Day 16 – Spiteful

“Do not even associate with a man given to angry outbursts; Or go [along] with a hot-tempered man, or you will learn his [undisciplined] ways and get yourself trapped [in a situation from which it is hard to escape].” Proverbs 22:24-25

How quickly does our joy, hope and faith turn into anger and despair when we talk about something negative? Instantly! Given this knowledge, how easily do we give up the weapons that were given to us to fight off all negative, to experience but a second of the feeling of confirmed indignation when we speak ill of someone else, whether deserved in our eyes or not? The saying ‘spiteful people spite themselves’ comes to mind, because in the end, whatever you do in spite, will always come back to you and expose what is really going on in your heart, revealing the dark motives and unhealed hurt which motivated the spite in the first place. We are called to be forgiving, healed and compassionate, filled with wisdom above our contemporaries, because we know actions in others, as in ourselves, come from a place of either hurt or healing – the choice is ours.

Prayer: Lord, hurt people hurt people and we, having received Your promise of healing with forgiveness, come to you and repent of all our negative thoughts and actions towards others. We want to be those ambassadors of the Kingdom who have processed our hurts and come to a place of healing so that we can be the catalysts who promote healing in others. Show us where we still have festering hurt, Lord, so that we may be healed and whole. In Jesus’s name. Amen.

Written by Anna-Mart Nel for www.womenoftheword.co.za