Published: June 20, 2008 05:01 pm            

Mike Scarlett: Dirty Harry and Jesus agree on limitations

I love the old Dirty Harry movies. In one of these movies, just after Clint Eastwood pulled the trigger and killed the bad guy, he said, “A man’s gotta know his limitations.” The apostle Paul was faced with limitations too. He complained about his thorn in the flesh. He also said, “the things that I would not do, I do, and the things that I would do, I do not.” I wonder if his thorn in the flesh had to do with temptations and the resulting choices that he made.

Just as Dirty Harry had a physical gun with a trigger, we all have “emotional guns” with “emotional triggers.” An emotional trigger is anything that stimulates us to do something. For example, if I smell a cherry pie, and I am tempted to eat it, the smell of the pie has become a trigger that could cause me to indulge. If I know that the local bakery makes cherry pies every day, then just driving by and smelling the bakery can trigger a temptation to stop and buy a pie.

Many times a trigger leads us to the irresistible. Irresistible means just what it says … we can’t resist it. Because the irresistible is not something we can resist, it would be wise to take action before we are tempted. In the example of the cherry pie, if I can’t resist it, I would be wise not to drive by the bakery.

Similarly as Dirty Harry understood that a man should know his limitations, Jesus recognized that sometimes individuals should understand their limitations. When Jesus was instructing his followers on how to break patterns of sin he said, “If your right eye offends you, pluck it out,” and “if your right hand offends you cut it off.”

There has been much debate among theologians and Sunday school classes about whether Jesus meant that we should literally cut off our hand, or pluck out our eyes. I don’t think that I have ever heard of anyone who did these things to avoid temptation so I have to assume most people don’t take it literally. Whether it was meant to be literal or not, I think the point of his message was that we need to identify the thing that leads us into temptation and remove it from our lives.

I personally believe Jesus was referring to triggers when he spoke of these things. To bring his message into modern day times he might say something like this; “If you can’t resist Internet porn cut off your Internet service.” “If you can’t drive without getting road rage, then car pool, or have your spouse drive.” “If you can’t resist Doritos, don’t bring them home.”

Understanding what our triggers are is crucial to overcoming the destructive patterns in our lives. One way to identify our triggers is to keep a notebook by our side. Every time you experience a relapse, or are tempted, take note of what happened just prior to giving in. Write down the who, what, where, when and how that was going on at the time you were tempted. Once you have identified the stimulus or trigger that caused the temptation, you can take action to interrupt the temptation process.

“I’m not going to go there,” is a phrase that became popular a few years ago. This phrase was a way of saying “I don’t want to talk about it, think about it, or participate in it.” Many times this phrase is used jokingly as a way to sidestep or avoid something. As we begin to understand our triggers, as well as our limitations, I think it would be helpful to decide ahead of time to avoid our triggers and say to ourselves, “I’m not going to go there.”



Mike Scarlett is a Christian Counselor and may be contacted at mikescarlett.com or by calling 817-933-5041.

        

• Click to discuss this story with other readers on our forums.