No Nudist In The Kingdom Part Five

"Therefore, laying aside all malice, and all guile, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking (gossip), as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious." 1
Peter 2:1-3 NKJV

Therefore putting off all evil speaking. Here is another No-brainer
in the Christian life. What a sad-sad testimony for a Child of God to speak evil of another or tell an obscene joke. In this verse some translations just say gossip, but the truth is, all evil speaking is sin to the Lord. The Bible tells us that this is hard to control in our natural state. James writes," Forwe all stumble in many things. If any one does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man able also to bridle the whole body.......Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell........But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessings and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so." James 3:2-10
Here we see that for a Christian this should not be. As a Christian living by
his or her old nature, they cannot control their tongues. It is humanly
imposable. A lot of this evil speaking can come from the former sins mentioned in this verse Malice, guile, hypocrisy, and envy. If we put off these things we should be able to cease the gossip and evil speaking of others. But I'm afraid to say that many of us have these problems. I confess I also struggle with these. In the workplace I find it easy to speak against a
supervisor that does not do things the way I think they should be done. Or a co-worker that has done me wrong and I open my mouth against him to others. Only by walking in the Holy Spirit can we overcome this curse of the tongue. And as the old saying goes," If you can not say anything good, don't say anything at all." How tiring it is to hear someone who does nothing but complain about others. Confess up, you hate to see them (us) coming. "Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh" James 5:16 This includes all evil speaking.

I shared at the beginning that when the Lord tells us to put off or take off
something, Him gives us something to put back on. He will not leave us naked. So I will continue with the Armor of God in Ephesians.

Prayer: Lord, forgive us of our evil speaking and gossip. We pray that we will walk in your Spirit and you will guide us in how we are to speak. May our speech only glorify you. Amen

Temp#43: Shut-My-mouth

I've been dealing with the reason as to why I have been moved from job to job in the last ten years. I somehow felt that there was more that the Lord was trying to teach me or mold me.
Then one day I came across this verse in my reading.

"Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and innocent, children of God without fault in the mist of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast the Word of life......"
Phillipians 2:14-16

I took a hard look at myself and saw that I did not smoke (anything) with the guys. Talk about getting laid the night before. Try to talk using as many vulgur words in one sentance as possible. Steal as much from the warehouse as I could get away with. I saw a fault in me that I felt had caused me grief in every job I've had. I can't seem to quit complaining about work and management. I've been in management I didn't think anyone talked or complained about me, but I complained about co-workers and spoke ill of them many times. In this way I was no different than the others. I was not the light that the Lord wanted me to me. Being a light means that we are different than the others. Like night is from day. And more than just different, a light that shows the way out of darkness.

We may not be able to reach perfection,but we can become blameless and innocent like this verse says. That means that we may do wrong without knowing it and become blameless but we should not become guilty by doing thinks we know is wrong. And the reason for this is not to earn our way to heaven or even the presence and favor of the Lord, but to become the witness that the Lord wants us to be of His goodness.

So my next thing I need to work on is to do the logical thing. As we say in the south, "Shut my mouth."