life or death

" The tongue has the power of life and death,
    and those who love it will eat its fruit. " Proverbs 18:21

 

The tongue produces words. There are over 250,000 words in the English language. Approximately each person speaks between 7,000 to 25,000 words each day. Men obviously being on the lower end leaving the women on the upper end. We talk, everyday, all day. Our voices carry a large amount of our words. But in this day & age it is easier, quicker, & requires less energy to just type some words up. We voice our opinions daily via social media. Twitter statistics show that 600 tweets are posted per SECOND, along with Facebook posts averaging 700 per SECOND. The level of output we use our words with daily is astonishing. I have always thought that the fact that we can voice out loud what we are thinking is so crazy cool, but do we ever think about who is hearing our words? Chances are you just bit your lip because you just had an 'oh crap' feeling, That's okay, me too. I talk a lot, & I talk loud ( right mom ?) & without thinking. I love being able to say what I am feeling or just come out of my head for a little while. The thing is, we hide behind this curtain of entitlement. That we have the ' God given right to say what we want.' But the thing is that we don't. We do not have what this world calls 'freedom of expression' which is in my wording ' you do you because we don't wanna argue or get sued because of it.' Being a Christian means we abide by what the word of God says. In the verse I opened up with it talks about the tongue being life & death. What you outwardly put into the environment around you whether it be natural or cyberspace, it is adding something to this world & will directly impact someone. Adding something of life means showing Christ. It means humbling yourself behind what you may be feeling & extending grace & encouragement. I love those people who just are a breathe of clean fresh air because they just shine their light on my soul. I want to be that person people are like ' I know I can count on Kalyn because she is always using her words, tweets, facebook, pinterest, & instagram to encourage me.' yeah well I wish I could say that I am always an uplifting person, but I cannot. This is a struggle that is deep in me & I find it hard to break sometimes. I do not even mean to do it 98% of the time. I just burst out in attitude about something I really am not even mad or upset about. I won't think about how I word an answer or a comment to where it will come out as helpful instead of just a big wrecking ball of negativity. I know I do it & sometimes I just have to say ' Kalyn just don't say anything,' because I get carried away in what I think & too little about if I am encouraging the other person that I am broadcasting my heart to.

A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart. Luke 6:45

So when I am not focusing my words on producing life in my words, that means the overflow of my heart is not where it needs to be. It says this is an evil heart. WOAH, you're probably thinking 'man she just called me & herself out on being evil, what is wrong with her?' I am not saying I do not love God, I do. I love his word, I love praying, & worshipping & teaching . ( so why are you saying you may have an evil heart sometimes? ) We all learn who is evil, the enemy Satan. We know he only wants to kill, steal , & destroy us. ( John 10:10). It compares him to a thief because he takes any opportunity to rob us of our joy or hope. When we speak death, we let him manifest in our words to be carried to what will destroy the receiving end of the words we put out. The enemy wants us to think that God doesn't love us or that we are not forgiven. He will take any opportunity to swoop in to remind us of just what we did that brought us so much shame & guilt. This recently happened to me as a person I used to be very close to, sent me a text that directly brought back a massive mistake I made. A few short words brought me back to that place of being lost & feeling so unloved & drowned with shame. I texted my mom & her response was this " The devil is using he/she as his mouthpiece." This was the truth as I took a step back to look at the situation more clearly. Yes what this person said was completely true, I DID mess up & I DO still deal with the consequences. But, God is continuously working in me to restore my heart & mind to his will. The message was not meant to contribute encouragement to me. It was meant to tear me down when I started to be joyful & look up again. This was the enemy being allowed to get in my head in a sneaky way through someone he knew I cared what they said. He knew I would start to question whether I could be loved by God fully again without a label of my sin stamped on my forehead. I do not want to be the person who allows the enemy to be apart of my words I speak or contribute in any way. I want to speak life, not death. I fail daily. After receiving that text, I immediately fired back by posting on twitter a very obvious tweet directed at the person. I just did what they did, right then. It is in our culture to just post away when we are mad. I contributed to the death & I allowed Satan to be apart of my words for the day as I posted a tweet not full of life in replace for a tweet to retaliate against the person who hurt me. That was so wrong of me to do. I want to be a woman of God, not of the world which is always looking for a way to hurt someone. I am not saying that it will be easy or that when you slip up, you are automatically done for life & stamped an evil person. You aren't, with Jesus we have grace. As the children of God, we are expected to show Jesus through our actions & words. I know some days it is like people are just asking for you to snap, but will you give in to the enemies plans or will you turn to the word of God & what it says?  Make Proverbs 18:21 the prayer of your day when you come into communication with others. This world is in desperate need of a life giving conversation or post. Shine your light to the world as you think about your words before you type or say them. Are your words bringing life or death ?