Guarding Your Words

One of the classes that I’ve trained for a while now is DISC. If you’ve ever taken a DISC class, you probably remember what you are. I’m a high I which stands for Influencer. One of the characteristics of a high I is that we tend to talk a lot. Because of that, my mouth has gotten me into trouble several times in my life because I just didn’t know when to be quiet. A scripture I heard a lot growing up was Matthew 12:34: “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh” (KJV). I was constantly reminded that my words reveal what’s on the inside of me. If I wanted to change what came out of my mouth, I had to change what went in my mind and heart. I was told, “Garbage in. Garbage out.”

As a kid, I didn’t really understand that concept. In high school, one of my teachers had our class memorize Psalm 141:3: “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.” I think King David must have been an I as well. He needed help watching what he said too. I began praying this verse because if I couldn’t stop talking, at least God could help watch the words that came out of my mouth. Over time, I began to change what I read and what I watched because it does have an affect on what’s in our heart. I started trying to eliminate the garbage that was going into my mind. In times like we’re in, that’s never been more important because there’s a lot of garbage out there to stream.

A prayer I learned to pray to help me was Psalm 19:14. It says, “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer” (NLT). Not only do we need to watch what we say and think, we need them to be pleasing to God. To help with that, I often have to bring thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). I stay vigilant about the thoughts that go through my head and the rabbit trails they go down. I interrupt them whenever they are not pleasing to God and refocus them onto things that are (Philippians 4:8). It’s not an easy process, but it’s one that we all must get better at because we are what we think (Proverbs 23:7) and we can never take back words spoken.

Photo by Maria Krisanova on Unsplash