The Power of Words
New signs were placed on my grandson’s Regent’s baseball field backstop this year. I was pleased to see those words. They were placed on the visitor’s seating side and on our side. “WE ARE TO BE SALT AND LIGHT! Do not talk “at” or “about” other players, fans, officials, or parents!”
The signs apparently made the difference as even our students’ watching the games held their peace except for cheering our guys on! I was proud of them.
It was very different than our experience at another school’s baseball field. Shawntel and I, in our Regents’ team shirts, were present and ready to encourage our boys with our positivity! That’s when the other team’s group of student fans started with mean-spirited, tacky, smack-talk WORDS to our team players. They bombarded my/our PEACE ZONE!
They were so obnoxious that our team’s parents moved away from them. We stayed. I told Shawntel: “I have the mind to go over and grab those kids by the ears and haul them out of here!” We were amazed when it looked like an adult fan came over to them and said: “Keep it up! You’re doing great!” Argh!
These are both “Christian-based” schools which means our “seasoned words of light” should be just that – LIGHT! BTW, we won that game. In that sense, all that smack talk was of no value at all to the other side’s team. It only made them look and act foolish! We’ll just let God handle them! Best idea!
Words. We are surrounded by them. There are our own words, the conversations going on around us and the words we hear spoken on podcasts, radio talk shows, social media and television.
Words are my way of life because they are what drives me to blog daily. I know words can heal, encourage, and motivate. I also know words can kill, steal, and destroy our peace, our joy, and our comfort. Our words are so powerful that they can literally change the atmosphere in a room – from a dark room to a light-bright room.
God proved WORDS matter. He started out this massive universe with creative WORDS “Let there be light, and there was light”. (Genesis 1:3). “A good man/woman brings good things out of the good stored up in him/her, and an evil man/woman brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.” (Matthew 12:35)
These are words that can bring sunshine to someone’s day: “I love you. You are important to me. Thank you so much. You look great today. I’m so sorry. I forgive you. I like your new hair style. Great job! I’m so proud of you! You brighten up the room when you come in.”
We were made in God’s image. He created this world with His words. We, too, create with our words. We can usher in praise when the world seems to crumble around us. We can bring hope when everything seems hopeless. We can soothe a troubled heart when someone is in despair. We can bring LIFE with our words.
God is looking for hope, peace and love-filled messengers. He wants our WORDS to be on target each day doing just that. With words, Jesus spoke healing and forgiveness to people in need, and it happened. And we can never forget that God spoke our name and WE happened. Since life and death are in the power of the tongue, don’t we want to be life givers with the words we speak?
“Words can bring death or life! Talk too much, and you will eat everything you say.” (Proverbs 18:21).