Walk of Life, day 12 – September 2020-Thoughts from the Book of Proverbs.
A man will be satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth, And the recompense of a man’s hands will be rendered to him. – Proverbs 12:14
Robin S. Sharma, in his popular book “The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari” brings out an illustration about a stone cutter and a cathedral builder and it goes like this.
On a dry and a hot afternoon, a person went questioning few people working in constructing a building. The difference in the answers given by two workers working on the same job captured his attention. The question and the scenario are the same but two different answers.
The question is “What are you doing now?
The scenario is “Breaking stones”
The reply of worker 1 who seems to be much exhausted is “I am toiling so hard, breaking these stones right from morning till evening.”
The reply of worker 2 who is very much focused and enthusiastic is “I don’t have much time to answer as I’m working on building a big cathedral”
Very sure that everyone will appreciate the perspective of the second person as the words that he has used to answer the question has life. The writer of this proverbs has said that a man will be satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth. Is it not much correct to say that a man will be satisfied with good by the labour of his hands? Certainly not. How much ever we might labour but if the fruit of our mouth is not aligned with the right context we are not going to be satisfied.
We must be very much watchful with the words that we speak. Words reflect the intents of our heart.
Just bring forth the scene of Isaac blessing Jacob to your imagination. Jacob is standing before his father with the delicious food that his mother has prepared for him. Thank God it’s not an Indian cuisine which has many courses in its menu. Most probably Isaac would have had the meat curry with some bread. After the eating session there comes the blessing session. When we connect this scene in today’s context it should have been Isaac calling his personal lawyer to come with the bonded paper and in it he would have said, “I, Isaac whole heartedly declare that my entire property will be given to my younger son Jacob and nobody has the right to claim it in the future” This type of a blessing makes sense. But what happened actually Isaac blessed Jacob with words and after receiving the blessings Jacob walks out of the house empty handed.
Ponder over the richness of the words that Isaac uttered to Jacob. Those words were enough for him to lead his life thereafter. My dear brothers and sisters there is power in the words that we speak.
Joel 3:10 says “Let the weak say, I am strong” what is going to happen when we say that we are strong while we are weak or by saying I’m rich while we are poor. We tend to feel the same as we say and eventually get habituated to become strong and rich.
Our tongue has to be trained to be always optimistic and encouraging. Our intra personal communication, which is the way we talk to ourselves should be always positive, honest and encouraging which will certainly be an outcome in our inter personal communication.
The most satisfying words in this universe be nothing other than the message of the cross and the salvation received through it. Let us not forbid to share the gospel. May we be used in the hands of the Lord to bring forth lives of abundance and satisfaction.
May our Lord who is THE WORD, help us to be careful with the words that we speak.
Words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness. Mother Theresa.
