Monday, January 08, 2007

Hung by the Tongue


Yesterday, I used M & M candy to teach high school girls in Sunday school. The lesson, Hung by the Tongue, was about our words.

I passed out little packages of M & M's. This is how we played a game.

Red M & M = Loving words
Blue M & M = Words of encouragement
Orange M & M = Words of hatred
Yellow M & M = Lies we tell
Brown M & M = Ugly thoughts that come out
Green M & M = Jealous words

I remembered back to when I was a little girl. Way back when, I can still remember ugly things I said--including hateful things I said just yesterday. Our neighborhood group of girls was heading to the movies one Saturday. I must have been about ten. All of us wore jeans except for Diana. She wore a church dress. I said, "I can't believe you're wearing THAT to the movies. Nobody dresses up THAT much for a movie."

Diana went home crying and didn't go with us.

I'm 46. This many years later I still remember my "orange" words.

I was hung by my tongue. James 3 is a great place in the Bible to learn all about our tongues. "But no one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil and full of deadly poison."

We talked about times we'd hurt our friends with our words. We also talked about the words of encouragement spoken to us and how powerful they are.

Being a writer is hard work--at least for me. Many days I've considered quitting. It never fails. I'll get a hand-written note from someone. "You'll never know how much your story meant to me. Please keep writing. I didn't think anybody else had ever felt this way."

See how it works?

Let's see if we can use blue and red M & M words today to the people around us.

♥Julie

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is completely true! Way to go for blue and red. Proverbs says a lot about the tongue and how it is untamable. Well, we won't be able to conquer it completely, but let's try!

Julie Garmon said...

Thanks, B. How'd you do so far today. Right now, it's 3:38 p.m. on Wednesday...

♥ Julie

Anonymous said...

Hey Julie. It's around 1:00 on Thursday. It hasn't been too bad or too great either. Mostly thinking sarcastic or angry thoughts, not really spouting them off (Unless it's to myself ;-)

What about you???

Anonymous said...

Hey - the 'anonymous' comment above is actually mine. I forgot to hit the 'name' space :-) oops

Julie Garmon said...

Hey B. I blew it today. I had a wreck, totalled my car. I'm fine, the person I hit is fine, but I lost my temper (rare for me--I'm serious. I usually cry when I get mad). I came right out and cussed at a family member who said something like, "Women drivers. Always putting on lipstick or talking on their cell phone."

At least you kept your thoughts to yourself.

:-( Julie

Anonymous said...

Julie - I am so sorry about your wreck! I'll pray for you - and for everyone else in the universe :-) -to spread God's love today. God Bless

Anonymous said...

i LOVED this story! this was an amazing way to teach kidz about how their words effect others! im just tryin out this website and ur story is the first i red! ithought it was very interesting! keep up the good work! GOD BLESS YOU

~PeAcE and LoVe ALWAYS~