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What words do we use to affirm our agreement or celebration?
I’m talking about your verbal daily drivers. The words that come easy and without thought to express yourself. When something goes to our liking, some words people have chosen to express these affirmations of agreement are… Sweet. Cool. Sick. Slick. Groovy. Nice. Awesome. Wicked.
I recently was around someone who repeatedly used wicked for his affirmation. I’ll frequently say sick in a throwback to my days in JNCO jeans. I mean, it’s all making a comeback.
It rose my awareness for what our word choices are when we express what we approve of and are aligned with. The daily drivers of our mouths and minds and hearts. The words that come from our mouth come deep below before they’re formed in our vocal cords.
“Brood of vipers! How can you speak good things when you are evil? For the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart. A good person produces good things from his storeroom of good, and an evil person produces evil things from his storeroom of evil. I tell you that on the day of judgment people will have to account for every careless word they speak. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned.””
The stories we tell ourselves will direct our lives in the same way a river carves its path through the rock and soil. As will the words we use to tell our stories.
An account I’ve been enjoying on Instagram is The Christian Psych Nurse Practitioner. She connects some of the dots with what it means to renew your mind. In a recent post, she shared how important it is to agree with what God’s word says about you, even over what we’re tempted to believe. The largest deception comes when our stories are half true, when we hear half of it but are kept from the full truth.
A half truth exposes we may fail at something, but to take on being a failure is an identity statement that will inform not just our story, but how our brains adapt to the road we’re on.
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.”
I’m not talking about the power of positive confession to make manifestations of our hearts desires. No amount of petition repetitions for getting $10,000,000 in the mail while binging TV series is going to make that money miraculously appear. However, continuous confessions of “I’m never going to get it” or “I’m the worst” or “so and so hates me” or ruminating on your perceptions you refused clarify will create their neural pathways. Your brain will reap what you sow in it.
This is how addiction works. Dopamine drips it’s return-inducing cocktail when we a take a walk with something pleasurable, until that walkway becomes a rut that we tell ourselves is impossible to escape. Then, when life hits us, we fallback to the rut we’ve carved for ourselves straight into whatever negative self-talk, video game, pornography, drug, shopping, or app on our phone was propped up as a ramshackle tower to find refuge in. Our daily driver words can indicate the story we’re telling.
A strong tower of full truth is we may be the worst, we may be addicted, we may be weak, we may feel alone, but Christ has given us hope. For the worst, who we are has been washed clean in the blood of Christ. For the addicted, the chains may feel strong but He is the chain breaker. For the one who feels weak, who you are is in his strength and not if you have to do pushups from your knees. For the one who feels like they walk alone, the author of Hebrews (13:5-6) applies God’s promise in Deuteronomy (31:6) to never leave us or forsake us.
I’ve gone down the path of relying on myself so many times it’s a wonder the taste of vomit hasn’t wisened me up quicker. I’ve spoken atrocious words to myself, such as this world would be better off without me. Not once, either. That trash was with me for long seasons of life. Confirmation bias had declared my false prophecies to be true when the affirmations I told myself would prove otherwise didn’t come.
But it’s folly to be like a dog returning to the vomit of our falsehoods when hope tells the second half of the story: but Christ. This world may feel like it’d be better off without you, but Christ has a purpose in His plan you cannot yet see. Those in the Hebrews hall of faith didn’t receive life on a silver platter as a confirmation of their identity.
“Others experienced mockings and scourgings, as well as bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, , they were sawed in two, they died by the sword, they wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated. The world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and on mountains, hiding in caves and holes in the ground. All these were approved through their faith, but they did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.”
Did you catch that phrase right in the middle? The world was not worthy of them. Their leadership abilities or faith did not keep them from being homeless, poor, afflicted, or sawn in two.
This is the nature of faith. Not denial that I’m more round in the middle than I was a few years ago and instead of a six pack, I have a hairy bagel, but the story of my life is greater than what I can manifest or see with my own eyes. It’s belief and trust that the Lord is working all things together for His glory and our good, even if we’re toddlering as we learn to walk. Learn to walk we must. We cannot stay on milk forever, as tasty as it may be.
Such a perspective gives us hope, if we will discipline our tongues to follow. Life and death is in the power of the tongue, and wildfires rage because of the sparks that fly from it. My tongue has built up and my tongue has torn down. This should not be. Fresh and salt water should not come from the same source. Cold comforts of lies and hot unrighteous wrath make for a lukewarm fount. Hope can pull us out of that.
Or, we can continue the path we’re on. We’re given allowance to keep our wicked lives, and from the heart the mouth will speak. Maybe, just maybe, it would benefit our daily lives to put more thought into the words we choose to use for our daily drivers. We can choose to despair or we can choose to hope. Sure, life will put its pressures on us, and it has. Disappointments and let downs will come, sometimes at our hands. Less than a day ago I was confessing my own black pilling and disillusionment out loud.
The words we choose to narrate our days not only reveal our hearts but will guide our paths.
Do we want an angry, despairing, envious, covetous, resentful, lustful, contemptuous, cowardly, wicked life?
Do we want a loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, self-controlled, optimistic, hopeful life?
Death and life is in the power of the tongue.
Those who love it will eat its fruits.
Wishing you well,
~ J.P. Simons