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blogging, faith, hope, insanitybytes22, internet culture, love, opinion, relationship, words
I have to disagree with Glass Planet who wrote post called “Swine and Pearls but mostly Swine,” about blogging and words that fall on deaf ears. It’s not the lamentation I disagree with. I sometimes ponder what is worst, to have your words left in obscurity,to be rendered invisible, or to draw people’s ire and hostility? It’s a question that is a bit like that old game we used to play as children, so which is worse, to freeze to death or burn to death?
Oh the angst and woe of writing and blogging….
I’ve been on the internet for a long time chatting with people. I have met the “Hatred, blind, stupid and vicious.” I have met it on the ground, IRL, too. It can be downright repugnant. Anyone ever doubt that sin is a real thing in the world, or believe that we are all just happy people who basically want to do good? Yes, well I have been thoroughly relieved of such notions. Perhaps 10% of my day involves other people pouring hateful words over me.
Hatred is just the flip side of love. It’s indifference we should fear.
I certainly don’t disagree with the idea, “never doubt Jesus.” Oh, amen to that! “Nobody knows what they’re talking about like Jesus. Sometimes it’s downright shocking how a look at a passage I’ve been reading for over fifty years can deliver fresh, slap-in-the-face clarity and put the world back in order.” Yes, yes, just beautifully stated. When it begins to feel as if I am trapped in an asylum run by insane clowns, The Word can bring order back to my universe, save me from the entropy that threatens to consume us all, and deliver clarity, that Living Water that is so vital when one becomes parched and confused.
No, the part I disagree with is the last paragraph, “The spoken word has no power. None. The only words that matter are the ones that are heard and swine aren’t known for listening.”
Au contraire. The spoken word is everything and it has tremendous power. It has so much power, our Lord Himself is often called The Word. We could even say we ourselves are simply a word He once spoke into existence, a word He continues to speak into existence, like a potter always refining His creation. We are just a spoken word and as such, our words too have creative power. The words we speak over ourselves and others are everything, they write the whole narrative. The words we speak in His name have even more power and as we learn in scripture, His word never returns void. Never! We can not always see it, our vision is not broad enough to see the harvest of our words, but it is there.
Our words change minds and hearts, perhaps not the mind and heart of who we are speaking to, but there are always others listening. This is especially true on the internet,this voyeuristic world full of eyes on us that we can’t even see. There are comments, articles, ideas that go back years, forever preserved in cyberspace, still being viewed, still being accessed.
Most head butting, war of words you will lose. “I recognize the vast superiority of your words and have now changed my mind,” said no one on the intertoobz ever, but our words still matter, for good or ill, we have planted them. Sometimes all we have is the idea that I loved you enough to share my words with you,to show you another way, a better way, once actually called The Way, in fact. When it comes to faith we have to remember we are just one small seed and team work is everything. It takes a few hundred thousand seed to plant a crop.
Good words are love. Someone wise once told me, we need to love those who don’t listen all the more, because that might be the only reward they ever have. The epitome of their existence is frozen in one small moment, the inability to receive love. So lay it gently at their feet, dust off your own, and move on.
But never say words don’t have power. We are never as significant nor as insignificant as we imagine ourselves.
any1mark66 said:
The response is what you really must user to value your words. If I can draw a strong response from you I have successfully written my post. Even trolling from another blogger, shows you’re words have created a response that must be presented. A very back handed compliment, but to illicit responses are wins. Being left invisible is truly worse fate. It’s like learning from doing something right. The response allows you to huge your effectiveness in writing . Good or bad!
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insanitybytes22 said:
Well said. Even trolls serve a purpose. 🙂
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any1mark66 said:
They’ll start by editing it for free. Then review every point for clearly sake, so you can understand their level of misinformation. 🙂
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insanitybytes22 said:
LOL!Yes. Never underestimate someone’s ability to take your words completely out of context and to spot every spelling error. 🙂
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any1mark66 said:
My experience had been thank them and watch then dissapear
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claire said:
I quite agree.
Words are very powerful things. When you speak about something (particularly God’s words) you are bringing people to a choice, to reject, ignore or receive. Something is changed, a choice presented and made, even if it is to reject or ignore. For this reason it behooves us to be careful of our words – they often do more than we know for good or for bad.
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Rebecca LuElla Miller said:
I didn’t read the original, but I wonder if they weren’t referring in their “no power” proclamation to those who believe that words are like magic wands. Sort of like Abra-kadabra. If we just say the words, giving no thought to their meaning, then, wallah. I believe that’s what the “name it and claim it” crowd asserts. But I could be wrong ad maybe they meant something entirely different.
Words must have some sort of power. Certainly God wants His people not to use His name in vain. And it is at the name of Jesus that all knees will bow.
On the flip side, Paul says in Ephesians that no unwholesome word should come from our mouth and James says our tongues–the source of our words, I take it–are full of deadly poison. In fact, James asserts the power of the tongue when he compares it to a bit that controls a horse or a rudder that controls an entire ship.
Our words don’t have magic power, but they have the capacity to do great good or great harm.
