I Will Seek That My Words Be with Grace

"I Will Seek That My Words Be with Grace" – Colossians 4:6 The Lord hears us, and we have an angel beside us writing down everything we say. If we speak evil words, we are showing that the Lord is not in us. Life brings sorrows and it brings anger, and one has the right to be angry; but we must be very careful with the words that come out of our mouth, because the Lord knows with what sense and with what feeling they are spoken. Our daily testimony is what truly speaks and says that Christ lives in us: how we act and how we speak, in every gesture where it seems no one is watching.

I. Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man (Colossians 4:6).

A. Grace is the set of qualities that make a person pleasant.

1. They make one kind, courteous, and charming, allowing a sense of pleasantness and sympathy through words. For the one who is all smiles it comes easily; the rest of us have to learn it.

2. We must speak with gentleness, seeking harmony and charm in our language, avoiding harshness and roughness. Paul teaches us to be careful how we speak and how we present ourselves before people.

3. Life makes us hard and harsh, because we get used to dealing with people who are hard of heart and we say: "I will be the same, that is what they deserve." But by our deeds we shout to them whether we are like them or whether we are different.

4. Grace includes giving each one the answer he deserves: if someone speaks to me, attend to him, look him in the face, and pay attention to what he is saying. Today people converse while looking at the phone, and that is a lack of respect.

5. We have self-control to recover on the hard days, and we regain it in prayer, asking God for strength, peace, and joy, so that this is what is reflected in us.

B. An argument leads nowhere.

1. One fights and the other fights; no one listens, each wants the last word and wants to say it louder. It is living the heat of the moment and letting the flesh loose, nothing more.

2. No problem is solved by blaming the other, because the other will not yield. And if that happens in daily matters, arguing about the Word leads nowhere.

3. No soul can be won on the basis of an argument, nor are children won by arguing all the time, only to make it look in church as if everything were fine.

4. It is by our lives that we draw others; it is the only way, by example. The duty is laid on us to show Christ to others with our daily life.

II. What must not come out of our mouth.

A. There are ways of speaking that edify no one.

1. Creating mystery and horror: speaking everything in the negative, with fright, tragedy, and agony. Evil things are happening, but God is the greatest and is with us; that horror must not paralyze us, nor should we frighten the children at home.

2. Mockery, sarcasm, and irony: throwing in the little joke and the little laugh to make the other feel bad, and going home thinking "I humbled my brother, I won, I felt superior."

3. Pride, arrogance, and competing with others: "I have this, I did that." That gives no peace, no joy, no fullness; it leaves a giant emptiness.

4. Constant complaining: "my life is a disgrace, this job is worthless." The job we have is the one God gave us, and it pleased Him to bless us with it. If we are in a trial, God wants to teach us something.

5. What is impure produces heaviness and annoyance to the ears of the one who listens. When we take part in an impure conversation we ought to feel reproved, not laugh along, and withdraw.

6. When God gives us the chance to speak well and instead we carry impurity, we harm the one who hears us. Better to keep quiet: "I am not well, I will not give an opinion."

B. The One who hears us in secret.

1. Before people it is easy for us to pretend; in secret we let loose. But there are angels listening there, and the Holy Spirit is there.

2. It is better for a human to hear you than for the Holy Spirit and the angels to hear you. The human forgets by the next day what he heard; the Holy Spirit does not forget, and it is written in the book.

3. We live guarding ourselves so that human beings do not see us, and we forget that what matters most is who is watching us.

III. Seasoned with salt: to add and not to subtract.

A. Our words must influence those around us positively, especially those who are not believers.

1. If the one who is not a Christian sees us living worse than he does and always in the negative, he will say: "What do I want with that God of yours?"

2. A conversation should leave the other encouraged, with joy and with strength, not with a hundred thousand pounds on his shoulders.

3. We reflect Christ by bringing a different flavor at work, with a coworker, with our parents, and with the neighbor, because we do not speak as the ungodly speak. People notice that one speaks with faith, with hope, with maturity, and with firmness, without hatred, without envy, and without strife.

4. We add value to a conversation by being the salt, as salt adds to food.

5. Those who do not know the Lord must be spoken to with a fire that does not go out. If we do not, the day that person stands before the Lord it will be written that no one came to present Jesus to him. New sheep are reproduced among ourselves.

B. The world wants us frivolous, impure, and bitter.

1. The world makes us hard and cold, so that we feel nothing for anyone and even rejoice at what happens to another "so that he would learn."

2. God wants to give us peace, joy, and love in His kingdom; the enemy wants to take that away and put his own in us. Knowing the truth, we still give more place to bitterness than to love.

3. People will always do and undo; what we have to guard is our own heart.

4. Bitterness afflicts: instead of doing good, we do harm. If they see us bitter, no one will say that this person has Jesus.

IV. He who is not deep does not transform lives.

A. Depth is gained in prayer and in reading the Word.

1. It is not about getting by on the surface. One prays for as long as one can, but one prays; and without knowing the Word there will be no depth, because we will not even know what to say.

2. One need not be a teacher nor give theology for someone to understand who Jesus is: the love of Jesus shows clearly even in simple words, because the person has already seen Him in us.

3. Sometimes we are not deep because we want to live superficially, without drive and without strength, because it is easier. For others to be transformed we must speak on God's behalf with strength.

4. This road is long and we cannot grow weary or hard. If our children see us bitter and frivolous, they will say: "If this is what mami is like, imagine what is left for the world."

5. In counseling one must not be frivolous nor speak out of anger: one must persuade with patience and with love, because the qualities of Jesus are supposed to be in us. With our own there will only be argument.

B. What God is watching.

1. Forget what others said and how they said it; the only thing that matters is how I speak. In every situation God looks at our heart and is testing us.

2. It does not matter if someone insulted me: what God is watching is how I am going to react. Blaming the other is no excuse, because it was left written in the Word that, no matter what they say to us, we are to have His qualities.

3. The salt the Lord asks of our speech is a sincere conversation without duplicity, not being two-faced, saying one thing while thinking another.

4. Let us ask the Lord that His Spirit fill us with wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, power, and fear, so that our conversations be neither empty nor senseless. It is not theological wisdom, but wisdom in God to know what to say when we must counsel someone.

5. When that grace was shown in Jesus, it won the ear of the Samaritan woman: she asked how a Jew could ask her for a drink, and He answered her with all grace, with all passion, and with all love (John 4). Amen.