Read
“What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
Matthew 15:11
Reflect
The Bible has a lot to say about the words we speak. Words spoken in faith often resulted in healing. Proverbs 18:21 even says that the power of life and death is in the tongue.
In today’s passage, Jesus says that the things you speak are far worse for you than any bad food you might eat. Imagine that every time you said words that hurt someone else, you got sick. Or if every dirty word you uttered made you physically filthy. What if the bad things you say you want to happen to someone else instead happened to you?
Now, imagine that there is actually life in your tongue, and the things you speak made you healthy and well, or the blessings you spoke to other people actually happened to them and to you.
That may not actually happen physically to you, but your words are precious in the Lord’s sight, and He wants you to always use them for good, and never for evil. He doesn’t want you to defile, or dirty, yourself by saying words of profanity and abuse. Rather, He wants your words to be a blessing to yourself and to others, and to Him as well.
Today, let life come forth from your mouth. Pray that the Lord will sanctify your speech and that you will use your words always for blessing, and never for cursing.
Reflection copyright © 2021 Doug DeBolt.
Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
