The Water That Flows from My Stream

Reading this morning in preparation for my day, I was once again prompted to think upon my tongue. I was thinking about the way I desire to teach my children, about a conversation I had with a beautiful four year old in Walmart yesterday (my daughter), about the tones, the almost arguing I do at times with little people, the displeasure that can be heard in my voice, the annoyance, the lack of self-control...

This job of being a mother, and for that part, the job of being a person, lends to using our voices and the using of our voices can lend to blessing people or cursing people. No matter what kind of day I have in regards to my tongue, the best day or the worst, I can always do better, for I am not perfect,"if anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body" ~James 3:1.

The song Sacred, the one I have been meditating on for all these months now, has one of my all-time favorite lines: "when I forget to drink from You, I can feel the banks harden, Lord make me like a stream to feed the garden". The garden for me is my children, five precious souls that will live on forever. What am I giving them to drink, bitter water or fresh water? Sometimes, I hate to say it, there is a great amount of bitter water flowing from my stream. There is a way, though I have not found it out yet, to speak to, to train my children, to teach them, to correct them to guide them with only fresh water. That bitter water slips in there so easily. How can this be? How is this possible? I want a stream that only yields fresh water!!

"With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh."


How can I purify this stream that flows from me, so I speak grace words, only words that strengthen souls, as Ann Voskamp would say? It is all related to what the Lord has been working in and out of my spirit. I must first abide in Him and His words in me. I must abide, spend time with Him so that I can be full of the water that is sweet, the water that runs clear, and fresh. Then I shall bear the fruit of my lips that I long so desperately to bear. To hear the words flowing out of my stream, strengthening little ones, big ones, all who hear them.
So today I cling to this from James chapter 4:
But He gives more grace. Therefore He says:
“ God resists the proud,
But gives grace to the humble.”

Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up."

"It is Your grace I need, to humbly say, what a wretch I am much of the time in the way I speak, in the tone I use. Help me to know how to speak rightly. Keep me close to You Lord, abiding in You and Your words abiding in me. Be glorified in filling me with fruit overflowing, fresh water from the stream of my mouth. Not that it can be said that I am good, but that my Savior is good, that You may be glorified. That men may see my good works and glorify My Father Who is in Heaven. Help me to draw near to you, near to You, near to You Oh God. Give grace to my tongue today, for the souls that are nearest to me need fresh water to feed them.
In Jesus Name,
Amen, So be it!!!!"