"Though they curse, yet bless thou" (Ps. 109:27)
We are surrounded with profanity. I learned how to cuss at Catholic school! Using my faculty of speech in a way that always honours God and builds up other people is something that I struggle with. It is easy to swear when frustrated and upset, when feeling depressed or wounded (physically or emotionally), or just to add some emphasis or shock value to a conversation.
Even though they are not given physical, vocalised existence through the mouth, these words are formed and can linger and poison us perfectly well in the mind. If I lack confidence and courage to tell someone how I really think or feel or that I don't like what they have said or done to me, I can spend time reliving the scene mentally, this time demolishing them with my quick wit and thoughtful sarcasm. People I dislike are repeatedly shot through in my mind with all the things that I want to tell them, each dart being further and further inflamed by my unseen and uncontrolled desire.
And yet, for all the effort that goes into suchlike things, none of them are of God. Though we are surrounded by the bad example of others, we are not called to imitate it.
"Though they curse, yet bless thou"
