Cull Your Words – Proverbs 13:3

“Take Care Of Your Tongue Like The Way You Take Care Of Gold & Silver.”-(Ali Ibn Abi Talib)  “You are master of what you say until you utter it, once you deliver it, you are its captive.”-(Talib)  “A fool is made more of a fool, when their mouth is more open than their mind.”-(Anthony Liccione)  “Keep quiet and ponder! Speak and say something!”-(Ernest Agyemang Yeboah) [source]

Whoever guards his mouth preserves his life;

he who opens wide his lips comes to ruin. (Proverbs 13:3, ESV)

I remember sitting across from my friend’s father, a man I had never met before, looking to see who he was, to get to know him, when he made the statement that he was a person who did not “cull” his words.  He was proud of the fact that he didn’t choose his words  or act carefully to speak well in his interactions with people.  He just told them whatever came to mind, even as he was doing with me.  It is hard to imagine anything more foolish.

Guarding one’s words can save one’s life.  When heir-apparent David escaped Saul by fleeing to the Philistines and realized that the Philistine king he was hoping would take him in was in fact ready to do him in, he feigned insanity and it saved his life (1 Samuel 21:10-15; and see his psalm about it, Ps. 34).  It can also save hurting others.  I’ve learned the hard way never to ask a woman if she is pregnant.  Never, you say, never?  Yes, never.  Unless maybe you are performing some emergency therapy and must know whether she is pregnant so as not to hurt the baby.  But other than that, NEVER!

The one who opens wide his lips, who puts no damper on his own speech, will have no friends and will often sin with his mouth.  Think before you speak.  Engage the brain God gave you before you hit the gas pedal on your words.  Learn from the wise what gracious speech is all about.  Trust God to take care of you, not your motor mouth.