Thursday, January 7, 2021
Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.  Ephesians 4:29b

If you’ve never had a cannoli, you’ve missed one culinary delight!  They’re shell pastries, stuffed with a delicious sweet, creamy filling, laced with little fruit bits.  Sometimes, when all the stars and planets align in your favor, the bakery showcase will contain some that have the shell coated in dark chocolate.  These desert treats are legendary in the Italian-American community.  I had never experienced having a cannoli until I married into that bunch; thank you, Lord!

My late father-in-law, Tony, was a master at consuming cannolis (or any other kind of pastries).  While we were still living in Florida in 1985 Elizabeth’s mom, Sofie, passed and Tony didn’t quite know how to occupy his time, so he kept the roads hot between Port Richey and Gainesville where we lived.  He would arrive, spend a few days with us spoiling our kids, and then hit the road (sometimes just leaving us a note in the middle of the night). 

Before he came to visit, he would call us to take orders for Italian pastries from Angelina’s, bakery, the cannoli Promised Land.  One of those calls proved that Paul’s advice about saying helpful words sometimes is just out of reach for mortals.

Tony’s hearing wasn’t spectacular.  When he called it was always a shouting match to get simply basic communication going.  Whenever he called before his road trip to visit us, it was known as the Cannoli call.  One such call created a family code that has endured the passing of generations.  Here’s how it went:

Tony:  I’m comin’ up; you want anything?

Elizabeth:  Angelina’s?  Tony:  Yeah. 

Elizabeth proceeded to detail the usual box-full, including, of course, a half-dozen cannolis. 

Tony:  OK…so you want angel puffs, crescents, and the cookies, and no cannoli?

Elizabeth:  Yes to all that, but we want the cannolis too.

Tony:  You want two cannolis?  

Elizabeth:  No, I said the cannolis too!

Tony:  That’s what I said?  

Elizabeth:  The cannolis?

Tony:  Yeah, you want two? 

Elizabeth:  Not just two, there won’t be enough for everybody.

Tony:  OK, so…no cannolis?  

Elizabeth:  Yes, we want the cannolis too.

Tony:  So, we’re back to two cannolis?  

Elizabeth:  Dad…bring the cannolis.

Tony:  What?  

Elizabeth:  The cannolis…get a box, OK?

Tony:  I’m getting the box…what do you want in it? 

Elizabeth:  Cannolis…bring enough for everybody.

Tony:  You don’t want the cookies, just the cannolis? 

Elizabeth:  Dad, do you want to live in a nursing home?

I’m not certain of the connection, but several weeks later Tony moved to Las Vegas.

From that phone call to this day, when someone in our family is having a hard time understanding the communication process it is known to us as (drum roll, please):

No Cannoli

Communication is, as the saying goes, an art as much as a science.  Without good, encouraging communication our lives are impoverished and less hopeful. 

It’s easy to get sidetracked into taking short cuts, thinking others surely understand what we’re saying.  But that is the death knell for relationship.

For You Today

Paul’s advice is to err on the side of good and helpful.  That takes patience and care for those who have trouble with communication.  Anything less is, well, no cannolis!

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!

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[1] Title Image: Courtesy of Pixabay.com

Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation^©

For other posts on this text see Words That Destroy and Explicit Language      

 

The Power of a Curse

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Wednesday, June 26, 2019

For the choir director: A psalm of David, regarding the time Saul sent soldiers to watch David’s house in order to kill him.  To be sung to the tune “Do Not Destroy!”

They come out at night, snarling like vicious dogs as they prowl the streets.  Listen to the filth that comes from their mouths; their words cut like swords.  “After all, who can hear us?” they sneer.  But Lord, you laugh at them.  You scoff at all the hostile nations.  You are my strength; I wait for you to rescue me, for you, O God, are my fortress.  In his unfailing love, my God will stand with me.  He will let me look down in triumph on all my enemies.  Don’t kill them, for my people soon forget such lessons; stagger them with your power, and bring them to their knees, O Lord our shield.  Because of the sinful things they say, because of the evil that is on their lips, let them be captured by their pride, their curses, and their lies.  Psalm 59:6-12

Captured by your own pride, curses, and lies…what an incredible minefield in which to walk!  What human being isn’t trapped by his own pride?  Who among us hasn’t uttered an idle curse (either with his lips or heart)?  Has there ever been anyone but Jesus who never lied?

