Speak in Love

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.” --I Corinthians 13:1

Through discernment, we can easily recognize insincerity in speech.
I can be as a mighty orator, speaking forth high-minded thoughts,
but if I do not speak with sincerity and love, my words are vain.

I can speak angelic thoughts, as if what I say is a message from Heaven,
but if I lack love and purpose, my wards are empty.

Words can be well-chosen, clear as a gong against well-crafted brass.
Words can resound with majestic ringing as clear notes from a cymbal,
but without love, such words bear no worthy message.

Dr. Dick Furman, an American surgeon, was returning by plane January 25, 2010 from a mission assignment to earthquake devastated Haiti. There he had spent weeks in heartbreaking and grueling surgical work, trying to patch up mangled bodies caught under rubble from falling buildings. On the plane, tired in body and troubled in spirit over the plight of the people he left, Dr. Furman wrote impressions of his work and the people he had sought to relieve from terrible suffering. He made hospital rounds the night before he left, and at each bedside he stopped to caress the brows of people. He had amputated limbs of several, performed tedious wound surgery, done the best he could under circumstances to relieve their suffering. He bowed his head, filled with love and compassion, and prayed for the people who had lost so much and still were suffering unbelievably. Holding each patient’s hand individually, he voiced as his prayer Philippians 4:7: “May the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” He spoke in love and with deep compassion. He had done what he could with the surgeon’s knife. Now they needed Jesus, the Great Physician. Maybe other Christian voices, speaking in love after Dr. Furman left Haiti, would continue to minister to their spiritual needs.

With love and compassion in your heart, pray to God now on behalf of the Haitian people who are in such great need, physically and spiritually. Speak in love.

c Ethelene Dyer Jones; Monday, February 1, 2010