Every trap requires some cooperation from its victim.
The mouse must want the cheese.
The fish must want the worm.
A person must want a million dollars from the Nigerian Prince.
An individual must agree to answer a difficult situation with anger.
Nobody and no situation can force you in to the trap of reacting angrily. If this was the case, then everybody would react the same way to a situation. A person cannot make you angry. If they push your buttons, it is at least partially you that agrees to make your buttons available.
If someone can force you to act out angrily (as opposed to passionately,) then there is no such thing as sin. Sin is a free act of the will. If someone can force you to be so angry that it they that make you sin, then reality, the sin is there’s, not yours.
But that is not the case.
When you are cut off in traffic there are a lot of important emotions at play. “That is dangerous. Than is rude. That is unthoughtful. I am worth something - my desire to get home is important too. I’m trying to cooperate so that we can all get to where we want on time, why are you so special? . . . “ So forth and so on. A driver can go deeply down this wormhole of thinking and end up committing an act of road rage. I have found myself in this situation.
But it doesn’t HAVE to be that way. One can be challenged to practice humility. Practice patience. Practice forgiveness. Practice praying for one’s “enemies.” Practice giving thanks that the person who was unthoughtful gave you the opportunity to push you to your spiritual limits so that you might grow stronger in the faith.
This too is a possibility - not an inevitability.
It is often difficult and, like a muscle, takes a great deal of exercise (time, practice, increasing difficulty) to make strong. Nobody can force you to react negatively or positively It comes down to deciding how closely you want to follow Christ and then determining to begin working on it.
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