We live in an age where truth has gone begging; what has replaced simple truth is obscenity, invective slurs thrown at each other.  It is a mud-slinging contest with the prize of this culture awarded to the vilest potty-mouth.  I do believe my mother would have run out of mouth-washing soap!

Jesus did not have a single word of praise for such.  However, the Lord did pass a searing word of warning about how we use words:

And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak.  Matthew 12:36

Now, if an idle word can get you in trouble on judgment day, imagine what judgment will happen for the mean-spirited nastiness that floods like a torrential downpour from the mouths of people in everyday life.   

Paul understood the difference between vile language and helpful language.  In Acts 9 the Apostle is breathing out words of death and destruction to Christians, followed by the deeds of oppression and execution.  In a heartbeat Paul’s soul is converted when he met Christ, and the conviction that brought down the enemy of Jesus and His church, becomes the instrument of building up that same church he persecuted.  Here’s good advice from this once foul-mouthed Pharisee, who’d learned how to clean up his act (and his mouth):

Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them. Ephesians 4:29

For You Today

A little more advice from a formerly trench-mouthed apostle of doom, who had learned what really should proceed from our lips; he learned that if you want good stuff to come out of your mouth, you need to fill the heart with that good stuff, because that’s where all the words have their birthplace.

And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing.  Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable.  Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.  Philippians 4:8

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day.

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[1] Title Image:  Pixabay.com     Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from The New Living Translation©

Explicit Language

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Monday, January 7, 2019

Don’t use foul or abusive language.  Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.  Ephesians 4:29 (NLT)

…in 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that movies were not considered protected speech under the First Amendment and thus were subject to regulation.[2]  After wrestling with what the movie industry could show on screens for a decade and a half, the 1930 Hays Code became the first ratings system to alert the public as to content in a movie.  That code evolved into the modern-era ratings system (1968 MPAA) created by the movie industry itself.  That system now includes explanations of why movies are classed G (general audiences), R (restricted audiences), and so-on.  Violence, Sex, and Language are the main considerations. 

But it is the why that always catches my attention.  When Elizabeth and I are trying to decide which movie to watch, I look at the ratings.  Explicit language always gets a pass for me.  I just don’t want to hear it.  I threw my lot in with the Apostle long ago, that being a foul-mouth just isn’t helpful to living a Godly life, and being taken seriously as a follower of Jesus Christ.  Foul language displays hatred, and anger; it also conveys a sense of distaste for others, including disrespect and denigration. 

I also have to laugh when I see movies that earn a more restrictive rating (like “R” or “NC-17”) because they contain what is termed explicit language – it’s anything but explicit!  That word means “clear” or “obvious” or “plain”.  What Hollywood calls explicit is simply vocal shock filler, replacing the need for elevating ideas with genuinely-intelligent vocabulary by polluting the atmosphere.  Let’s face it, if you haven’t got the brains to say something clearly, profanity can deflect attention from your ignorance…and if it’s yelled louder, you’ve got a real shot at hiding gross stupidity!

There is a story about the 19^th century author Samuel Clemmens (also known by his pen name, Mark Twain[3]), a man committed to the constant use of profanity, and his wife, Olivia, a godly woman who was always trying to get her husband to clean up his foul-mouthed ways.  She had little success.  

One day Olivia decided to pull out all the stops.  She figured if she demonstrated for him just how awful profanity sounds, he would quit.  Walking into the room where Samuel was writing, she stubbed her toe against the door jamb (on purpose), and then let fly a string of locker-room curses that would have turned any air blue.  Without looking up, or missing a beat, the legendary Mark Twain blew out a puff of cigar smoke and said:  My dear, you oughtn’t talk like that.  Smugly, Olivia replied:  You don’t like the sound of those words, Samuel?  Said the author:  Oh, they’re great words, but you just don’t have the music to go along with it.  In an ironic and perverse way Samuel Clemmens nailed the Apostle Paul’s point, that cussing, foul-mouths are a strange fit for God’s family. 

In Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus Paul gave us the higher level for speech, letting every word dropping from your lips be helpful and encouraging.  It’s hard to do that with an alphabet that is only 4 letters strong!

For You Today

Hollywood does nothing but push the limits of culture’s envelope when it comes to holding-up profanity, obscenity, and violence as normative or trendy-cool.  And that means exactly what it sounds like, you can expect next year’s Oscars, Emmys, and Music awards to contain worse than this year’s! 

The question begs:  Is this what we really want our children to see, hear…and become?

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day.

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[1] Title Image:  Pixabay.com

^[2] The Meaning of Movie Ratings

[3]Image:  Pixabay.com