Becky
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insanitybytes22 said:
Ha! I love the synchronicity here, Becky! I’ve just been reading about this “name it and claim” it thing. Honestly, I have no clue about some of these churchian references. I’ll have to keep researching and see what the conflicts are.
Kind of interesting, there’s some frolicking debates over the etymology of the word “abracadabra,” too. Today it’s associated with magicians and magic. It used to be related to amulets and charms, which begins to take on an occult element. But long ago before all that we have the Aramaic, Avra c’dabrah, “I create like the word.” Then we have the Hebrew, “as it is spoken.” In the days of kings and monarchs, their words carried real weight, so kings speak and things literally happen. No magic really, just power and authority.
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lang3063 said:
IB, I appreciate your thoughtful response. Cogent, heartfelt and elegant, as always. I don’t want to start explaining, clarifying, etc. because, I think the bottom line is that we actually disagree on this point. I know you’ve given this topic a lot of thought, as have I. The only thing I would emphasize is that nothing in my post should be understood to mean that we shouldn’t proclaim the truth to the best of our ability, often to the limit of our endurance, and leave the results to God. I’ve just seen too many bloggers attempting CPR on discussions stiffened by rigor mortise, tearing their hair out to phrase one more response with logic and grace while those at the other end turn up the white noise and grab another stick of dynamite. I’ll admit the post was inspired by frustration but it does express how I see things, which is probably why I’m an infrequent blogger.
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dawnlizjones said:
Becky, I’m really glad you wrote this. I had some things to say, but have been in a big house with extended family (including or precious 2-year-old grandie) and only have so many “words” in me this week! Thank you for beautifully articulating this. I think I so see his point, and there is wisdom to be had from the Holy Spirit as to the when and where, but I would like Him to have to reign me in more than push me out there, if you get my drift. The parable of the sower has some seed falling of unproductive ground, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t supposed to sow it, or that it was wasted. Just a thought. (Sometimes I might get a little too caught up with semantics….)
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Paul said:
Indeed IB,The Word and words carry huge power. in fact John 1:1 says clearly that in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God. Those who are not honest or speak without thought, are abusing themselves and the Word. We are just scratching the surface on how the human brain works and what it does. There are studies that appear to suggest that human thought can have a real affect on quantum particles – which are the building blocks of the universe. If that turns out to be true then it provides a link between thought and reality – a link that would support the fact that what we think and then say, does in fact have a very real affect on our world, even excluding our affect on other humans.
To wax philosophical, I truly believe that God used the Word to create our universe. When God spoke the Word he created time/space because He clearly stated what was to come – in other words time came into being for the effect of the Word was not felt when God spoke but rather after He spoke. Break time out of the time/space continuum and what remains is space.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Love this comment, Paul. That’s what I’m talking about.
The bible also tells us, “ask and you shall receive” and “you have not because you ask not.” We aren’t talking about materializing a Ferrari here, or at least, probably not. These are much larger spiritual concepts. The words we speak over ourselves and others really have a profound impact.
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Paul said:
That’s an interesting aside IB. You know there are those who say (and I’ve seen this work and used it) that whatever you want, just voice it and focus on it and it shall appear. And so too it does. The problem I have with using that to get money or a Ferrari, is that it requires focus and it requires that you put that item ahead of all else. That is like doing drugs – there is one narrow band on which the user benefits hugely but it is at the expense of other important qualities and concepts =like God. That said, when we find the right questions to ask = those that carry forward our deeds and lives such that they most please God. (i.e maximizes rightness in totality) As we find our way towards God our questions get “more right”. When we discover the right questions,then focusing on them benefits all. Oddly enough, it might be a Ferrari if that is what is needed to do God’s will. it is impossible to say and delightful to realize. It might be expensive rings and a coiffure and a Tux and a manicure that most allows us to do God’s will. Which sounds totally ludicrous but actually has happened. Remember Schindler’s List? Schindler kept his standing with the Nazis by remaining impressive looking and exuding elegance and power. This allowed him to work behind the scenes to get train loads of Jews out of Nazi held territory. If they had begun to suspect he was not what and who he said he was -i.e. the trappings of power disappeared – they would have stopped his activities and killed him. This caused Schindler great anguish for he knew if he sold the items he would have more money to free more Jews – but he would also lose his standing with the Nazis. In that case God required flashy rings and a tux and a manicure, etc. to do His work.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Ah, so well said! Scripture addresses this too and how we sometimes ask wrong: “there is one narrow band on which the user benefits hugely but it is at the expense of other important qualities and concepts.”
There’s a saying, “be careful what you ask for, you just might get it.” What we are asking can interfere with other things that are going on.
Great story about Schindler. I never really noticed that, but you’re right. I’m not a big fan of prosperity gospels, but I do think there are many principles there that can help some people with financial wounding, what I call poverty of spirit. That’s one of our biggest problems in the US, not a lack of money, not oppression, but a poverty of spirit that creates learned helplessness and self enforced poverty. We bump into this a lot at work, you get people housing, an income, and they wind up back on the streets again.
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A dad said:
As I say periodically,
“God does have some poor angle writing down this entire pathetic conversation !” 😏
We will be held to account for every careless word!
So “be careful little mouth what you say!”
Or write on the Internet !
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