“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”
Psalm 19:14 (ESV)Psalm 19 ends with a prayer, not a strategy, not a five-step plan. Just a quiet ask: God, let what comes out of my mouth honor you. Because the real enemy of the words we should say is not that we do not know what to say. It is that we keep waiting for the right moment, the right opening; Christmas, after the holidays, once things settle down.
The enemy will always give us a reason to wait. The flesh will always make inertia feel responsible and reasonable. And meanwhile the people we love most are sitting on the other end of a conversation we keep putting off.
Tom, 52. Been in church most of his adult life. He and his younger brother Rick, 47, have not had a real conversation in three years. Not one big fight; just a slow drift. An unspoken comment at a funeral, a missed call that turned into a year, then just inertia. Tom thinks about Rick almost every single week. He never picks up the phone.
🥀 The Flesh
Friday evening, Rick crosses his mind. Same playlist as always. He should call me first. I didn’t do anything wrong. If he wanted to fix it, he would. Tom reaches for the remote. Tells himself there will be a better time; maybe Christmas. He has been telling himself that for three years. Two years later Rick has a health scare and Tom sits in a hospital waiting room feeling like a stranger next to his own brother’s wife.
The fruit on Tom’s tree? Cowardice, disconnection, a harvest of regret.
🌿 The Spirit
Rick crosses his mind and this time Tom sits with it instead of reaching for the remote. He prays something honest: God, I don’t want to keep being the man who knows what to say and never says it. He picks up the phone. Four rings. “Tom?” “Yeah. Hey. I’ve been meaning to call. I’m sorry it took me this long.” The first five minutes are awkward but they stay on for an hour and twenty minutes and end the call with plans to see each other next month.
The fruit on Tom’s tree? Courage, restoration, grace.
The flesh waits for the perfect moment. The Spirit knows the perfect moment was the last one, the one before that, and also right now. Make the call. Say the thing. Take the walk.
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