Studies show that an adult person speaks 7,000 – 20,000 words a day. That’s 2,555,000 to 7,300,000 words a year, and between 158,410,000 to 452,600,000 in your adult life. That’s a lot of words we speak. How many of those are careless versus carefully chosen? Our words carry weight with the people who hear them. Someone will hear something you say and it will stay in their mind for the rest of their life. Beyond that, your words will echo for eternity because one day we will be judged by what we have said. When we put those millions of words we say into perspective, it reminds us to be more careful in what and how we say things. There’s a lot more riding on them than you think. Once they’re spoken, you can never recapture them.
Here are some Bible verses on choosing words:
1. Death and life are in the power of the tongue, And those who love it and indulge it will eat its fruit and bear the consequences of their words.
Proverbs 18:21 AMP
2. Reckless words are like the thrusts of a sword, cutting remarks meant to stab and to hurt. But the words of the wise soothe and heal.
Proverbs 12:18 TPT
3. Be careful what you say and protect your life. A careless talker destroys himself.
Proverbs 13:3 GNT
4. When you speak healing words, you offer others fruit from the tree of life. But unhealthy, negative words do nothing but crush their hopes.
Proverbs 15:4 TPT
5. I tell you, on the day of judgment 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.
Matthew 12:36-37 ESV
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash
Devotions by Chris Hendrix 