Read my lips...shut up!

Our words can be a very slow and painful train wreck. Our spoken words are like emptying the feathers from a pillow. Once they hit the wind you can never put it all back where it came from.

Three recent situations that I observed (and cringed!) reminded me of the power of our words--either to destroy or to build.

Lets reduce it to the bare minimum. Your daily spoken words will either:

1. Build and encourage
2. Destroy and discourage

Spend them wisely, because there are no refunds. We've all been there and tried to retrieve a sentence a moment too late. At home. At work. In neighborhood. At church--words matter. They build or destroy...they encourage or discourage. Steward your words well.

From my devotions:
Proverbs 13:3 "He who guards his lips guards his life, but he who speaks rashly will come to ruin." Did you see that? This is serious business. There is a direct connection between our life and our words. James called the tongue " ...a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body...no man can tame it." Maybe we should pay closer attention to the wake of wreckage our words leave and adjust accordingly. Maybe like James said, this is God's jurisdiction and we need his help. I pray often that God would guide, guard, and filter my words before they hit the air waves. Don't tell my kids I said this, but just maybe we all need to shut up from time to time? You with me?