Be Slow To Speak

You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry. James 1:19

There’s a lot of noise these days.

It’s not coming from those thumping boom boxes in the car next to you, or the guy yelling into his cell about his brother-in-law’s psychiatric evaluation. It isn’t your neighbor’s lawn mower in the middle of your Sunday afternoon nap.

This noise results from a selfish desire to share our personal thoughts and opinions with the universe in a never-ending stream. We demand the first, last, and middle word in every conversation.

We are frequently angry, and we seldom wait for others to finish their sentences before spewing our responses at them. We are the antithesis of this scripture verse.

What if we led the way to a quieter world by

• keeping opinions to ourselves unless they actually add value to the dialogue?
• deciding never to have the first or last word in any dialogue?
• not contributing to the cacophony?

I imagine people would pay more attention when we did speak up.