But no one can tame the tongue. It is restless and evil, full of deadly poison. Sometimes it praises our Lord and Father, and sometimes it curses those who have been made in the image of God. (James 3:8, 9 NLT)

That is an eye opening verse. That verse really rocks me to my core. I never really thought about it before until I really paid attention to that verse. I can’t even begin to count the times that I slandered, cursed, or said how much I hated someone in the past. All this time I was slandering, cursing, and hating what Jesus created and made in his image. What Jesus found pleasing, acceptable, and made to be like him I degraded and slandered.

I am no different than any one else. I make mistakes too. We have all fallen short of the glory of God. We all like to think that we are special but we are not. The bible says that God has no favorites. I look back and see that I have let my tongue degrade the image of God and what he created and yet, I have committed the same sins that I curse others for doing. I am such a hypocrite! It’s very difficult to conduct an honest self evaluation of yourself and your actions, but it something we must do to become better people and better Christians. It is something that we must do to become better Warriors 4 Christ!

Even fools are thought wise when they keep silent; with their mouths shut, they seem intelligent. (Proverbs 17:28 NLT)

So many times I have been the fool. And I don’t mean the fool that was quiet and seemed intelligent. No, I have been the loud fool who didn’t know how to keep his mouth shut. I played the part of the fool for a long time and I played it well.

Taming the tongue is very difficult when you are opinionated, aggravated, upset, or even just bored so you engage in gossip. Trust me, I speak from experience. But I have found through much practice and prayer that it can be done. But please let allow me to expand on this topic. What about social media sites that you are associated with like Facebook and Twitter? When you update your status or send a tweet, is it cursing the image of God? When you read a post on Facebook that a friend or family member wrote that degraded another person or slandered them did you hit the like button? Yup I bet you didn’t think of that. But it’s true. You are still degrading the image of God if you are degrading another person through any chain of communication.

It’s not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth.” (Matthew 15:11 NLT)

We must all be aware of our words and pray without ceasing that we do not curse and slander the image of God. Remember, Christ made us all in his image.

Verse of the day:

Indeed, we all make many mistakes. For if we could control our tongues, we would be perfect and could also control ourselves in every other way. (James 3:2 NLT)

Challenge of the day:

The challenge for today at first will sound fairly easy to accomplish but it will be one of the most difficult challenges that you will face in the bible. Today I challenge you to hold your tongue. Don’t bring others down or speak idle words, just remain silent. It’s like grandma always said, if you can’t say anything nice then don’t say anything at all.