Self Controlled and Gentle

  It is very difficult to keep your anger and emotions under control when being verbally, emotionally or even physically attacked.  Staying under control takes a great deal of focus and fortitude.  The easy thing is to lash out when someone is verbally attacking you.  Often verbal retaliation is only escalates the encounter.  Many relationships have been destroyed because of the inability to keep oneself under control.  
   In America, until the 1940s, no black player ever played in Major League Baseball (MLB), the best league in the world for this sport.  Today, baseball is a sport played in numerous countries and has been an Olympic sport.  Prior to 1946, only white players played in the MLB.  Jackie Robinson, a black man, broke the color barrier and was the first Negro player ever to play in MLB.  
   The owner of the Brocklyn Dodgers Baseball team, Branch Rickey, told Jackie that he had to be someone who could never fight back, physically or verbally, when white players and fans would hurl insults and throw balls at him.  Rickey needed a ballplayer who would not fight back when every part of Jackie’s body told Jackie to fight back.  Jackie never fought back when attacked, won the respect of his teammates and ultimately, Major League Baseball and its fans.  
   To be a developing spiritual leader, we are exhorted in 1 Timothy 3:1-7 to live self-contr ...