Arson… I seem to be an arsonist. I’ve learned some lessons about setting fires, been burned by a few that I’ve set…still, I seem to forget the lessons, and mindlessly set another fire.
‘..think about how a small spark can set a big forest on fire.’ (James 3:5)
I don’t play with matches. I have a problem with my mouth. It gets big sometimes, and overactive, spurting out stuff that is better left unsaid. Yes…you’ve heard this before from me. And yes….I’m still battling it.
I saw myself in a log a few nights ago. My husband put a log on our fire that was not an ordinary log. This log had at one time had a limb attached to the side of it, and the center of the log all the way to where the little stump of a limb stuck out on the side, was hollow. When he put it on the fire, the flames went crazy. The hollow place created a draft, perfect for fire to really ignite.
I have been in situations like that…seeing little glowing embers…and I set my mouth in motion, putting that log on the fire, and just the perfect one to cause a draft …then the situation turns into a dancing fire. “..wickedness burns like a fire…sets the forest thickets ablaze so that it rolls upward in a column of smoke.’ (Isa. 9:18)
The wisdom writer wrote “ As charcoal to embers, and as wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome man for kindling strife.” (Proverbs 26:21) And this… “ without wood, a fire goes out…without gossip a quarrel dies down.” (vs. 20)
Seems I have a tendency to be quarrelsome…for I’m guilty of kindling strife on occasion. God forgive me and ‘set a guard over my mouth O Lord, keep watch over the door of my lips.’ (Ps. 141:3)
Whether it’s ‘big’ fire or ‘little’ fire…or ‘big’ strife or ‘little’ strife…it’s all the same in the eyes of God. “With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness….out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, (and sisters)..this should not be.” (James 3:9,10) I want ‘the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart to be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.’ (Ps. 19:14) They are not always so…
If you think I’m writing this for you…I’m not. It’s for me….yet again. Sigh…
But if it spills out on you…talk to God about it. He’s heard it before…
