Good Morning Everyone,
Our theme for this month: “Taking care of your soul”
Our Bible verse for today: “Life and death are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” Proverbs 18:21 (HCSB)
Our thought for today: “Be the voice of blessing in someone’s life today.”
In the fifth grade I was a mess. I was a year older than all the other students because I had stayed back in the second grade. I was also from one of the poorest families in the class, and most of my clothes were hand-me-downs which I had been given from the neighbors. And, even though only in the fifth grade, I already had a severe case of acne – pimples everywhere! I was awkward and self-conscious and I had a very poor self-image.
My teacher was a young woman by the name of Roberta Ryder. She was probably in her mid-twenties at that time and to me she looked like Ms. America. I was in love. And the best part was that she liked me too. In fact she adopted me as her teacher’s pet. Obviously she recognized a young boy who was struggling in life and so she made me her own special little project. She constantly found ways to affirm and encourage me.
One day we had a writing assignment. We had to pretend we were newspaper reporters and we had to write a story about something that happened in our neighborhood. I don’t even remember what I wrote about but I do remember what Ms. Ryder had to say about it. In front of the entire class she said, “Jimmy, you should be a writer. You’re good at this.” Her words of praise and affirmation went straight into my heart and they lodged deep in my soul. I drank in those words like a thirsty man in the desert and I’ve never forgotten them. Almost fifty years later I can still hear her saying, “Jimmy, you should be a writer. You’re good at this.” And my heart still swells. The remembrance of those words still makes me feel good and warm inside – even five decades later. (Actually another teacher had made a similar remark to me a couple of years earlier but it was Ms. Ryder’s statement, said with such warmth and kindness, and out of a tender relationship she had built with me, that really hit the mark and stayed with me.)
The point is that our words have power. They penetrate to the soul – to the very core of our being – and they take root there. In a world where people are verbally battered on a daily basis, we the people of God have the privilege and the potential to be the voice of blessing in peoples lives. In a world where people are chewed up and spit out on a regular basis your words can tell them “You matter, your life counts, God loves you and so do I.”
It costs us little, really, to speak words of blessing. But the return on that investment can be huge. I’ve received fifty years of life-giving encouragement from that simple statement which took Ms. Ryder less than ten seconds to make.
I want to encourage you to be intentional about peppering your speech with words of praise and encouragement. Words are powerful. They take root in the soul and they have a profound impact on people’s lives. Be the voice of blessing in someone’s life today.
God Bless,
Pastor Jim
Oak Hill Baptist Church 