Choose Your Words Carefully

The sermon opens by emphasizing that discussing the fruit of the Holy Spirit without addressing speech represents a major omission, since words are the primary expression of spiritual qualities such as love, joy, peace, and kindness. The pastor asserts that speech is the most important means of communication between people, through which we express intentions, emotions, and inner understanding. According to Matthew 12:34-37, Jesus teaches that each person will be judged by their own words at the final judgment.

The second section focuses on the power (strength) of speech. Words can revive someone in despair or kill someone full of hope, as Proverbs 18:21 states: "Death and life are in the power of the tongue." The pastor illustrates with the story of Colombian soccer player Andres Escobar, who was severely criticized for scoring an own goal in the 1994 World Cup and was killed five days after returning home. Words wound like a sword but are more dangerous because they cannot be retrieved, are transmitted from person to person, and change as they spread. The problem is that words can kill three aspects of a person: physical, emotional and spiritual, and community. The sermon includes the Aesop fable about the tongue to demonstrate that the tongue is the best organ (used to express goodness, respect, love) but also the worst organ (used to curse, slander, lie).

The third section presents five essential qualities of speech: truthfulness and honesty, kindness and compassion, wisdom in the right place and time, boldness and courage, and restraint. The pastor cites many passages from Proverbs and other Scripture books to illustrate each quality. He also warns about the damage of "talking about people, telling stories about people" (gossip), as this can divide relationships and cause misunderstanding in the church. The sermon emphasizes that sharing third-hand information through gossip leads to distortion—a small story becomes an elephant, misunderstandings arise, resentments form, and problems multiply without direct resolution.

Finally, the sermon stresses that God will judge people not only by faith and deeds but also by words. This is because words reveal a person's true nature—"out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks" (Matthew 12:34). The pastor encourages believers to monitor their daily speech carefully, choose each word thoughtfully, speak truth to their neighbors, and follow Jesus's method in Matthew 18:15-17 when there are issues: speak to the person privately, then bring witnesses, finally report to the church. The sermon closes with a call to practical application: cultivating the fruit of the Holy Spirit through intentional, truthful, kind, wise, and measured speech in all relationships.