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- ESPAÑOL: Llamados a Ser Animadores: El Poder de las Palabras
Though it happened decades ago, I still remember the look on his face, after I uttered those horrid words.
Hi my name is Dean Smith and in this podcast, I want to talk about the power of words.
I was attending Bible school at the time, and living on campus in the boy’s dorm or maybe it was the men’s dorm. I can’t remember. Over the school year, we got to know each other pretty good.
There was one fellow who was struggling spiritually. He was an athletic body builder type of guy, as wide as he was tall. Almost immediately, we realized that he was struggling spiritually.
But many prayed and ministered to him, and by the end of the school year, it was obvious that the Holy Spirit was moving in his life.
He was softening and good things were happening.
With the school year basically over a bunch of us were wrestling and horsing around in the dorm, as guys are prone to do.
He ended up slamming me to the floor. I wasn’t injured but it hurt.
Though it was accidental, I was angry and unleashed a torrent of words against him.
Though I can’t remember what I said, I can still see the shocked and hurt look on his face.
In a matter of seconds, my words undid what the Holy Spirit had been doing in his life.
I asked God to forgive me, but I may still need to forgive myself.
But I have been on the receiving end of negative words as well.
Several years back, I received a strange prophetic word from one of the few full-blown prophets that I have come in contact with.
He prophesied, “God says you have the ability to start a business, I am not saying that you should, only that God says you could do it.”
God was not calling me to start a business, the Holy Spirit was only saying that I had the ability to do it.
Why would God give me such a bizarre word?
I believe it was connected to something that happened to me about ten years earlier. A friend told me to my face, that I could never run a business, and that I was incapable of doing it. Those words uttered in moment of frustration, haunted me. I can still remember the room where he said them.
I told no one about this, but ten years later the Holy Spirit knew it as still impacting me, probably in ways I didn’t know. The Holy Spirit wanted to cancel the negativity of those words spoken over me nearly a decade earlier.
This is because words have power.
Perhaps the best example of this, is a Bible verse that has always caught my attention. The Apostle Paul writes, that, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).
Paul states that faith comes by hearing. This is not to say that it can’t come from reading, but for Paul hearing imparts faith or creates faith inside the one hearing it.
Words are so powerful that they can transform a person’s life for an eternity.
But if this is the case, then the opposite can be true as well. Negative words have the ability to create unbelief in the one hearing it.
A classic example of this involves the story of the 12 men sent to spy out the Promised Land by Moses.
Two spies, Joshua and Caleb, returned stating that God was giving them a bountiful land.
But ten spies gave an evil report. All they saw was the giants and the impossibility. They said we looked like grasshoppers in our own sight (Numbers 13:33). They publicly spewed out their unbelief and contaminated the whole nation of Israel.
But here is the key, they were speaking out of there own insecurity. There own lack of confidence. Remember how they worded it. We looked like grasshoppers in our own sight. Our own sight.
This is how they looked upon themselves.
They were simply speaking out of their own personal inadequacy.
Soon all Israel was seeing themselves in the same way because of these words. Gripped with fear, they back away from fulfilling their calling. Israel would spend the next 40 years wandering in the wilderness, until everyone contaminated by those words, except for Joshua and Caleb, had died.
The sad thing is I have no doubt that before this happened, thousands of men were ready to enter the Promised Land. But they would never fulfill their destiny.
Joshua would go on to lead Israel after Moses died. Because to be an effective leader, you must conquer fear.
As we study the Book of Proverbs, several verses speak of the power of negative words. In Proverbs 12:18, they are compared to “the piercings of a sword”.
These negative words have the ability to cut deep into our psyche. They can cause wounds and infection. But the verse continues that the words of the wise bring health. They can bring healing to the words that were spoken negatively.
In Proverbs 15:4, a wholesome tongue is compared to the tree of Life, while a perverse tongue “crushes the spirit.” This is exactly what happened to Israel after they heard that evil report.
Along this vein, a good friend of mine has purposefully chosen to quit listening to the news because of what it creates in his life, worry and fear.
Later, Solomon warns that, “death and life are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21).
There is a reason for these ominous warnings, because Jews believe that words had power.
William Barclay explains in his commentary, “To the Jew a word was far more than a mere sound. It was something which had an independent existence, and which actually did things.”
The Jews believed that once spoken, words had a life of their own.
Throughout the Bible, we see God constantly speaking encouraging words to His people. Often, it was done to counter the negative words spoken by others.
After Moses died, Joshua took over the leadership of Israel.
In Joshua chapter 1, verses two through 9, the Lord spoke encouraging words over five times to Joshua. I am not sure exactly how this happened, perhaps it was through a prophetic word.
For example in verse 6, the Lord said, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall cause this people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give them.”
And finally in verse 9, the Lord says, “Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”
It seems that the negativity of those fear-filled words that Israel wasn’t good enough to drive out the giants were still hanging in the air.
God countered this with multiple powerful declarations of confidence, that Joshua could do it.
God wrote the users manual for the human body He created. He knows how our mind works.
Not surprisingly, this was the same conclusion that University of Chicago Professor Dr. John Cacioppo came to in a study conducted in 2003.
He found out that people are affected much more by negative words than positive one. Maybe its due to our fallen human nature, but negative words have much more of an impact on us than positive ones.
It explains why political parties run negative ads. They are simply more effective than positive one. Voters may not like them, but they work.
The second thing their research showed is that takes two positive comments to overcome one negative one.
In an article for Today’s Christian Woman analyzing Cacioppo’s study, author Peggy Bert writes:
“That’s why personal insults or criticism hit us harder and stay with us longer.”
“Our brain needs a higher number of positive entries to counterbalance this built-in negativity bias. And several small, frequent, positive acts pack more punch than one giant-size positive. The size of the positive doesn’t count; quantity does. It’s strictly a numbers game.”
But negative comments can even be more damaging if they come from family members, close friends or coworkers.
According to Hara Marano’s article in Psychology Today, entitled, Our Brain’s Negative Bias, research has shown that if the negative comment comes from someone who is close, the impact is much more severe. Their words are much more potent and It takes upwards of five positive comments to overcome the damage done by one negative comment.
Other studies have found that negative feedback can directly impact a person’s ability to their job.
In an article, published by Time, Eric Barker looked at how negative and positive reinforcements affect the work place.
One study found that work groups which performed best had a positive to negative comment ratio of 5.6 to one. They had over five times as many positive reinforcements as negative.
Medium performing groups had 1.9 positive words spoken to them for every negative.
The worst performing teams had the exact opposite. They had three negative to every positive.
While, there are times for admonishment and correction, these must be heavily balance with words of encouragement.
As believers we are told to, “encourage one another and to build one another up in the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 5:11).
The Greek word, ‘oikodomeo’. literally refers to building or renovating a house. It often described expanding or enlarging a building.
Paul says we are to build each other up in the Lord. We are told to deliberately speak words of life and encouragement to people, expanding their spiritual life.
With every construction project, there is a purpose and in many instances even a plan. It makes me wonder if God has a similar plan for encouragement?
The Holy Spirit knows what every person needs to build them up, so we need to be sensitive to His leading.
With that in mind, we need to ask the Holy Spirit what He wants you to say that will encourage and edify others. He may give you a prophetic word, a word of knowledge or wisdom.
God is calling you to be an encourager.
Thanks for joining me on this podcast and I will catch you again.
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