Reckless Words

Proverbs 12:18 Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.

It’s amazing the gems that you can find on the web. Today I stumbled across Dave Burchett’s site and his post about Alec Baldwin’s voice message to his daughter. Mr. Burchett does a wonderful job pointing out Baldwin’s failures, not just what he said to his daughter but also in his apology.

When I saw the news the other week and listened to what Mr. Baldwin had said to his daughter I physically cringed. And it wasn’t just the words that he spoke, though they were bad enough, it was the vehemence he used in saying them. Every word, every single syllable was spat out like a cobra spitting venom. Each word was another jab, another cut. Each one was intended to bite just a little bit deeper than the one before.

I’m not saying this while wagging a finger at Alec Baldwin. No the cringing I did, and am still doing, is not because of what he was saying, but because I heard my own voice in that unrelenting diatribe. I know all too well how my temper can (seemingly) get beyond my control and my words are no longer used as an admonishment but instead, like a finely honed sword, they are used to eviscerate.

Dave Burchett points out in an excruciatingly vivid story the damage that words spoken in anger cause.

I related a story in my book, “Bring’em Back Alive”, about a little boy with a terrible temper. His father gave him a big bag of nails and instructed him to hammer a nail into the fence every time he lost his temper. After the first day over three dozen nails were hammered into the fence. But as the days went by the little boy began to control his temper more and more. One day the boy realized that he was no longer driving nails into the fence. When he proudly told his father he was given the new task of pulling out one nail for every day he continued to hold his temper. Finally all of the nails were removed. The father took his son out to the fence. “You have done a great job, son. But look at the holes in the fence. This fence will never be like it was before. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can stick a knife in a person and no matter how many times you say I’m sorry, the wound is still there. A verbal wound is just as bad as a physical one.”

Personally, I need to head to the hardware store and pick up a 50 lbs. box of coated sinkers.