I Slammed A Door And Frightened Somebody Small

It was not even the door you meant. That is what a slam is. You meant to leave the room and your arm did the rest of it.

And then the sound. Bigger than the house. Bigger than anything that had actually happened in the ten minutes before it.

And when you turned round there was a small person in the doorway who had jumped, and who was watching you with a face you have been carrying ever since.

They did not cry. That would almost have been easier, because crying has a procedure and you know how to do the next bit of that.

What they did was go very still and look at you the way people look at weather.

I am not going to give you a way to stop yourself next time. That is a technique and this is not a place that hands those out. And I am not going to tell you it was only a door, because that small person did not experience it as only a door.

Nigh unto them that are of a broken heart

There is a line in Psalm 34 that is usually read over people who have been hurt, and I want to read it tonight over the one who did the hurting.

The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. (Psalm 34:18, King James Version)

Contrite. That word is not in there by accident and it does not mean sad.

Contrite is an old word for crushed, and in the Scriptures it belongs to the person who has done the wrong and knows it. Broken heart and contrite spirit are two different states and the verse holds both of them together.

You are somebody this verse was written about, and being the one at fault has never once put a person outside it. Psalm 34:18 says the LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit, and the Holy Spirit is the one who takes that into a hallway where a door just shut too hard.

And look at the position word. Nigh. Near.

Not watching from a distance. Not waiting until the apology has been made and received. The nearness in that verse is a response to the crushed state itself, which means it is already in effect while a person is standing in a kitchen feeling sick about themselves.

You have God close to you right now, and that closeness has never waited for the situation to be tidied up. It is written in Psalm 34:18 that He is nigh to the broken and saves the contrite, and the Spirit of God is the one who comes near before anything has been put right.

The flinch is information and it is not a verdict

Now the flinch, because that is the image on repeat and I am not going to talk you out of it.

A flinch is a body doing arithmetic faster than a mind can. It does not mean a child is afraid of you as a person. It means a loud noise happened near them and a body did what bodies do.

That distinction is worth having tonight, and it is not a comfort I am inventing. Ask any adult about a door slamming in the house they grew up in. Most of them will tell you about the sound, not about a person.

You are not somebody your child is frightened of, and one flinch has never once been the same thing as fear of a person. Psalm 34:18 puts God near the crushed rather than filing a report about them, and the Holy Spirit is the one who reads a startled body accurately.

And here is the plain thing, because it has been building all evening.

That moment is not a verdict on you. It is not a score, it is not a grade, and it is not the true nature of this household finally showing itself in one loud second.

It was ten minutes of pressure and an arm that swung harder than it meant to, and there is an answer for it.

You have not been unmasked by a door, and one loud second has never been a report on a whole family. The written word saves the contrite in Psalm 34:18 rather than exposing them, and the Spirit of God is the one who refuses to build a case out of a hallway.

Where a person goes when the anger has a size to it

I have to say a straight thing here, because this page will be read by more than one kind of reader tonight.

If what came out of you frightened you, or if it has been getting bigger over the last year, or if some part of you is wondering what you might be capable of, then telling one person is right. Today, not eventually.

A doctor, a pastor, a counselor, one friend who will not repeat it. Saying it out loud to a person is how a thing stops growing in the dark, and it is not a confession of failure. It is the same move as calling somebody when your chest hurts.

And if anybody in your house is being hurt, telling somebody is right, and it is not your job to weigh up whether it is bad enough to count. That weighing belongs to somebody trained for it, and handing it over is the correct thing to do.

You are able to tell one person today, and there has never been a version of that which made you a worse parent than staying quiet. Psalm 34:18 puts God near the crushed rather than at a distance judging them, and the Holy Spirit is the one who is in a phone call made from a car in a parking lot.