Me and My Big Mouth

tact'ful-ness n.: 1. consideration in dealing with others and avoiding giving offence; 2. a gifting that I apparently lack

My husband (and my dad, for that matter) could look directly into another persons eyes and tell them they were the meanest person with the most rotten attitude and uneven ears and they would tear up, hug them and thank them for being so awesomely genuine and loving them as a person. It's an unbelievably wonderful gift...that I do not have.

Now, seriously, they would never say exactly those things, but God has truly given these men of my life a way with the spoken word. In the face of an opportunity to share what's on my heart, I find myself often making excuses before the burning bush just like Moses once did, "But...um, God? Don't you remember that I don't speak well at all?"

So it happened again tonight - one of those "Moses Moments." I opened my mouth at the wrong time in the wrong place and apparently said the wrong words. Three strikes and I'm out. I totally offended a friend of mine (unbeknownst to me at the time), and I'm praying tonight for grace to cover my multitude of sins and wisdom to figure out where to go from here. One thing's for sure: this handicap of mine definitely forces humility on me (and makes me ever-so-thankful for my incredible husband).

And...as if humility weren't enough, God so graciously provided some conviction as well (this was waiting for me when I got home tonight as part of my daily reading):

"A word out of your mouth may seem of no account, but it can accomplish nearly anything—or destroy it! It only takes a spark, remember, to set off a forest fire. A careless or wrongly placed word out of your mouth can do that. By our speech we can ruin the world, turn harmony to chaos, throw mud on a reputation, send the whole world up in smoke and go up in smoke with it, smoke right from the pit of hell. " James 3:3-6 (The Message)