For years I worked in a school and witnessed first-hand the effects of children’s words on each other. The old rhyme ‘sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me’ is a blatant lie; Wes King’s song ‘Sticks and Stones’ exposes the pain words can cause:
‘All this pain that I feel will leave a stain on my skin
And the marks that they leave expose the shadows within.’ (‘Sticks and Stones’, Wes King)
James reminds us that the tongue is powerful (James 3:3-12) and urges us to be consistent in our speech. Paul gives us guidelines for how we should speak when he says, ‘Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.’ (Eph 4:29) It is a challenge to speak consistently, building other people up according to their needs, because it means we need to know the people to whom we talk (some people respond to gentle encouragement; others need more bracing talk, for example.) It also means that we must consistently think before we speak, something that is easier said than done! The acrostic THINK gives us good advice on speech:
If it’s not, then perhaps we shouldn’t be saying those things!