By Daniel Garner
"Some people make cutting remarks, but the words of the wise bring healing" - Proverbs 12: 18
"No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world" - Robin Williams
On Drop-Day 70 years ago, on 6 June 1944, the president of the United States gave a prayer over national radio. A prayer that did not divide, but called for a united front. A prayer that no one was fired from for hurt feelings. We had bigger things to worry about than bruised egos. There were no country national flags allowed on the front of any landing ships that dropped so many thousands of Soldiers upon the beaches of Normandy, and in the same way that we were united in force we were always united in spirit. That is what prayer is meant for, not being cast as a weapon against those we, not God, deem inferior.
Words can bring together, tear apart and mend again in equal measures. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's prayer brought a united front just as other world leaders were using their words to keep rifts deep within races, country borders, but most importantly peoples hearts.
Proverbs says in chapter 12, verse 18 that: "Some people make cutting remarks, but the words of the wise bring healing". In a discussion of words, those words rank pretty high near the top!
Wisdom and prudence and those who have full measures of both can hold a large sway over people. Which is good, if they're good stewards of those gifts. But it's very easy to write something or to do something that gives vent to the less noble of our feelings and desires. We're all human, we mess up, fall and sin. It's just what we do. But what we do after we realize we've messed up speaks everything about us. However, when wise people that people look to in their lives messes up, to rectify the potential hazardous effects of it can bring about a landslide of hurt and pain. Just look back on how many politicians you know who "misspoke" or an actor or actress that went on a circuit of late night talk shows to apologize for getting into a reporter or fans face.
In those cases it may seem that sometimes it's easier to simply not strive for forgiveness. Sometimes you keep trying to fix the problem, vice, or wrong that instigated it in the first place for so long and so hard with such wonderfully vain intentions just so you don't have to ask for that forgiveness. Because then you'd have to accept fully how you hurt. How you've hurt others. Still you try so hard so much that you begin to overcompensate, like a car turning on a slick road, that you not only do not rectify the original mistake but you add to it. Spending so much time that you're not pretending that you are not lying about how you really feel. The danger to this is that the cycle keeps repeating, again and again, becoming systemic. Wisdom is knowing when to stop.
Strength?
Sometimes the true test of it is knowing how to let go. Pain is not a symptom of frailty. Giving into it is. Sometimes how you deal with loss and setbacks is the better part of valor.
The Takeaway: Life is not always easy and it can hurt, but we shouldn't let that get us down. Life isn't always what we choose to make of it, but what we do with what we're given is a huge sign of our character and faith.