Be a Tea Kettle, Not a Diet Coke
Be honest – did you ever put a Mentos mint inside a bottle of Diet Coke to see what would happen?
In case you don’t have firsthand experience or don’t want to do a quick search on YouTube for the video, you can expect the Diet Coke to quickly fizz up and shoot upward out of the bottle. The actual phenomenon, referred to as a soda geyser, dates back to the early 1900s when people would put Life Saver candies through pipe cleaners to drop them into soda bottles. However, it didn’t truly go viral until 2005. I won’t bore you with the scientific details of how this all works, but I did find it interesting to learn that a physical, rather than a chemical, reaction is what takes place.
Why is this story on my mind, you may be asking? Far too often, I see people emotionally explode similarly to a bottle of Diet Coke after a Mentos is dropped in. Many in today’s world are quick to diminish negative feelings or discourage the expression of emotion. This doesn’t dilute the emotions or cause them to go away – this simply leads to the gradual building of pressure until it’s impossible to keep it all inside.
The shortest verse in the Bible is John 11:35, but it makes up in impact what it lacks in length. The verse, which follows the news of the death of Jesus’ friend Lazarus and an invitation to view the place where he was buried, simply states that Jesus wept.
If a picture is worth 1,000 words, the mental image of our Creator and Savior becoming visibly emotional upon the news of a friend’s passing gives us a great deal to process and comprehend. You may wonder would Jesus cry about physical death, knowing that He Himself offers both resurrection and life (as he professes a few verses earlier in John 11:25). It may also seem odd given that Jesus likely knew a physical resurrection for Lazarus was coming only a few verses later, but it remains significant regardless.
I believe Jesus is the perfect example for us to follow in all areas of our lives, and this includes a picture of what it looks like to properly display emotion in a healthy way. Jesus could have chosen to keep the tears inside, but he didn’t. Instead, he made himself vulnerable by letting it out. Jesus was God, but he was also human, and he expressed his humanity in a noticeable manner by choosing to express negative, difficult emotions.
May we follow in the example that Jesus set before us. May we choose not to fall in line with the all-too-common societal norm, allowing the pressure to build until we explore. Rather than living life like a bottle of Diet Coke that’s only one Mentos away from exploding, let’s strive to live more like a tea kettle that will begin to whistle when it’s time to let out some of the internal contents. If we aren’t proactive about regulating our internal emotions, we may not realize that there’s a problem that needs to be addressed until it’s too late.