October 28, 2009

• Our Words by Cynthia Moore

  Our women’s luncheon was awesome – as always.  We begin with a pot luck lunch, go upstairs for praise and worship and have a guest speaker.  This month’s speaker was Cynthia Moore – Pastor Don’s wife – and boy did she give us a message that was so convicting – homework too!!! Our next meeting is November 21 and you are welcome – we begin at 1 and are pretty much done by 4.  It is a good group of women, and there is plenty of fellowship and friendship.

  To begin the meeting we were each given an index card and told to anonymously write a recent negative event that happened, and record what we said at the time of the event and what we said to others after the event.  We passed those cards in to be used later in the meeting.

  Cynthia held up the Bible and said, this is the Word of God.  We have it.  We need it.  It teaches us.  We need to hear and obey. God’s words are life to us. 

  1 Samuel 15:22-23 So Samuel said: “Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD?  Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebelion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He also has rejected you from being king.”

  When we do God’s word we receive blessing, favor, and He makes our paths more smooth. If we don’t do His Word our lives are not very god.

  God tells us:  DO NOT WORRY, and He tells us to FORGIVE those who offend us.  We often say, “I can’t help worrying.  How can I forgive them?”  But when we don’t obey God in this we will find that worry and unforgiveness can lead to stress which leads to disease.  We need to obey what God tells us or we end up harming ourselves.

  BELIEVE, KNOW, TRUST God’s Word.  When we do deal with our experiences through the truth of God’s Word, God works supernaturally in our lives. The more experience we have with God and following His Word, then we learn how beneficial it is, and we begin to trust God more and more, and know that He has our best interests at heart. We need to trust Him even in our bad situations.  He will get us through.

  To follow God’s Word in our lives means we have to KNOW GOD”S WORD.  If we don’t know what the Word says, how can we follow it?  We need to read the scriptures so we know what to say and believe.  The Bible is the Living Word.  It is not imperfect, it is the pure Word of God - it is real and accurate.

  If we don’t know what we should pray regarding a situation, seek the scriptures for a story or a verse that shows us what God has promised.  Cynthia also told us that when God repeats something in His Word it is for emphasis and should be taken to mean that God means it. 

  Our tongues speak our words and thoughts, and we need to master what our tongues say. Look in a concordance to see what God has to say about the situation, believe God’s Word, speak God’s Word.  We want God’s Word to be the Word that comes off our tongues.

  Even if we read scripture and know His Word, we don’t always speak it. Why?  Sometimes it is our upbringing. We might have spent our formative years with people who always viewed a situation as negative.  And without thinking we model ourselves after that kind of negative behavior and thinking.

  God wants us to give the Glory to Him, for what He has done in us.

  Cynthia shared how someone told her mother that Cynthia looks like her mom, and her mom’s reply was, “Oh poor thing.”  What kind of message did that send to Cynthia?  When she was growing up her best friend’s mother used to respond to every situation negatively.  That becomes a habit, and we need to break the negativity habit. 

  Some people don’t know how to say something in a positive way.  Some think people don’t take them seriously if they are too positive, that they have to be mean, negative, or strong to be heard. 

  We need to believe God’s Word and say what God’s Word says. Then, no matter our circumstances, we can have the peace that passes all understanding.

  There is a big difference between TRUTH AND FACT.

  They can run in parallel directions.  The worldly and spiritual are always going on at the same time.  When we perceive that something is wrong in the world, we need to put the WORD above the World.  The TRUTH of God’s Word in place of the fact.  The fact may be that it seems to be a bad day, but the TRUTH is that we are blessed and highly favored.

  Cynthia read from a book called Hung by the Tongue Written by Francis Martin.  He tells us that to control our mouth we have to control our mind and what we think.  Proverbs 23:7a For as he thinks in his heart, so is he. There was more that she read from this source, it seems to be a good book, but may not be easy to obtain.

  We need to accept that Scripture is literal.  These are spiritual principles that the Word contains that God set forth.  They are always operating. For example, the principle of sowing and reaping.  Sometimes knowing these principles does not make it any easier to follow them.  But God’s Word is truth, and as we follow these principles we learn that we cannot beat God at giving.

  Luke 6:37-38 Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.”

  If you spend your time criticizing people, you will reap criticism and receive judgments yourself.  That does not mean that we don’t judge, but how we judge is very important, and God knows our hearts. 

  If we want to be blessed, sow blessings to others and we will reap blessings.

  There are three things that will help us with our tongues:  1) prayer; 2) awareness; and 3) work and yieldedness.

  PRAYER- God helps us, we can’t do anything without God helping us.  It takes time and effort on our part to learn our scriptures and open up the Word, but God will use the Word to teach us, guard us, and help us to change.  Invoke God’s love.

  1 Corinthians 13 is the Love Chapter – and it tells us that Love never fails. We can’t do anything without love. If our life is not moving the way we want it to, we need to check our love walk.  We want things to come from a heart of love. We don’t want to act out of anger and resentment.  Let our words be words of love.  If we have to say tough words to someone, we may have to say them a different way so that they can be received. Speak the truth in love.

  AWARENESS:  We need to be aware of what we are saying.  Listen to ourselves, get a monitor (a friend or family member) who will point out when we are speaking negatively.  Ask their help. Tell them we are trying to learn to speak more positively and ask them to let us know when we are not.  It can be tough to have someone point it out, but if we really want to change, we need to be aware of when we are being negative.

  Cynthia then pointed out that there are times when we need to vent – and the way to do that is to get with someone that you have a positive relationship with and let them know that you are venting.  It has to be a trusted person who can then pray with you, and one that you know that what you are venting will not be repeated to others. And when you vent, don’t do it with character assassination.  Hopefully they will help you to find constructive things to say or do.

  When you do have a legitimate complaint and need to speak it to someone, be aware of how you are saying what you want to say. Don’t NIT PICK OR NAG.  Choose your battles. Sometimes things are not worth getting upset about.  Some things are so small you don’t want to let them get you upset.  Overlook the small stuff.

  It does take work to change our tongues.  We have to do it though, to make the effort to retrain our mouth, learn how to say things a different way, and try to learn to use positive phrases. 

  For example if you want your husband to take out the garbage – don’t nag and question him repeatedly, “Did you take out the garbage?” Or say something like, “You never remember to take out the garbage.” A more positive way of saying things is to say something like, “I love it when you take out the garbage.  Or thank you for taking out the garbage.”

  And even if a person doesn’t do the perfect job, say nice things about the good parts that they did.  People are more motivated by complements than they are by negative things.

  Avoid killer phrases such as:  You ALWAYS….. or I’m just sick of you when you…..

  Ecclesiastes 12:11 The words of the wise are like goads, and the words of scholars^{YehwehPaladin}