Place Guard over My Mouth

Ps. 141:3

Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth;
Keep watch over the door of my lips [to keep me from speaking thoughtlessly].AMP

Have you ever had one of those uh-oh did I say that out loud moments? Perhaps you found yourself complaining to God instead of praying to God. (I have found myself doing both of these.)

 When the pressure and stress of life happen we may find ourselves speaking faithless words instead of faith filled words.  When we are frustrated with our husbands, children or co-workers we must be mindful to speak out of love not frustration. James 1:19 puts it this way” Understand this, my beloved brothers and sisters. Let everyone be quick to hear [be a careful, thoughtful listener], slow to speak [a speaker of carefully chosen words and], slow to anger [patient, reflective, forgiving];”{AMP}

In Psalms 141:3 the author understands how easy it is to speak words that can not only be damaging to others, but to ourselves and our faith. So he asks the Lord to place guard over his mouth. A guard is to protect, keep careful watch over, safeguard things that are valuable. Think about how valuable our words are.  Proverbs 18:21 declares that “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it and indulge it will eat its fruit and bear the consequences of their words.” {AMP}  Wow!  The words that come from our mouth are so valuable and powerful that they can produce life or death. Its’ no wonder we need to be mindful of what we say.

Father, today we ask that you place a guard over our mouth. Help us to speak words that are life giving and full of faith.  In Jesus name amen.

Amazing Father

Our heavenly Father is truly amazing.  Sometimes I think we forget just how amazing and awesome He truly is. 

In spite of all our imperfections and short comings He loves us. His desire is to have an inmate relationship with each an everyone of us. He so wanted this that He gave us His only begotten son (John 3:16). He allowed His son to pay the price for us.

God loves you! Do you hear me? God love you! Yes, He really does love YOU! You were created in His image and the Father desires to have a loving relationship with you.

Today don’t look at the mistakes made but the grace that was given. Let’s not focus on our imperfections but on His perfection.

Today choose to accept the Father’s love. Walk in His love, live in His love and most importantly share His love with someone.  

A Faith that is Alive

James 2: 14-17

Hebrews 11: 1-6

A Faith that is Alive

A Faith that is alive requires action.

James 2:17-18Amplified Bible (AMP)

 So too, faith, if it does not have works [to back it up], is by itself dead [inoperative and ineffective]. But someone may say, “You [claim to] have faith and I have [good] works; show me your [alleged] faith without the works [if you can], and I will show you my faith by my works [that is, by what I do].”  

To be dead is to be void of life.  The opposite of dead is alive. So then as believers in Christ we must have a faith that is alive.

The word work here is not referring to salvation because we know no amount of good works that can save us.  The word work when define means the act of doing.  So then faith without the act of doing is dead. So faith that is alive then must have an action to match.  

The ability to believe and have a faith that is alive is in us.  I want you to think about this. We will get up go to job and work the hours they give us because we believe that at end of the week or whenever the payday is we are going to get a check. But we do not even know if the business has money to pay us. We haven’t seen their checking account we don’t know how much debt they have. We don’t even ask. We simply believe because they hired us they have the money. If we can act on a man’s word and trust and believe that we are going to receive what he promises us then surely we can have faith to act on the word God and the promises of God.

Now go to Hebrews 11. There were 3 things God showed me that indicated these people had a faith that was alive.

1.     They moved in obedience to God.

2.     They Trusted God for the increase

3.     They Focused on God not Man

    Many of us have prophetic words and promises hanging over us and our families and while we are waiting on God, He is waiting on us to take a step of faith. What God is asking you to have faith for now very well could be the stepping stone for where He wants to take you.   It’s time for us to mix what we say we believe with action.