Sitting down at the dinner table with my family, I overhear my son say to his Uncle something hurtful. When I say hurtful, it wasn’t something that he understood to be hurtful. So I explained to him why we don’t say things like that to people, and how our words can hurt or help people. I asked him what he wanted his words to do, thankfully he said help people. (insert proud moment here). I wanted to make sure he really understood what I was saying to him, so I broke it down another way. So, I said “it’s better to tell people something good about themselves rather than something bad. That way we are building people up instead of bringing them down.” When I said it that way, it’s like a light bulb went off in his little learning brain. It actually even helped me to hear it out loud. I challenge you, go back and read my statement out loud. It’s so important that even as adults we take this seriously, our words DO affect people. I don’t know about you, but I’ve said some pretty hurtful things. On the flip side, I’ve also had some pretty hurtful things said to me. Our words do matter. I believe God honestly wants us speaking life into people.

Prayer:

Lord, we sometimes say things not even realizing how harshly the receiving end took it. Bring back into remembrance anything that we may need to go back and apologize for. Please help us in forgiving those who might have said some harsh things to us as well. We want to start building people up, speaking life, and hope. Give us the words you want others to hear. In Jesus name. -Amen