Aggressive Driving

From “A Liturgy for Experiencing Road Rage” (Every Moment Holy, Volume 1, by Douglas McKelvey)

If my heart were more content in you, O Lord
I would be less inclined to rage at others

Of course, I’m not the one struggling with road rage. In fact, I’m not even sure that the driver of the car in which I’m riding is struggling with road rage. He’s simply an aggressive driver.

I can’t even look when he accelerates up onto someone’s tail before initiating the pass. The speedometer needle goes far higher than I am comfortable seeing or experiencing.

But I’ve learned to keep my mouth shut in those situations. I say something later, but in the moment isn’t the time.

I looked up the prayer for road rage in Every Moment Holy. Doug has written a prayer for everything. Every moment IS holy.

Of course, I changed the words — because clearly I’m not the one with the problem. I prayed, “If his heart were more content in You, he would be less inclined” to drive so aggressively.

God, could you just fix him?

The next lines in the prayer say,

Let me gauge by the knot in my gut,
the poverty of my own understanding
of the grace that I have received

It’s kind of hard to pray that about someone else when I’m the one with a knot in my gut. I’m the one with a poverty of understanding.

So I go back to the beginning.

If my heart were more content in you, O Lord
I would be less inclined to rage at others look to change others
Let me gauge by the knot in my gut,
the poverty of my own understanding
of the grace that I have received

The knot in my gut these days is about so many things that are out of my control, the least of which is aggressive driving.

I open up my knotted hands. Again. To relinquish what I can’t change.

And I have the conversation. Again. “When you drive like that, it makes my very uncomfortable.”