Words of encouragement are all some know. "They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the comb." Psalm 19:10
Unlike gold and honey, words of discouragement are all some people have to say. Their sentences are like an overstuffed suitcase. They carry unnecessary baggage and really do need to go through an x-ray machine and be unpacked before they reach the other side of the conveyor belt.
Sometimes a person's brain leaves the station before it has time to weigh the words in its heart.
I think that words are the clumsiest, most inadequate measure of one's heart that we have. I, cherish words of affirmation as an outward expression of another's love for me. But sometimes I forget to measure them when I speak.
I forget to consider that the person with whom I am sharing all my words and sentences, may not see them, hear them, or understand them quite the way I intend. Why? Because sometimes they are ill-chosen, ill-timed, ill-defined, and ill-written. So how else can one communicate?
My husband chooses to express his heart, mind and soul with acts of service. Yet even acts of service can be misconstrued, can't they? One time my husband thought he was doing me a service by trimming my forsythia bush away from our air-conditioning unit. He cut off all of its sprawling stems just as it was coming into full-bloom. Instead of me having a gorgeous display of yellow to hide the hideously ugly air-conditioning unit by my house, I had a short ball of yellow that called attention to that hideously ugly air-conditioning unit.
Did I ever rain on my husband's parade of expressive love when my distorted words of affirmation screamed, "What in the world were you thinking! Why didn't you simply uproot the thing!" I gathered up as many of the manicured stems that lay on the ground as I could in my arms, took them in the house and placed them in every jar imaginable to finish blooming inside my home. For days those brightly colored stems made peace with my heart. But for my husband, they served as a reminder of how his acts of service had failed to express his sincerest wishes. Sometimes, attitude is everything, and words are entirely too much.
Words can be everything that's wrong. Everything that hurts. And would be better left unsaid.
"A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones." Provers 17:22
Ill-chosen words destroy the heart of the hearer. They are not worth the air it takes to even whisper, let alone to shout. May the Lord give us words befitting a cheerful heart filled with His love and grace.
