From the bluff overlooking the Santa Barbara surf, I fired the smooth stone like David’s sling into the Goliath of the Pacific Ocean. As I watched the stone slicing the air toward the foamy tide, an abrupt wind boomeranged the projectile into the back of a young woman’s head. She slumped from her perch atop a rocky boulder and flopped into the sand below.
My eyes ballooned. Panic knotted my gut. I ran down the rocky pathway to the beach. By the time I arrived at the sand, the young woman was up and walking, rubbing the large lump on her head and scanning for the rock-throwing culprit.
Sadly, I never confessed my crime.
At 14, I had pummeled an innocent bystander, then shunned my responsibility to own up to it. Though I’d intended to sling the stone into the ocean, my decision to throw anything in the vicinity of the beach-going public was foolish and intentional.
I have replayed the mental video over and over again. If only I had confessed and apologized. Better yet, if only I could take back that ill-conceived heave.
Words like Stones
Harsh words are like hurtling stones. Once launched, their path is set–even the crooked path of deflecting winds and unintended consequences.
Words are a window to our thoughts. For this reason, we will be judged by our words and our thoughts. (see Alma 12:14)
Words reflect our attitudes and desires. They help or harm, uplift or degrade.
While some prefer to build with words, others use words to profane both men and God. Ironically, every tongue that profanes God shall ultimately “confess to God” (Rom. 14:11).
Bridle the Tongue
The apostle James reminds us that, “If any man bridleth not his tongue, this man’s religion is vain” (James 1:26).
Bridling our tongue is a key measure of self-control. It is also the diction of perfection: “If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body” (James 3: 2).
To be perfect at anything, we must master it. Self-mastery starts with the tongue. Our words can be uplifting and perfect minute by minute. That minute can stretch into five, and five into ten, until eventually, we have mastered our tongues for an hour, a day, a month and a year.
Glass Houses
We all remember the idiom, “Those who live in glass houses should not cast stones.” Parents, especially, feel the truth of this saying when they hurl angry words at their children.
The truth is we have all been guilty of decrying in others the very things we see in ourselves. When we berate or belittle others, we are like glass houses awaiting the inevitable slingshot round-trip of our unkind words. Such loss of self-control can shatter the brittle egos of both the hearer and the hurler alike.
Seeing as God Sees
I once heard a neighbor sling racial epithets at a crew of foreign laborers. These men had been guilty of nothing more than taking a drink of water from the neighbor’s spigot during a sweltering summer’s day. Among that crew of laborers, three of four would later serve the Lord as bishops.
I have often wondered how differently we would treat others in word and deed if we could see them as God sees them?
The next time we are tempted to verbally lash out–especially at our children–pause and reflect on their true potential. In this way, our fussy five-year-olds will be seen for who they really are: precious children of our Heavenly Father, future missionaries, future parents, and stalwart patriarchs and matriarchs of the generations ahead.
Tongue of angels
I can never retrieve the stone I threw that terrible day at the beach, but I can bridle the slingshot-words hurtling from my tongue.
With the Holy Ghost as our partner, perhaps we can move beyond bridling our tongues, to “speak(ing) with the tongue of angels” (2 Ne. 32:2). And that is a stone’s throw from heaven.
Wm J. Monahan is a 1980 graduate of BYU Law School and former Phoenix stake president. He serves on the high council for the Queen-Creek Chandler Heights Stake. He practices law and is an adjunct professor of law and ethics at Chandler-Gilbert Community College.
