The way someone speaks directly affects my desire to be around them. You can be the nicest, funniest, most awesome person in the world, but if I don’t like your language, I’m going to avoid you.
And, just for the record, I’d rather be around a cusser than a gossiper. Constant negativity just drains me, so if you’re always cutting other people down and sharing the latest “dirt” on everyone else, I’m walking the other way when I see you coming. (Now, if you’re a cusser and a gossiper, I’m under the table in the corner, hiding from you.)
James calls the tongue a fire that can set fire to the entire body, corrupting your entire life. And it’s so easy to read James 3, nod your head, smile smugly and think, “Well, I sure am glad I don’t cuss!”
Meanwhile, the whole time you’re patting yourself on the back for having better language than the person next to you, other folks are sneaking out your back door before you get the chance to verbally skewer yet another church member.
Simply avoiding the f-word and the s-word and the d-word and whatever other letter-word you can think of is NOT the picture of surrendered speech you’re shooting for!
Surrender has never and will never mean looking better than the next guy.
Surrendering your words to Jesus means you give him all your words, not just the four letter ones. You let go of the temptation to gossip and the habit of spreading negativity. You encourage people instead of publicly humiliating them. You give them life instead of trying to suck the joy out of it.
Surrendering your words to Jesus means exercising these words from Paul…
Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt…