Words that Matter Most
Tuesday night was the season opener for my grandson’s baseball team. There have been plenty of pre-season games, but now we’re in the ones that matter most. Shawntel and I were present and ready to encourage with our positivity! I had on my Regent’s Knights team shirt and ready to cheer with the rest of the Regents’ fans. But that’s when a large group of student fans for the other team came over and sat right smack dab amongst us. And, when they did — the mean-spirited, tacky, smack-talk WORDS to our team players began to bombard my/our PEACE ZONE! They were so obnoxious that parents of players on our team 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 playing against each other and you would think that “words” would matter, but apparently it wasn’t the case with the other team or school. Though we would mumble a bit about the harassment of those kids, we remained focused on the game and cheered our team on. By the way – we won 6-3. 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, and television. Words are my way of life because words and how they matter 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 brightening to darkening it OR from a dark room to a light-bright room.
God, Himself, proved that WORDS matter. He started out this massive universe with creative WORDS “Let there be light, and there was light”. (Genesis 1:3). Our WORDS matter. “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)
Aren’t these some of those good words? “I love you, you’re important to me, thank you so much, how can I repay you, you look really nice today, I’m so sorry, I forgive you, I like your new hair style, great job, this place wouldn’t be the same without you, I’m so proud of you, you are irreplaceable, you brighten up the room when you come in.”
“Words can bring death or life! Talk too much, and you will eat everything you say.” (Proverbs 18:21). 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 messengers of hope, faith and love and He wants our WORDS to be on target each day doing just that. Oh, the importance of words. With words, Jesus spoke over the loaves and fish to feed the multitude and it happened. 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, (Proverbs 18:21) don’t we want to be life givers with the words we speak?