January 13, 2024 - Proverbs‬ ‭13:2-3

“The words of the wise are kind and easy to swallow, but the unbeliever just wants to pick a fight and argue.Guard your words and you’ll guard your life, but if you don’t control your tongue, it will ruin everything.”Proverbs 13:2-3 TPT

Lord, how many times do we get frustrated with people and our words are not kind and easy to swallow. It is like we spew our frustrations and hurt on people through our words. Please forgive us for this. Help us learn to walk in wisdom. Open our eyes to see behind the scenes to what is really going on and give us your heart for people so we can respond to them the way you would. And at times when the words spoken need to be hard to hear, teach us how to deliver them with so much love that they still feel kind. Jesus, I think about when you literally called Peter Satan. I am sure that wasn’t an easy thing for him to digest. I mean wow, what a correction to receive. Yet Peter didn’t get so mad at it that he walked away from following you. I think it was because Peter knew how much he was loved by you. You had invested so much love into Peter that it gave you a place to speak brutal truth and still bring life.

Teach us how to love people like that. Give us the wisdom to know when and how to speak to people. Help us not react to people with hurtful/harmful words but teach us how to respond to people with wise words. Help us learn this lesson before we allow it to bring ruin into our lives and relationships. Let wisdom guide us when to address things and when to leave them up to you to address. Show us when we need to forgive and leave it in your hands and when we need to speak up. We want to be known as people who always speak with wisdom and love, even if the words we are speaking might not in themselves sound loving. Let them feel kind and easy to swallow, because of the love they are wrapped up in.

In Jesus name, amen.