Catching Fire: The Power of Our WordsSample

These verses from the book of Proverbs look at things that God doesn’t stand for, things that dishonor God, and ultimately dishonor others when we do them. Looking at what the writer of the proverb mentioned, we can see that three of the seven have to do with our speech. Laid out for us, we can see God hates a lying tongue, a false witness, and someone who stirs up trouble. Our words can contribute to all three things, which should give us pause and clue us into how seriously we should take our words and how we use them. It should cause us to think about how much our words can get us in trouble . . . and how the opposite is true!

This proverb shows us what God hates, but also what God loves. God loves it when we use our words to reveal the truth through honesty and when we work to make peace. There’s incredible power with our words—they can take us down a path of destruction and move us away from God, or they can honor God and reveal what God is like to the world. Today, think of how to use your words to point to God and show God’s character.