Freedom From Words That Kill Series

Freedom From Words That Kill

Freedom From... prt. 3

Wildwind Community Church

David Flowers

September 13, 2009

I want to talk to you about words this morning. Words are powerful. It is through words that we communicate our desires for ourselves and others and we pursue what we want in the world. It is through words that we express love and other creative energies. It is through words that we express bitterness and other destructive energies. Words are a vehicle for the human heart. So we're going to spend some time talking about words, but before that I'd like to introduce you to ten words that don't exist but probably should.

10 WORDS THAT DON'T EXIST, BUT SHOULD

1. AQUADEXTROUS

(ak wa deks'trus) adj. Possessing the ability to turn the bathtub tap on and off with your toes.

2. CARPERPETUATION

(kar'pur pet u a shun) n. The act, when vacuuming, of running over a string or a piece of lint at least a dozen times, reaching over and picking it up, examining it, then putting it back down to give the vacuum one more chance.

3. DISCONFECT

(dis kon fekt') v. To sterilize the piece of confection (lolly) you dropped on the floor by blowing on it, assuming this will somehow 'remove' all the germs.

4. ELBONICS

(el bon'iks) n. The actions of two people maneuvering for one armrest in a movie theater.

5. FRUST

(frust) n. The small line of debris that refuses to be swept onto the dust pan and keeps backing a person across the room until he finally decides to give up and sweep it under the rug.

6. LACTOMANGULATION

(lak' to man gyu lay' shun) n. Manhandling the "open here" spout on a milk container so badly that one has to resort to the 'illegal' side.

7. PEPPIER'

(peph ee ay') n. The waiter at a fancy restaurant whose sole purpose seems to be walking around asking diners if they want fresh ground pepper.

8. PHONESIA (fo nee' zhuh) n. The affliction of dialing a phone number and forgetting who you were calling just as they answer.

9. PUPKUS

(pup'kus) n. The moist residue left on a window after a dog presses its nose to it.

10. TELECRASTINATION

(tel e kras tin ay' shun) n. The act of always letting the phone ring at least twice before you pick it up, even when you're only six inches away.

Just a little fun with words there. Anybody ever been on the receiving end of words that weren't so fun? Anybody ever dish them out? We've been talking about anger the last two weeks and the next logical place to go after dealing with anger (by the way, I hope you ARE dealing with your anger) is to talk about words. Because there's a progression that happens with anger isn't there? You feel angry, therefore you do angry things (slam doors, throw stuff around, pout, etc.), and you say angry words. Angry words are words that kill. They kill not only the person they are said to/about, but also the one who says them.

But it's not just angry words that kill. Because perhaps even more often than words are used to hurt, they are used to manipulate. These are not angry words, they are empty words. Empty words also are words that kill. I will remind you here, as I promised I would do in each of these messages back in week 1, that when we use words that kill, whether they are angry or empty, we do so independently from God. God is not in our words of anger, nor is God in words that attempt to manipulate other people and bend them to our will, for the satisfaction of our own ego.

Colossians 4:6 (MSG)

6 Be gracious in your speech. The goal is to bring out the best in others in a conversation, not put them down, not cut them out.

Christians are people (or at least are supposed to be people) who are allowing their every thought, attitude, action, and word to be informed, shaped, and guided by the Spirit of Jesus. And yet if you are a gossipy person, if you enjoy the rumor mill, and saying and hearing bad things about others, there's probably no place you would be happier than in most churches in America. When it comes to speech, churches are among the filthiest places you can be. But we are filthy in clean ways. We may not be speaking "F this and F that and F you." No, it's wrong to swear, so we leave the F-words out of our filthy, gossipy talk.

Anger and gossip feed the ego. Anger feeds the ego's (the flesh's) need to be heard and to be right at any cost, to prop itself up and put others in their place. Gossip feeds the ego's need to feel important, and if I know something about someone then it will make me look important if I say it. Gossip also feeds the ego's need to get a laugh from others and be the center of attention and thought well of. It also feeds the ego's need to have power. When we know something other's don't, we have power. And when we choose to share a secret with someone, we are in a position of power, as we then have the keys to knowledge. Why did you hate it when you were a little kid and your parents said stuff like, "Time for B-E-D?" You hated it because you couldn't spell, and because you couldn't spell you therefore did not have access to the knowledge they had, and because of that they had power -- power to keep you from knowing something.