The Words of our Mouthes

Daily Feast-The Words of Our Mouth

Last night at Youth Group we talked about profanity. First it was hilarious when I said, "We are going to talk about profanity," and the entire group said, "What's profanity?" I guess that our educational system needs to step it up a bit. Anyway, our discussion time was about the words of our mouth. Something really cool happened in the midst of our lesson time. I did what I could to prepare for the evening but right in the middle of our talk the Holy Spirit invaded my mind and showed me what HE really wanted to conveyed and I want to share that with you.

Our first scripture was James 3:4-5; "Look at ships also, though they are so great and are driven by strong winds, are still directed by a very small rudder wherever the inclination of the pilot desires. So also the tongue is a small part of the body, and yet it boasts of great things." James is saying here that our tongue, one of the smallest parts of our body has a giant effect on our lives.

I then proceeded to ask the students where in the bible is the list of words we should not say. If our language has such a huge effect on our lives, surely God must have given us a clear cut list of what too and not too say. The answers were hysterical. They were pulling things out of every page of scripture trying to come up an answer. The truth is there is no list of words that we can and cannot say. Now that doesn't mean that there aren't certain words that our society has labeled "foul," or "bad" language. That fact remains we as believers in Jesus Christ should stay far away from these certain words. As I told the students, what if you tell a friend you are a "churchy" person then go and use a whole bunch of expletives. What will that say to the person? I think we all know the answer to that.

The revelation (and i will admit maybe you knew this and it has just taken me a while to figure it out for myself) is that this goes so much deeper that just not saying "bad words." As Francis Chan says in his book “Crazy Love”, "Jesus didn't just die so we could try and not cuss." We were given to ability to speak for such a greater purpose.

Ephesians 4 says, "Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for the edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear." We were given to ability to speak, so we could speak good things into each other's lives. You are able to talk to build up those around you.

So now the rubber meets the road, when you speak are you using your words for what they were meant for or not. We have several sets of siblings in our group and you should have seen the guilt on their faces. They totally gave themselves away. You could tell they were not. I have seen firsthand what they say to each other and they had every reason to be guilty.

There is a word in the bible that I think we all need to learn; slander. Slander is defined as ANYTHING negative you say about someone. Anything you say that is not meant for the building up or edification of others is considered slander. By the way gossiping is totally included in that.

God gave us the gift of speech, not so we could tear others down, but so we could build each other up. The next verse in Ephesians 4 says, "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption." Using unwholesome words, filthiness, silly talk and coarse joking GRIEVE the Holy Spirit and have no place in a believer’s vocabulary.

Don't get me wrong I'm just as bad as the next person. I have said things and say things that are totally awful. We as believers in Jesus Christ need to start speaking as though we are believers in Jesus Christ. James says if we are able to tame the tongue we could bridle the whole body.

So I'm going to start right now and i encourage you to do the same. Say what is good for the building up of others. There is no magic formula or 5 step process I can give you. This depends on you and you alone. Be the change you long to see. Be slow to speak and when you do make sure it is for building up and not tearing down.

May our LORD be with you