"My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry" - James 1:19 (NIV).
There has long been an apt observation that while we have two ears to listen; we have one mouth to speak. Look at it this way. Suppose we had the opposite of two mouths and one ear. Don't you think life would have been a long drive of being harassed with all the noise you can imagine from competiting mouths! In creating us as we are, God did not take chances.
When we spend more time listening and not rushing to declare our thinking two things can happen. First of all listening gives us an opportunity to absorb in the views of the other party. And having heard we are then better informed to give an apt answer. Any of us may recall a time when in a rush to speak we said something so hurtful and just because of misinformation!
The Apostle James urged believers to be "slow to anger"! Anger is an emotion caused when we particularly feel strongly over a certain matter. When someone is so even that they never get angry over anything this might mean they do not have any feeling for any situation or subject.
Indeed our Lord Jesus got angry when he came over vendors who had turned his house into a market place (Mathew 21: 12- 13). But then his life was not one of someone easily provoked, quick to flex muscles at every single opportunity. While being arrested he asked of Peter to hold back against the soldiers, showing a certain remostrance though being God He had the power to hit back (John 18:11).
The Apostle James is much in agreement with the Apostle Paul who exhorts us to practice self control. Self-control is listed as one of the Fruits of the Spirit (Gal 5:22-23) – a sign that Christ is in us. If we let our emotions of anger run us then we are clearly hindering the work of the Holy Spirit to perfect us in Christ.
Prayer for today: Lord Father God of Abraham, maker of heaven and earth, through the power of the Holy spirit teach me to be slow to speak and eager to listen and practice self control in all my affairs, that I may glorify you in my life, this I pray in Jesus's name.
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19/04/2024 - 20/04/2024 All day“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland” ( Isaiah 43:19).
Just before fire was unleashed down on Sodom and Gommorah, Lot was told to pack up with his wife and two daughters and leave their homestead. Now, once out of danger, “But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt” ( Gen 19:26). Perhaps here we might pause and ask why she was bothered to look back.
Of course it could have been that old “curiosity killed a cat” mistake! Yet, it could also have been Lot’s wife was not sure where she was going and longed for her old life back. This is a common error. There was nothing stirring to look back. Just before Lot’s neighbors had attacked his house eager to rape his visitors. “They called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them” ( vv 5). Was there anything worth looking back to!
The case of Lot’s wife could be anyone else’s experience. The Lord has plucked you out of some mess. You have been delivered to a new life. Yet, somehow you decide to look back, as though there was anything good and worth longing for. Sometimes it is a bitter past you have been delivered from. Other than rejoice in your new blessings you keep being drawn back!
A wise caution goes, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly” ( Proverbs 26:11). If the Lord has just led you out of a certain mess why look back like it was much better! Instead look ahead, for “he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters, who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and reinforcements together, and they lay there, never to rise again, extinguished, snuffed out like a wick: Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past” ( vv 17- 18).
Prayer today: Lord Father God of Abraham, maker of heaven and earth, I thank you for delivering me from the darkness of the past and I look forward to a bright new future in you, this I pray in Jesus’ name!
