Watch Your Mouth!

"A man is not defiled by what enters his mouth, but by what comes out of it."
~Matthew 15:11

"Watch your mouth, young lady!" My mother didn't put up with sass from my siblings or me. One verbal warning was all it took because my mother didn't mess around. We knew one more word would mean we'd get our mouths slapped. In those days, we understood those warnings were to teach us respect for our parents and others.

The verse above isn't just about disrespect, it's about our eternal souls. Verse 18 goes on to say, "the things that proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and those things make the man unholy."

We speak from the abundance of our hearts. What is in our heart is going to come out of our mouths. Whether those things are good or bad, people know us by the words of our mouth. We see it on the news and we see it on Facebook, and other social media every single day. The things people post on social media are the things that fill their hearts. The Bible tells us, "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks (Luke 6:45)."

Even the memes we post that we may think are funny, or in some other way amusing, are often crass and off-color. I often see people post Bible verses, and then the next post will be something that has a four letter cuss word in it, and they think nothing of doing this.

"From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, these things ought not to be so (James 3:10)."

Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins. When we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, He will come into our hearts and guide us by His Holy Spirit. However, the caveat to this is that we have to let Him be Lord and Savior. The Lord wants to clean us up on the inside so that our hearts are pure and right before Him. Because one day we are all going to stand before God Almighty, and we are going to answer for every word that comes out of our mouths (Matthew 12:36).

"Let no no unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building up the one in need and bringing grace to those who listen (Ephesians 4:29)."

It seems to me these days, more and more people are just interested in hearing their own voices without paying attention to what they are actually saying. Our words make a difference. Our words can build up and our words can bring down. Our words can cut like a knife. Our words can make people happy or they can make people sad.

We teach our children not to bully and not to say hateful things, yet we do not even think about the things we say to our spouses or to our friends in front of our children. We complain about hatred in the world, yet we do not even consider the hatred that is coming out of our own mouths.

We have a lot of problems in this world but every single one of them can be traced back to the problems we have with ourselves. As  part of the human race, we need to clean up our own act. But as part of God's family, we need to practice what we preach.

"Let your conversation be gracious as well as sensible, for then you will have the right answer for everyone (Colossians 4:6)."