Devotion for today: To speak or not to speak

Scripture for today: James 3:
Power of the Tongue.  Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you realize that we will be judged more strictly, for we all fall short in many respects. If anyone does not fall short in speech, he is a perfect man, able to bridle his whole body also. If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we also guide their whole bodies. It is the same with ships: even though they are so large and driven by fierce winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot’s inclination wishes. In the same way the tongue is a small member and yet has great pretensions. Consider how a small fire can set a huge forest ablaze. The tongue is also a fire. It exists among our members as a world of malice, defiling the whole body and setting the entire course of our lives on fire, itself set on fire by Gehenna. For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. This need not be so, my brothers. Does a spring gush forth from the same opening both pure and brackish water? Can a fig tree, my brothers, produce olives, or a grapevine figs? Neither can salt water yield fresh.

Christ says: Matthew 5:37

"Let your 'Yes' mean 'Yes' and your 'No' mean 'No'.  Anything more is from the evil one."

St. Francis de Sales tells us: An Introduction to the Devout Life:

"Let your speech be gentle, frank, sincere, clear, simple, and truthful. Avoid all duplicit, artifice, and affectation; for although it is not expedient to tell everything which is true, it is at no time allowable to tell what is not.  Never permit yourself to tell a lie in the way of excuse or otherwise, remembering that God is a God of truth.  If you accidentally say what is untrue, and it is possible to correct yourself by explanation or reparation, do so. A sincere excuse is of far more avail and more powerful than a lie." "No art is so valuable as simplicity. Worldly prudence and carnal wisdom appertain to the children of this world, but the children of God go on in a straightforward course, and their hearts are steady and confident.  Lying, duplicity, and dissimulation are the sure signs of a low, groveling mind."

Prayer:  Psalm 141:1-9

I have called to you Lord; hasten to help me!

Hear my voice when I cry to you.

Let my prayer arise before you like incense,

the raising of my hands like an evening oblation.

Set, O Lord, a guard over my mouth;

keep watch at the door of my lips!

Do not turn my heart to things that are wrong,

to evil deeds with men who are sinners.

Never allow me to share in their feasting.

If a good man strikes or reproves me it is kindness;

but let the oil of the wicked not anoint my head.

Let my prayer be ever against their malice.

My thoughts: St. James certainly doesn't try to sugar-coat the terrible sins we commit with our tongues! People's reputations can be destroyed; our hearts become selfish, set on doing whatever it takes to get what we want. The harmful words of others can destroy us, and need to be avoided, as David warns us in the Psalm. We must be vigilant over our tongues, and ask ourselves if our "yes' really does mean "yes". None of us wants to be guilty of having a "groveling mind"!

Your prayer to God:  Let us bring before God today all of the people we have willingly or unwillingly harmed by our words.  Let us ask Him to heal the hurt we have caused and the pain we have inflicted by not being honest, by gossip, by spinning the truth to our advantage.  Then let us tell God how sorry we are, ask His forgiveness, and resolve to use our tongues for His honor and glory, and not our own.