The tongue can be a tool or a weapon

Coffee Hour @ Chicklit Power...

Welcome to Coffee Hour and thanks for stopping by! Oh, how important it is to make the time to take the time to get a bit of encouragement throughout the day. It’s like a mini recess, or a power nap…well, actually, no closing your eyes right nowJ Grab your coffee, and your SOF (strand of faith) and join me as I share from my heart to yours.

We’ve all heard and even been known to say that the tongue can be a tool or a weapon. There are so many scriptures on the subject of speaking…evil versus nice, uplifting versus demeaning, encouraging versus discouraging. It’s almost like I can hear myself saying yada, yada, yada, in other words, yeah, yeah, I know.  But have you ever thought you knew something only to find out you really didn’t know in depth about that something? Oh, my goodness, what a piece of sweet humble pie! And just FYI, the Bible mentions “tongue” as it relates to the words we speak 129 times! I’m thinking we need to understand all we can about it so we can use it the tongue as a tool and not a weapon! Let me share with you what I mean and how I came upon a deeper understanding of this principle.

My husband and I were working in our Battlefield of the Mind Devotional and workbook, Chapter 5 to be exact, and she cited a verse that truly caught my attention and pulled on the strings of my heart: 1^st Peter 3:10 “For he who would love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.” Oh, if only it were that easy, right?

I pondered that verse and it wouldn’t leave my head! Something was pushing the curiosity button within me: why is it the tongue is mentioned first before the lips? Couldn’t they just say lips because that’s where words come out, right? Well, that may seem like a sort of silly or philosophical question to you, but let me tell you, I chewed on that, and tasted it, no pun intended, for several days. In fact, I added this verse to my stack of verses that I am committing to memory. This scripture has followed me into many difficult conversations I’ve had this past week, and continues to follow me, but somewhere along the trip, I’ve received a revelation, a deeper meaning.

Have you ever been so mad at someone you could spit? Or you could literally taste the anger coursing through you, almost feel it on your tongue? I have! And actually recently! :-( See, emotions, negative or positive, travel up through your heart, which is the seat of your mind, into your mouth, onto your tongue and then out of your lips!

The tongue is where the words are formed…as we taste them! And then I had this thought: It’s almost as if God created the tongue as a stop sign but often we blow right through it and cause an infraction!

Oh, Abba, whenever I taste negative emotions on my tongue, please help me swallow them instead of letting them roll right off my tongue and out through my lips. And thank you for the promise of loving life and seeing good days!

Evinda