Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
You’ve probably heard the phrase, “It’s not what you said, it’s how you said it,” and you’ve probably heard it used as a joke to poke fun at somebody who was maybe more sensitive about something that was said to them. There’s truth to that statement. Our words have power, not just in what we say, but in how we say it. That’s the very lesson that we learn from our Verse of the Day today.
It's Proverbs chapter 15, verse 1. "A gentle answer deflects anger, but harsh words make tempers flare."
Comfortable With Conflict
Years ago, I was serving on staff at a church. I was part of our core leadership, and part of our growth was hiring on a leadership coach. The idea was to look at different areas of leadership, to see where we were strong and where we were weak. Part of this process meant taking an assessment for ourselves, how we thought we were in these different areas, and also taking the assessment for each other and having some of the staff take it for us. Then what they would do is they would compile all the answers, and they would compare and contrast them to one another.
It was no secret at the time I was a very direct leader. If I had something to say, I was just going to say it. If you had something against me, I wanted you to just tell me. I thought that conflict was much easier if you could just be direct with each other.
Part of the assessment was looking at conflict management. I thought, I am so good at conflict management. It doesn’t bother me one bit. We take these assessments. I get my score back. Surprise, surprise, I scored incredibly low in conflict management. When I say low, I mean absolutely failing in this area. I was shocked. I was like, this is one of the ones I would have thought I was doing really good on.
A Real Person on the Other Side
I sat down with our coach, and I love this guy. He was so good at what he did. He just looked at me and he said, “There’s something that you need to understand. There is a difference between being comfortable with conflict and being good at managing it. You’re comfortable with conflict, but you forget that there is a real person on the other side of your words, and when you’re direct, it can hurt them and it can cause them to shut down.”
This really stuck with me over the years. I’ve been trying to be better about thinking about not only what I say, but how I say it. When we’re quick with harsh words, it usually causes people to shut down or get angry or push back. When we can be gentle, when we can speak the truth in love, people are much more receptive to hearing what we have to say, because then they know that we’re not trying to attack them. We’re caring for them. We’re speaking from a place that says, hey, I want the best for you, and I want to speak honestly with you. Can we have a conversation right now?
Speak the Truth in Love
I don’t know how you use your words, if you find yourself to be somebody who’s incredibly direct, or maybe you honestly are afraid of conflict and so you steer away from it. There’s a healthy tension to be had—to be open, to be honest, but to speak the truth in love, to make sure that we’re capturing that gentleness.
I encourage you to look around your life to see how you talk to different people. How do you talk to your friends? How do you talk to your family? How do you talk to your coworkers? Beyond that, how do you talk to the person that’s checking you out at the grocery store? How do you talk to that person that made you a little bit upset at work because they disagreed with you? How are you talking to that one friend that’s been gossiping behind your back?
We can’t be partial in the way that we use our words. Sure, we can be honest and direct, but we have to be gentle. We have to be loving. We have to reflect that heart of Christ. Let’s be thinking about the power behind our words, so that we can love like Jesus in the way that we use them.
