Say What You Mean to Say
Scripture For The Day
February 17th, 2023
"No More Broken Promises"
One of the main things we taught our
daughter when she was growing up was that you never make a promise that you can’t
keep. Gone are the days of the old when a man’s word meant something. People
will say whatever they think you want to say and then break their word, their
promise, with excuses. People will use words to make it sound like their word
is more powerful than it really is by using “By God, I will..” or “I promise on
my….” But Jesus tells us that this is not how we need to be as we continue
to study the message in the sermon on the mount.
My husband and I have both been hurt by promises never kept. I imagine all of us have been hurt by broken
promises. But because of that hurt, we as parents made a point of teaching our
daughter to stay true to what she said. If you don’t mean it, don’t say it. And
if you say it, you better follow through with it.
Jesus again expands during His Sermon on
the mount on what was once taught by saying it goes even deeper than that. Yes,
you should never break a promise. But He tells us in Matthew 5:34 that when we
make a promise don’t use His Name or the Name of His Father or even the name of
heaven to make it sound more powerful. Because we don’t have that authority. We
can’t even use the name of the earth because the earth belongs to Him. We can’t
use the name of a city because it belongs to Him. and we can’t even use our
own head because we can’t even make one hair of our head turn a particular color (originally,
not by dye products)
So, instead of making empty promises, Jesus tells us in verse 37 that we need to only say yes when we mean yes and no
when we mean no. If we try to say more than that then we are allowing the enemy
to destroy our witness. People will learn not to trust what you have to say.
And as a Child of God, we need to be
found trustworthy.
Today and every day we need to say what
we mean to say and follow through with what we say. No more broken promises. Can your word be trusted?
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