September 6 So many words!

Ecclesiastes 5:7 and 6:11 There is ruin in a flood of words. Fear God instead...The more words you speak, the less they mean. So why over do it?

Proverbs 22: 17-19 Listen to the words of the wise, apply your heart to my instruction. For it is good to keep these sayings deep within yourself, always ready on your lips. I am teaching you today - yes, you - so you will trust in the Lord.

Now I am an admitted bibliophile - I love books! and the words in them...filled with story. And I like words used beautifully and carefully; that's one of the elements of great writing. And with all that said, I have been guilty of filling the space between another person and myself up with words, sometimes to avoid the unsaid.

God speaks to that issue - we should be a people of fewer words and more meaningful ones. The flip side of that is that we should, instead of being a people of many words willing to share them all, God is calling us to be listeners. And I think listening means more than hearing. That's why there are two words to describe what happens when the vibrations of spoken words penetrate our ears and then minds. One word, hear means simply that the mechanics work - our ears do pick up the noise. The other means that we receive the sound with interest. God is calling us to hear with interest the words others speak, and that's tough to do when we are focusing on our own words.

Then in Proverbs, we are told who to listen to - the wise, not just he words spoken into the air of the wise, but the ones recorded. In many cultures the aged people are revered because of their wisdom. I fear that in our culture, the aged people are an embarrassment to us. We chuckle over their lack of being au courant or up to date with the latest technology or jargon, and we seldom think of asking them about the old days and what they learned living through so many years.

Similarly, I wonder how often we read the words of the writers of Scripture with the idea that we are mining them for gold, for wisdom, that will help us learn how to live. And I mean the kind of mining that causes us to be so excited we are quick to share the words and the relationship with God they help-s us to have with others. Instead I fear, too often we fear doing just that because people might think there is something wrong with us if we go all "Bibley" on them.

I love A.W. Tozer's words on that subject: The sacred page is not meant to be the end, but only the means toward the end, which is knowing God Himself.

Well, I've rambled- stream of consciousness, they call it I think - all to say that words are important. We should be careful about the ones we use, use fewer of them in general, and pay attention to the words of others, especially of the wise, whether they are spoken or written down as God's Word.