Talking Against God and Others

 What good does it do for us to speak against God and other people? Think about it! Does it really do any good? I don't think so. It doesn't solve anything by us being negative. This is especially true when we are being ungrateful, or we are trying to lay the blame for something on God or others. Yes, I know there are times when we need to point something we think is  wrong out to God or to others, but why do we need to do it in a negative way? It would be much better to speak nicely, and to speak in a way that helped to find solutions, instead of just complaining. The Israelites were very prone to complaining against God and Moses. One time when they did this, God became angry and sent poisonous snakes to punish them. (Numbers 21:7) Then, the people came and cried out to Moses confessing their sin or speaking against God and him. They asked Moses to pray for God to take the snakes away, and God did provide a solution to the problem. I pray they learned their lesson, and I hope we will learn from this, too.

Our words can build up, or they can tear down. Our words and heal, or they can hurt. We can have a bad attitude, and allow words to flow out of our mouth that should never have been spoken. Once we have spoken them, we can never take them back. This is why we need to be slow to speak and slow to anger, as James told us. If we speak negative words, we are showing an angry, discontented heart, because our words come out of our heart. We need to confess our sins in our heart and ask God to cleanse us, so we have a pure heart of love, not anger. Then, we need to ask the Holy Spirit to help us think before we speak, so we can know what the Lord wants us to say and how to say it. Then, our speech will be edifying, which is what God desires from us all of the time.

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Tomorrow, I intend to read Numbers 22-24.