Every careless word.

First of, Happy Easter! This is a celebration that will never get old and of which we must never forget. The God man came into the earth to save sinners like you and me to reconcile them to Himself!

Today, I would like to talk about our words and the impact they have on us and on the people around us. We know from Genesis that; God created the world through the word. He spoke things into existence out of nothing (ex-nihilo). The power that was in the word spoken was made manifested immediately in the created things. This is such a marvelous account that never ceases to amaze me. How does one simply speak things into existence? And not just any thing, the world we live in, things created with so much detail and thought to it that it simply leaves one in bewilderment. Clearly, even from creation itself, we see that God’s words are and were not careless. He is very meticulous and precise with his words. He measures what he has to say. In the book of John, we are told that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us – we know that the Word here is Jesus. So, Jesus, the manifested word of God became flesh. The expression of God Himself became flesh, identified itself as man – the created being. Again, another marvelous event that deserves your full attention, but I hope by now you get my point: there is power in the word. Throughout the bible, we see a certain pattern in God’s way of operating with his people. There is always a word proclaimed before God Himself acts. That word can be a prophecy, a visitation from an angel just like in the case of Mary the mother of Jesus, her cousin Elizabeth, Abraham or even Samson’s parents. In the cases where the word is a prophecy, it usually comes through the mouth of a prophet. So, before God does something, He always reveals what He will do in advance. There are never surprises with Him come to think of it. God is very well articulated, and He does exactly what He says He will do. And that is precisely what the Lord expects from us, his children. To reflect Him, by being true to our words and letting our “yeses” be “yes” and our “no’s”, “no” as stated in Matthew 5:37. Moreover, as we imitate Jesus who is the image of the invisible God, we must ensure our words reflect him. Jesus never spoke anything that was not well thought, he never wasted his words. With his words, he chose to heal, to bring encouragement, to rebuke, to strengthen, to gather, to bring the message of hope, to bring salvation. He was the Word after all! Is it any wonder then that Jesus would say in Matthew 12:37 that “I tell you, on the day of judgement people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.” There is obviously more to that statement than simply being careful about what we say but it seems to me that this is the main idea. I believe one of the reasons is because we ought to imitate our Father in everything. His words to us are never careless, never spoken without prior thought so why should our words to one another be any different knowing they carry power to encourage or condemn? James says that with our tongue with praise God and with the same tongue we curse others and that should not be (James 3: 10)! There are many examples in the bible of why we should be careful with our words. I will take one such example which can be found in the book of Judges. Now, Judges, is an interesting book in the bible because its setting is during a time when there were no kings in Israel, and everyone did what was right in his own eye (Judges 21:25). You can imagine what life during that time was like. Moreover, in the times of Judges, the Israelites committed many acts that were evil in the eyes of the Lord which therefore led to their oppression from their enemies. Our story for the day is found in Judges 11, it is the story of Jephthah – a mighty warrior, son of a prostitute whom God used to deliver Israel from its enemies. What I want to focus in on here is Jephthah’s vow. Yes, his vow to the LORD. A vow is something you say you will do, a sort of promise and when you promise something to God be sure to honour it because He will hold you in contempt if you do not. Jephthah as he was going into battle with the Ammonites made a vow to the Lord saying “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whatever comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites shall be the LORD’s and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.” (v30). It is hard to know what prompted Jephthah to utter such rash words, was it the fear of losing the battle? Was it simply to have assurance that he would win? Was it his way of showing the LORD how grateful he would be for the victory? Regardless of the reasoning, this vow was a very careless one. Two reasons come to mind here: First, it was made in a haste, in a spur of the moment. This was probably made as he was battling or going into the battle. It says in the verses earlier that he (Jephthah) passed through Gilead and then Manasseh and then on to the Ammonites. That is a lot of movement which means Jephthah was on a roll like we would say, probably functioning on adrenaline even as the Spirit of the Lord was upon Him (v29). Things were happening fast, so it was not the time to make a thoughtful vow. Second, Jephthah’s vow does not take into account the possibility that a person of value could come out of his house to meet him instead of a thing as can be inferred from his vow, and that, that person might not be under his authority or even be willing to go along with his vow. Furthermore, why go all the way to vow to offer “whatever comes out to your house as a burnt offering”? Why not simply stick at “whatever comes out to meet me shall be the LORD’s”? Unfortunately, in the story of Jephthah, after the LORD gives him victory, the “whatever comes out of his house” is his one and only daughter. It is very sad because the victory becomes a bitter victory for Jephthah (v35), and I suppose his entire household too. Fortunately for Jephthah, his daughter shows him how important it is to honour one’s words to the LORD. She accepts to be sacrificed to the LORD in order that her own father might not sin against the LORD. She is remarkable and is to be honoured for such an act. Much more can be said to this and many other examples can be drawn from the bible to show that our words are very important to God and they have power. As Proverbs 12:18 says “There is one whose rash words are like sword thrusts, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.” Let us therefore strive for wisdom instead of foolishness. May the LORD have mercy on us.