We spent the week in Michigan at a tent meeting, where the family sang and enjoyed preaching from Tom Harmon. At the end of the week we visited the Keilen family and were able to sing in their church service on Sunday morning. More about both of these encouraging times coming up, but I especially wanted to share thoughts from the convicting and challenging message we heard preached at the Keilen’s church.
The message focused on our words of communication. Pastor Ron reminded that our conversations are either constructive or destructive! The Bible has so many warnings and exhortations about how we use our tongue: Ephesians 4:29-30, Psalm 141:3, Psalm 19:14, James 1: 26, and many others!! In fact, it would be an interesting study to count and search for all of the references to the tongue, our conversation, and the words of our mouth!
The pastor reminded us of several pitfalls of our speech: for some it may be profanity or vain words, for some it may be gossip or hurtful words, for some it may be manipulative or dishonest words, for some it may be tactless or thoughtless words, for some it may be angry or harsh words, for some it may be divisive or harmful words…. whatever our struggle may be, let’s remember the following poem their pastor closed with (author unknown)
“Be careful for the words you say;
Keep them soft and sweet.
You never know from day to day,
Which ones you’ll have to eat!”
How sad, but true!… We spend much time wishing we could take back things said carelessly! How many times have our words caused division and hurt instead of edification?
May God give us wisdom to guard our tongues and to use them for His glory!
Let us pray for Him to help us have victory in this often neglected area!!!
