“Blessing and cursing are not compartmentalized Bible words at all. They are simply the two ways we treat people. They are as inescapable as breathing in and breathing out.”
So writes John Ortberg in Soul Keeping. He’s right of course. As we enter the season of Advent, heading toward Christmas, we each need to take inventory. How are your words and actions toward others?
It’s a challenging thing to do…to hold up that mirror and consider the reflection. Harder still to try and grasp the recording of our voice. Ever notice that most people don’t like to hear their own voice on tape? That’s usually because we don’t actually hear ourselves as other do tonally. However, I wonder if perhaps there so some hint there that points us to the deeper concern of how my words sound to others.
Throughout the country, especially reading on social media, the sound of our words is increasingly harsh. Judgmental. Angry. Full of sound and fury…with finger-pointing to boot.
I get it. You may think that you don’t ever curse anyone. You never use angry words. Cursing, though, in this sense does not require to use of Carlin’s Seven Words you can’t say on TV. Cursing can be done through a glance. It can be with accusations. You can curse by withholding grace and love…even to those who don’t deserve the accommodation. I think, then, the greater likelihood is that each of us has cursed another.
Maybe the country would simply be nicer if we started more blessing. Offer more grace. God did that for you. You didn’t deserve redemption, yet He provided the offer anyway.
I’ll let God have the final word here since He gave the best blessing you could offer someone when He taught Aaron this:
“The Lord bless and keep you;
The Lord make His face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.”
This day…be an agent of peace NOT by demanding some action from another, but rather by blessing the others around you.