Shut Your Mouth

How is the best way to stop a quarrel or fight from happening? How can we actually prevent petty squabbles from breaking out and causing major divisions in families, churches, or friendships? How can we move to avoid making a mess of relationships when the problems do not need to be exacerbated? The answer is in the title: shut your mouth.

 

Now, let’s preface and get it over with. I am not here talking about serious offenses; neither is Scripture. I’m not talking about crimes or abuses. What I am here talking about is the kind of little thing that gets under your skin, bugs you, starts a fight, and ruins an otherwise decent relationship.

 

The book of Proverbs is about good, godly, wise counsel. Each proverb shows you how things should generally work when things are right with the world. And often the proverbs shows us how to deal with our words in such a way as to live a smarter and easier life.

 

There seems to be a running theme in Proverbs 17 regarding how you and I speak, especially when we are offended in a small way. Take a look, and see if you can find the pattern in what the Bible says to do to prevent a minor offense from becoming a major conflict:

 

Proverbs 17:4, 9, 14, 27, 28

 

4 An evildoer listens to wicked lips,

and a liar gives ear to a mischievous tongue.

9 Whoever covers an offense seeks love,

but he who repeats a matter separates close friends.

14 The beginning of strife is like letting out water,

so quit before the quarrel breaks out.

27 Whoever restrains his words has knowledge,

and he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding.

28 Even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise;

when he closes his lips, he is deemed intelligent.

 

Put that all together and what is the counsel? Shut up! Do not listen to a gossip who wants to stir you up toward conflict. Do not uncover or speak out loud to others everything that bugs you. Sometimes choosing to walk away and get over a small offense is far smarter than pushing the matter into a lasting quarrel. Even foolish people look smarter when they keep their mouths shut.

 

This all requires a bit of wisdom. Sometimes an offense needs to be confronted. Sometimes you need to be wise enough to close your mouth and walk away. How can you tell which is which? Here are just some bullet point thoughts that may help:

 

• Do not make every offense into a major problem.
• Take time to think and even sleep on a matter before choosing to confront someone with a minor offense.
• Be humble and recognize that you are also often the one in the wrong.
• Read Matthew 7:3-5 and consider how you might also be in sin. Repent first before thinking about confronting someone else.
• Do not spread your offense around to others and make a conflict bigger than it needs to be.
• Choose to let an offense go if it is relatively small and if it is not a clear pattern of behavior in a friend that needs to be corrected.
• Be quiet and listen to what others are saying. You may find that you misinterpreted what you found so offensive.
• Ask if you are seeking to love your friend or if you are just seeking to win in a conflict. Seek love over winning every time.
• Recognize that starting a quarrel has consequences, so be sure that the issue is serious enough to move forward.
• If the issue is over something trivial, it is often better to walk away than to battle for the final victory.

 

Friends, the truth is, we cannot spend our lives confronting each other with every little thing that bothers us. If my wife had to confront every failure of mine, I cannot imagine how she would have time to get anything else done. If your friends pointed out every flaw they see in you, you would probably not want to keep them as your friends. Be the kind of friend you want. Confront things that matter: issues of sin, issues of lasting character, issues that are strongly hurtful. Let go of issues that do not matter. See the preface above and never keep silent when issues of abuse are happening. But, let’s be honest, most of our personal conflicts are not over major offenses. Most are over the way someone wrote a comment on our Facebook page, didn’t invite us to an event they invited someone else to, or the way we think someone was thinking when they said something we heard them say.