1 Peter 3:10 For, “Whoever would love life and see good days must keep their tongue from evil and their lips from deceitful speech.
Peter now reflects on Psalm 34:12-16. Most people want to have a good life and live a long life. We want to come to the end of our days satisfied and happy about how we have lived. I worked in hospice care for over two years. I cared for hundreds of people during their last days. Sometimes I could tell about how a person lived the rest of their lives by how they died. People who had a hard life often had a hard death. We may die how we lived. A peaceful life full of love will help us as we end our lives because we will die in peace, especially for those who believe. Peter is encouraging his readers to have a good life by watching what they say. The apostle James writes something similar in James 3:1-9. The tongue only reveals what is inside. Our speech reveals our thoughts. If we talk without thinking, that indicates that certain thought habits have been formed. Evil and deceitful speech indicates a spiritual problem, that sin has dominating control of our thoughts. Finding freedom from sin through Christ should and will lead to a change in our speech patterns. If we find that our speech sometimes slips into a lie, we must ask ourselves who or what is in control of our lives. God offers a new way of life to us as we identify with Christ’s crucifixion. The Holy Spirit within us will convict us about wrong thoughts and empower us to find freedom from a slippery tongue. What a person says reveals a lot about his or her character. In spiritual terms, what a person says reveals a lot about his or her spiritual state.
For older posts, click here.