Devotion
Toothpaste and Talking
David Jacobs

I remember my school principal proudly performing a demonstration on the destructive nature that words can have on one another. This example has been performed in the west for generations. It is very simple. The leader presents a crowd with a tube of toothpaste. He deliberately squeezes the tube clean, spewing forth striped minty foam into the hand of a willing participant. Once he is satisfied that everyone can see the volume of toothpaste on the participant's hand, he asks them to put the toothpaste back in the tube. It is impossible. The participant may successfully put some of the toothpaste back in, but certainly not all of it. It is a mess that takes a whole lot of work to clean up. This is to demonstrate how hard it is to take back something once we have said it. Perhaps we can take back some of it, but not all of it. It is messy and unpleasant.

'Watch your mouth!' is often something you may hear of one who speaks out of turn. Whilst this may arise in some heated argument, David here asks this of God himself, to stand guard at our mouths, which are like gateways to our hearts. We can injure or heal, spread joy or confusion with simple words. But what God seeks is clear communication with him, for we often lose our own selves in Him and become immersed rather in the message of the Lord.

Prayer

When we entrust the Lord with our lips, we think before we speak.