uses that tone that frustrates the heck out of you, ask yourself this question: Have I ever used a tone with her that might be annoying? Start working on your own tone and then you can see clearly to talk respectfully to her about hers.