Skip to main content

Rituals and Motions

Proverbs 20:19  “A gossip betrays a confidence; so avoid a man who talks too much.”

I like this verse in theory, but honestly, how do you avoid yourself?  I really have had a hard time talking badly about certain people and places lately.  I do it and then think to myself, now I shouldn’t have said that or shared that.  Usually I keep what people tell me to keep in confidence in confidence, but there are times that I talk too much.

So what is the solution here?  Pray every morning?- I do that already…  But do I pray about the right things?  Do I pray that everything that I do and say would be pleasing to God?  Do I really mean it?  Do I just go through the motions?  There are so many times that we ask God to do something but it is just a motion.  Think about praying before a meal time.  It is so easy to just go through the motions- dear Lord, bless this food, help it to nourish our bodies…..

How would you like it if someone called you before something but wasn’t sincere?  It was like a ritual.  You want a relationship with them but you can’t seem to get past the basics. 

Hey, how are you? 
            Good, you?
Fine thanks.  What did you do this weekend?
            Not a whole lot. 

It is like when your kid comes home from school and you are desperate to know every detail of their schooling.  You want to know; what they liked, what they didn’t like, who they sat with at lunch, who they worked with, if the teacher said anything about this or that…  Usually kids come home from school and you ask them, “How was school?” Then, in response, all you get back from them is “fine”.  It drives you a little crazy because you want a deeper relationship. 

So, how does that all relate back to gossip?  Well, lets look at it this way. If we look to God and really ask Him to take away the gossip in our lives and are really seeking to know him and share our lives with him, then guess what, HE WILL!  If we just say it as a passing thought or a ritual or a motion, do you really think that it will happen?

I pray that the Lord guides my thoughts today and that He keeps my mouth from gossip and slander. 

Comments

  1. MindyOctober 18, 2011 at 6:54 PM

    You are so right! when I am studying in the word my peoblems melt away. May I not get to ritualistic with my prayers but be heartfelt, loving & truely caring♥ Thank you!!!!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What do you fight about?

I heard a blood curdling scream from the other room, followed by the cries of my other child and then a smack.   I had been sitting at the computer, and leaned my head back closed my eyes, took a deep breath and went to encounter the argument head on.   Apparently my youngest daughter was playing with a stuffed giraffe that my oldest daughter sometimes sleeps with.   Amidst the crying and tears, I was able to formulate the events that took place.   My youngest daughter had gone to the toy room and gotten the giraffe (a green 16” giraffe with brown spots) out of the room and brought it into the other room.   Here, the older sister saw that the coveted giraffe was not in her room and grabbed it from her sister.   The younger one screamed and bit the older sister who then cried and hit the little sister.   As I took another cleansing breath I began dealing with the issue at hand.   It is very difficult to reason with a 2 and 3 year old and let alone a woman, so we ended up agreeing to do
2 comments
Read more

do I mis-use the Bible?

WOW!   This morning I sat and started to read through Ecclesiastes.   I don’t know if the author of Ecclesiastes, Perhaps King Solomon, had a very sarcastic view on life or if he was just babbling.   But I can definitely see how this book could get a lot of people into trouble if they don’t know the full book or continue to read.   There are verses in there that say things like; eat, drink and enjoy the days on earth because they are meaningless, it is good to enjoy your time on earth and do not worry about anything. To get the full meaning of the book, you need to read it all- the true gems are the last two verses.   This book was written by someone (according to my study Bible) that was near the end of his life, he sees man in pursuit of so many things and vainly pursuing hopes and expectations- but faith teaches him that God has ordered all things according to his own purposes and that we need to accept our limitations.   The last two verses are the writers final conclusion: Eccle
3 comments
Read more

predictions...

We were all privileged to see the recent hype about the end of the world coming n May 21 st 2011.   The time came and passed without a rapture, without an earthquake, without a storm…   What were those people thinking and feeling?   This prediction made so many question Christianity and question God in general.   Now there were some good aspects of this prediction.   It got people thinking and talking about salvation and their eternal destiny… and, well, that is all I can think of.   Now lets look at what the non-Christian’s saw: a man, claiming to know the answer, claiming that he was right, who had a following, a way to spread his message and an amazing amount of money which usually makes you right in America.   If you were a non-Christian and you saw this guy talking and then May 21 st came and went, you would either think that Christianity was a crock, or that everything that the Bible says is a lie because his equation came from the Bible.   I had one of my non-Christian friend
2 comments
Read more