Words are Powerful

Psalm 19:14 May my spoken words and unspoken thoughts be pleasing even to you, O Lord my Rock and my Redeemer. (Living)

Psalm 19:14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer. (NKJ)

I am excited to be teaching another chapel tomorrow. This time I am teaching K-2 and 3-5. My mother in law is going to watch the children for me. I am praying that everything goes well at home, on schedule, and everyone obeys. We have all been sick with fevers, cough, and Julia even had an ear infection. It is our 2nd day on antibiotics...poor Mark just has a cold and didn't need medicine.

Tomorrow's chapel is entitled, "Words are Powerful!" Since I have been doing so many chapels for TCS in the past 2 years, I've decided to create a binder with all my notes and materials so that I will have all of these lessons on file. I did all the research, so why not be able to go back to it and hopefully use it again some day. Dr. Hartzler (one of the most influential people in my walk with Christ, my grad school professor from Baptist Bible College) told me that being a stay at home mom doesn't mean I have to stop using all my gifts, he is the one that actually encouraged me to start writing school curriculum for Mark and Julia. Curriculum planning has always been one of my secret joys for some reason, and preparing lessons to speak in chapel is another one.

I have a list of 20 words that I am going to read out loud and the kids are going to have to give me a thumbs up or a thumbs down if they get a positive feeling or a negative feeling from the word. Then we are going to talk about the rhyme, "Sticks and Stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." I am going to share how words have helped me in my life, and how they have hurt me. I am also going to bring up how we just celebrated the life of Dr. Martin Luther King and how his words helped to change our world and help the civil rights movement to flourish.

Then I am going to open it up to the kids and have them share how words have helped/hurt them recently. I am going to make a list of all the things that words can do: encourage, build up, make someone smile, inspire, bless, bring life, destroy, tear down, discourage, depress, dampen, bring death. We are going to talk about how teachers, parents, politicians, friends, enemies, and music/media use words.

I am going to then say: "What does God's Word say about words?" We are going to investigate Proverbs 31: 26 When she speaks her words are wise and kindness is the rule for everything she says.

Psalm 19: 14 May my spoken words and unspoken thoughts be pleasing even to you, O Lord my Rock and my Redeemer. (I will stress how even our thoughts need to be pleasing to God, just because we don't let the mean words come out doesn't mean we are not sinning if we are thinking negatively)

Ephesians 4: 31-32, Colossians 4:6, James 1:19, and Ephesians 4:29 (one of my favorite Bible verses for young people) Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.

I am going to close our time with coming up with ways that we can build up others and impart grace with our speech. I have some examples like: writing a note to your mom and dad saying how much you love them and how thankful you are to them and putting it in their purse/briefcase. On the recess field find someone to encourage by saying something kind or giving someone unexpected a high five/smile. Not to grumble and complain when you are given your homework assignments. Telling your teacher thank you for something he/she did today. I can't wait to hear what they come up with, these kids are so much more creative than Mrs. Mac! They are awesome!

Pray for me if you think of it tomorrow! From 9am til 10 am I will be speaking to little people who mean so much to me! I love TCS!!! Oh, and pray that Mark and Julia obey their grandma too!