My friend told me of yet another acquaintance who is dying of cancer. As he talked, he recalled a story from many years ago of a comment the man made to him. He never forgot. I won’t repeat the statement for it was unkind, but as he recalled the story, I thought of many statements, seemingly inconsequential, and how they linger in another’s heart, long after the words are said. They are tapes which repeat themselves over and over. When I asked how long ago since the man made the statement, he said about fifteen years, and at 88 years of age, it is as if it were yesterday. And this is how powerful words can be, how destructive statements can be.
Why do we do say things in the heat of the moment out of spite or envy and allow these unkind, ridiculing, mocking, hateful words slip off our tongues and implant them in another’s heart? Words and statements which cannot be recalled and cannot be unsaid?
Words indeed are medicine and I wonder why we are so quick to anger and so hasty to say unkind words. We seem not to mind hurting others with words but are reluctant and withhold words which can make all the difference in another’s life.
“Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.” Ephesians 4:29
The following is a story I believe would benefit all.
“A doctor wrote a letter of thanks to a school teacher for having given him so much encouragement when he had been in her class thirty years before. He later received this reply: “I want you to know what your note meant to me. I am an old lady in my eighties, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely, and seeming like the last leaf on the tree. You will be interested to know I taught school for fifty years and this is the first letter of appreciation I have ever received. It came on a cold blue morning and cheered my lonely heart as nothing has cheered me in many years.” ~ Author Unknown
Words have the gift of life, but they also have the power to destroy. Choose your words wisely.
“Before you speak. . . . .
T – is it True?
H – is it Helpful?
I – is it Inspiring?
N – is it Necessary?
K – is it Kind?
Eileen Light