Athlete’s Tongue
What? What in the world is “athlete’s tongue”? It’s athlete’s foot that spread to your tongue because you’ve spent so much time sticking your foot in your mouth!
Yep, and I’ve got it. I regret it. I’m saddened by it. I’m mad at myself for having it. But there are some things that happen … especially when they repeatedly happen … that I LET get the best of me. Then, boom. I put my foot in my mouth. Sometimes I want to blame time. Sometimes I want to blame stress. Sometimes I want to blame my own stupidity.
Bottom line, good people sometimes do hurtful or unfair things to us … again and again and again. And then instead of dealing with the issues, we stick our foot in our mouth and fall on our face. Underneath it all is a heart that wants to justify itself, its hurt, and its need to get even. So I think one of the most impressive things to me about Jesus going to the Cross is that he didn’t complain or whine.
“This isn’t fair! I know your secret sins. Let me go or I will tell everyone about who you really are! Besides, if you weren’t such a jerk to your wife, you would listen to her advice and know I was innocent. Speaking of your wife, does she know about …”
That’s kinda what I think I would like to have said to Pilate if I were Jesus. But in the unfairness of the trial, the inhumanity of his treatment, in the abandonment by his closest followers, during the ridicule by the crowd and the religious leaders, he kept silent except for a few emotionally moving words. And even these words were not mean-spirited or intended to justify any resentment or bitterness. And some of the those words come to me, with my athlete’s tongue and give me comfort: “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.”
But then I need something more than forgiveness, I need some spiritual healing, some holy medicine for my heart, because my athlete’s mouth is not a problem of my tongue or my feet, but of my heart:
“Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them.
“Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these defile you. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile you; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile you.” (Matthew 15:16-20)
O God, please heal my heart and make it like Jesus?
have this problem a lot.
that’s why i keep my tongue in my cheek so much, to give it room.
Sherry
14 Jan 09 at 9:23 am
In our Ladies’ Bible class last night we were discussing the fact that NONE of us is worthy of salvation. When we read the verse in Romans 7:15;
“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.”
When she finished, she said, “That’s me. That’s exactly how I feel.” All of the women echoed her sentiments; I said, “EVERYONE feels that way. If they do not, they are denying the sin that is in them.”
If we realize this is true, we must also realize that we need to forgive each other when we do these things. God won’t forgive US if we don’t forgive each other. And after all, next time it might be me that does it (hurts someone else)!
Linda Hoeck
14 Jan 09 at 11:27 am