A Guard Over My Mouth

December 14

Micah 5-6

Psalm 141:1-6

Proverbs 29:22-23

Revelation 8

A Guard Over My Mouth

“Set a guard, O Yahweh, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips.  Do not incline my heart to any evil thing, to practice deeds in wickedness with men who are workers of iniquity; and do not let me eat of their delicacies.”  Psalm 141:3-4 LSB

This verse always makes me think of the guards at Buckingham Palace.  We have all seen videos of people trying to get the guards to react, to speak, to move, or to do anything.  People try all kinds of stunts to entice them to break attention to no avail.  While at their post, they are on active duty protecting the king/queen and their job is to maintain focus on their security duties.  If they were to engage in conversation with the public it could distract them and compromise their effectiveness in the event of danger.  Their silence and focus allows them to maintain situational awareness and respond immediately to any potential threats.  While I don’t think we should always stay silent and keep our mouths shut, it is definitely a good idea to think before we speak.  Asking God to keep watch over the door of our lips is always a good idea.  Instead of blurting out the first thing that comes to my mind, I need to contemplate what I am going to say.  Saying the first thing that comes to mind is never a good idea and usually results in my regretting what I said.  I often have to apologize or backtrack what I said after I have time to think it through.  Psalm 39:1-2 says it well, “I will keep watch over my ways that I may not sin with my tongue; I will keep watch over my mouth as with a muzzle.” LSB  That’s a great word picture.  I need a muzzle over my mouth to keep me from speaking when I shouldn’t or saying something I shouldn’t.  The mouth has the ability to get us in trouble faster than any other part of our bodies.  The Bible is filled with admonitions concerning our speech. 

James 3 explains that the tongue is like a fire that spreads quickly or an untamed beast.  He says it is “a restless evil full of deadly poison.”  Jesus addressed the issue of the mouth in Luke 6:45, “The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil.  For his mouth speaks from the abundance of his heart.”  Jesus gets to the heart of the matter.  What is in our heart comes out our mouth.  So when things spew out of our mouth that we are horrified by, we need to examine our hearts for the source.  The first step is to read Psalm 139:23-24 that we looked at a couple of days ago and ask God to examine our hearts and show us any bitterness, anger, resentment, jealousy or anything else that is not pleasing to Him.  Then we confess it to Him and ask Him to purify us and cleanse us of any unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).  And we ask Him to guard the door to our mouth and help us to think before we speak (Proverbs 15:28, 10:19, James 1:19-20).  Like the King’s Guards we need to maintain our focus on Jesus and on the task at hand, which is representing Christ to the world around us, so that we don’t get distracted and compromise our effectiveness.