Word!

It is Thursday again…and my real plan for Thursdays is still in progress, so until then you stuck with me!

I was cleaning bathrooms this morning and thinking. Quite the combo there, right?  And this is what I was thinking about: A few weeks ago there was sermon at church about the tongue – how hard it is to tame and the trouble that it causes us.

While the whole sermon was enlightening the thing that has really stuck with me is the admonishment against minced oaths. There are so many that I use and I don’t think there is one of them that I mean what I am saying…I mean something though…but now I am not sure what. I am at a loss for words (imagine!). I don’t know what I mean, I don’t have the words – the right words, the words that are not taking the Lord’s name in vain, that are not swearing against God.

I keep going back to an episode of Disney’s Recess (one of my favorite cartoons – I just love the Ashleys!). The kids keep getting in trouble for using bad words, so the make up a word – WOMP – a word that is all theirs. They use it for everything. It’s a playground rebellion, until the grownups catch on and start cracking down on all the WOMPing. There is a trial and the kids defend their use of WOMP, saying that it is nonsense, it has no meaning and there for can’t be a bad word. But is it really meaningless?

What do I mean when I say “Oh my gosh!”?

The thing is I mean a lot of things, just like WOMP meant a lot of things to the kids on Recess. But how many of them do I mean to say? Not a one…

I would say that I have a vocabulary that is fairly rich, but I am not using it. I am not expressing myself truly when I use these minced oaths. I know that sometimes I say it because it is easier and quicker to come to mind. That is a lousy reason to swear or use the Lord’s name in vain, isn’t it (because I am lazy in my language)? 

Thanks for listening to what I found in the quietness of bathroom cleaning!

Don’t forget tomorrow is Friday! And it’s Girl Talk Dateline! Let’s talk!