Accelerator, brake, clutch. Every driving instructor in Hyderabad teaches the same three things
Before a learner is allowed near traffic he is taught three pedals. Accelerator, brake, clutch. Almost every accident on an Indian road comes down to one of those three being used at the wrong moment, and the licence exists to certify that you know which is which.
It is a decent picture of a life. You are free to go fast. There are junctions. There are red lights, and a red light does not become green because you would prefer it to be. A man who is about to be unfaithful to his wife is a man reading a red signal as green, and he usually knows it while he does it.
I have preached this. I would like to correct the part I got wrong.
The brake is not a muscle
The way I told it, self-control was something you generated. Grip harder. Want it more. That advice has one obvious defect, which is that everybody reading it has already tried it. Nobody arrives at forty having never attempted to control themselves.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
Temperance is the old word for self-control, and look where Paul files it. Fruit. Not equipment you buy, not a discipline you build in the gym before dawn. Fruit is what a living thing produces because of what it is connected to. A mango tree is not straining.
Temperance is fruit. A mango tree is not straining.
On Galatians 5:23
And then the last clause, which almost nobody quotes. Against such there is no law. There is no rule to enforce on a man who is already doing it. The rule was for the man who was not.
Grace does the teaching
If that sounds like a licence to do whatever you like, Paul saw the objection coming and answered it in a letter to Titus.
For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world.
Grace is the instructor in that sentence. It is the thing doing the teaching, and what it teaches is exactly the denying that we keep trying to produce by effort. So the man who cannot stop is not short of willpower. He is short of a settled conviction that God is already for him, and appetite rushes into that vacancy every time.
What to do on Monday
Solomon says get wisdom and pay whatever it costs.
Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. I have taught thee in the way of wisdom; I have led thee in right paths. When thou goest, thy steps shall not be straitened; and when thou runnest, thou shalt not stumble.
Notice who is doing the leading in those lines. I have taught thee. I have led thee. The steps not being straitened is the outcome, not the entry fee.
So keep the driving lesson. The junctions are real and so are the consequences, and a diabetic still cannot eat whatever is in front of him. Just stop trying to be your own instructor. You have a better one living in you, and he has been offering to take the wheel for years.
Premasis Satman
Founder and Executive Director of 5Talents Magazine, writing from Hyderabad. He has written the magazine's editorial column since the first issue in July 2012.
Self control · Grace · Habits · Editorial · Point of view