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Did you know that, on average, each of us speaks about twenty-five thousand words daily? My last book didn’t have that many words. A lot of language is flowing out of our mouths every day and having an impact on those around us. But how much of that flow is fulfilling God’s intended purpose for our speech?
― C.J. Mahaney, Humility: True Greatness
"But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment." Mt. 12:26
(Speech is a sharing in the formative power of the Word. Be mindful of how you use it today and every day.)
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Gn 3:1-8; Psalm 32:1-2, 5, 6, 7
Mk 7:31-37
Jesus left the district of Tyre
and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee,
into the district of the Decapolis.
And people brought to him a deaf man who had a speech impediment
and begged him to lay his hand on him.
He took him off by himself away from the crowd.
He put his finger into the man’s ears
and, spitting, touched his tongue;
then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him,
“Ephphatha!” (that is, “Be opened!”)
And immediately the man’s ears were opened,
his speech impediment was removed,
and he spoke plainly.
He ordered them not to tell anyone.
But the more he ordered them not to,
the more they proclaimed it.
They were exceedingly astonished and they said,
“He has done all things well.
He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”
USCCB lectionary
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Reflection on the Scripture
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\“Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the Lord God had made.” —Genesis 3:1
Never get into a conversation with the devil. Refuse to speak to him. “He is a liar and the father of lies” (Jn 8:44); he’s a fallen angel, superior to us in intelligence. You’re a fool to talk with the accuser, adversary, and liar.
That's the mistake Eve made. The devil initiated the conversation, but “the woman answered the serpent” (Gn 3:2). It wasn’t long before Eve thought God was depriving her of opportunities. She put faith in Satan’s lies and withdrew her faith in God.
Don’t get into a verbal or mental conversation with the evil one. Take authority over him and command him to leave in the name of Jesus. Don’t dialogue, but take the sword of God’s Word and attack the father of lies with the Word of truth (Eph 6:17). That’s what Jesus did when tempted (Lk 4:1-12). The only words Jesus had for the devil were: “Get out.”
What good can it do to talk to a liar? Speak to Jesus, think of Jesus. Leave the devil out.
Prayer: Father, may I not waste my breath on the devil but dedicate my voice and thoughts to praising You
Promise: “You are my shelter; from distress You will preserve me; with glad cries of freedom You will ring me round.” —Ps 32:7
Presentation Ministries
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Abandonment to Divine Providence
- by Jean-Pierre de Caussade
BOOK II,
CHAPTER IV. CONCERNING THE ASSISTANCE RENDERED BY THE FATHERLY PROVIDENCE OF GOD TO THOSE SOULS WHO HAVE ABANDONED THEMSELVES TO HIM
SECTION V. Nature and grace are the instruments of God.
The less capable the soul in the state of abandonment is of defending itself, the more powerfully does God defend it.
The divine action frees and exempts the soul from all those low and noisy ways so necessary to human prudence. These suited Herod and the Pharisees, but the Magi had only to follow their star in peace. The child has but to rest in His Mother's arms. His enemies do more to advance His interests than to hinder His work. The greater efforts they exert to thwart, and to take Him unawares, the more freely and
tranquilly does He act. He never humours them, nor basely truckles to them to make them turn aside their blows; their jealousies, suspicions, and persecutions are necessary to Him. Thus did Jesus Christ live in Judea, and thus does He live now in simple souls. In them He is generous, sweet, free, peaceful, fearless, needing no one, beholding all creatures in His Father's hands, and obliged to serve Him, some by their criminal passions, others by their holy actions; the former by their
contradictions, the latter by their obedience and submission. The divine action balances all this in a wonderful manner, nothing is wanting nor is anything superfluous, but of good and evil there is only what is necessary. The will of God applies, at each moment, the proper means to the end in view, and the simple soul, instructed by faith, finds everything right, and desires neither more nor less than what it has. It ever blesses that divine hand which so well apportions the means, and turns
every obstacle aside. It receives friends and enemies with the same patient courtesy with which Jesus treated everyone, and as divine instruments. It has need of no one and yet needs all. The divine action renders all necessary, and all must be received from it, according to their quality and nature, and corresponded to with sweetness and humility; the simple treated simply, and the unpolished kindly. This is what St Paul teaches, and what Jesus Christ practised most
perfectly.
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