Peace Hill Podcasts
Proverbs 18:20-21 - Feast of Words
We Feed on Our Words.
Our Words, Over Time, Define Us: “From the fruit of his mouth a man’s stomach is filled; with the harvest of his lips he is satisfied”.
Our words produce consequences. People respond and react to us depending on what we say to them. This is not only true in the immediate situation - but over time. Over the long run our words at as a frame - bringing the picture of who we are into focus. Our words create the understanding that people have of us.
Consequently the person who uses filthy language - over time - comes to be known as a filthy person. The person who speaks with gentleness over time comes to be known as gentle. This is obvious.
But what is, perhaps, less obvious is the fact that we feed on our own words. We have our own mantras that we repeat to ourselves - our own slogans we tell ourselves. A person who fears constantly rehearses dangers. The bitter man rehearses the offenses of others against him. The arrogant man rehearses his entitlements.
We speak to ourselves and convince ourselves - like a propaganda machine, we speak over and over and rehearse words that we have been taught by others - or understandings that we have come to on our own - whether good or evil. These words create the motivation and the behavior and the feelings that drive us. The words we speak create much of the reality we live in.
Our Words Seek to Satisfy Us: The second half of verse 20 is an ironic statement. “... with the harvest of his lips he is satisfied” - meaning both “filled” but also happy about being filled. This gets down to what is going on in the human heart. We satisfy ourselves with our own words. The words we speak are chosen and spoken to fulfill the desires in our hearts.
~ The guilty man who berates himself and rehearses his guilt is atoning for his own sin.
~ The bitter man who accuses others and rehearses the offenses of others is justifying himself.
~ The arrogant man who despises others and rehearses his entitlements is setting himself above others.
~ The unbelieving man who rejects the testimony of others and rehearses his doubts and objections is following his own faith.
~ The recalcitrant man who refuses to change his ways or listen to others and rehearses his excuses is choosing his own will and way.
Each of these are filled or satisfied - (although our own words never truly satisfy us) with the harvest of what we say. We feed ourselves on our own words.
Recognize the Spiritual Power at Work in Our Words.
“The tongue has the power of life and death; those who love it will eat its fruit”.
Our Words Are Loaded with Powerful Intent: The Tongue has the power to produce life and death - to tear down or to build others up. The words and tones of speech we use are generally loaded with meaning and intended to produce an effect or response.
I spend an entire marriage counseling session talking about these things - which is really not enough considering how much our words affect our marriages. We psychologize one another as a way of sounding superior and disrespecting one another. We label one another for the same reason. We lie to one another - not saying what we really mean but speaking to get the effect or response we want. We speak in emotionally manipulative ways - saying one thing with our words but another with our tones. We state as fact emotionally loaded words. We speak in ways pretending to be logical and above those we are speaking to as a way of pretending to be unmoved.
Our Words Are Part of a Spiritual Battle: There is spiritual power behind our words. Our words have the power of life and death. We all are prone to speak like the Serpent - who used words to bring death into our lives and alienation from God and one another. The power of sin - the spiritual battle - is in our words. There is a malignant voice tempting us to speak - not only to speak evil words - but to hear.
Our Hearing is Part of a Spiritual Battle: There is a malignant will, willing us to hear what we have learned to hear. Some of us are programed to hear disrespect in the words of others - and that becomes our interpretive grid when they speak to us. Some of us have been programmed to hear accusation. Some of us have been programmed to hear that we are not doing enough and need to do better. The Serpent uses this to full advantage - words can be malignant and hearing can be tainted.
Learn to Feast on Words of Grace.
Don’t Be Surprised By the War of Words: Words are very hurtful. All of us are struggling with this. There is damage in each of us - sin in each of us - in speaking - in hearing. We say the most unbelievable things to one another. But the church community can only survive if we recognize that we all are sinful in our speech. We all speak in the same ways - we all need grace for our words and grace to hear.
So we need to learn to be forthright with one another. Scripture says that the one who covers his sin will not prosper. I think that this sin - which is and is going to be in our midst - cannot be something that we cover. We have to speak honestly. The one who has spoken sinfully cannot just hope that his words will be forgotten. The one who has been hurt needs to speak up. There is definitely a place for giving people time - for taking time ourselves to allow high running emotions to settle before we speak. However, this should be tempered with the importance of not allowing a grievance to fester. We need to be forthright about resolving sinful words with the acknowledgment that we are sinners in need of grace.
Learn to Hear then Speak Grace: The order is important. The spiritual battle of our words begins by recognizing what words we are reacting to. We hear - in our hearts and minds, words of condemnation, of disappointment, of anger, fighting words, words like....
~ Nothing I do is ever going to be Good Enough
~ No one is going to tell me what to do, or take advantage of me
~ No one understands me
~ You have to make people pay for their wrongs or they will do them again.
These words/ understandings determine our response to people - what we hear them saying to us - and what we say in return. We rehearse them to ourselves - they are in our minds, the ways we think - they are the assumptions we live by.
Where have these words come from? Our upraising, our deep psychological needs? Hurtful things people have said to us? These things may have affected us - but the truth is that these sinful assumptions and words have come from the father of lies - from the Serpent - and we have accepted the words of the Serpent and, like Adam and Eve, chosen to listen to him and to believe them and act on them. It’s not psychology it’s sin!
These words of the Serpent need to be exposed, brought to the cross, confessed, renounced and replaced by the true words of Christ. Words like...
~ How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! (1 John 3:1)
~ Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus... (Phil.2:4-5)
~ No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. (1Cor.10:13)
~ To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow \n his steps. ‘He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.’ When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. (1 Peter 2:21-23)
These words are light - and they lead us into godly and gracious ways of speaking and living. If we are going to learn to speak differently, we need First to expose the ungracious words of the serpent - that we have taken in and believed. We need to recognize the lies that we have been sold and have taken into ourselves and loved. And then, Second as these words sink into us and we believe them, only then will our speech begin to change. As we renounce old sinful understandings and words and listen to and hear Christ’s words of acceptance and grace and God’s faithfulness and love for others, and challenge the things we have always said to ourselves - only then can we be able to hear God’s new words and speak them after him and be satisfied.
Sunday May 20, 2007
From the fruit of his mouth a man’s stomach is filled; with the harvest of his lips he is satisfied.
