- The Sorcerer and the Preacher
Not always are words just sounds that we hear or the letters on a page. Sometimes they are vehicles for transporting entities of a supranatural and supraliminal dimension (John 6:63). When that is the case, words should be feared.
A sorcerer once met a preacher whom he tried to seduce with his much money, but failed. Greatly offended by the temerity of that wicked man who thought that the Almighty could be bought with earthly currency, the preacher said, “Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money.” At once, the sorcerer, himself knowing the value and power of words (as that was his currency in sorcery), pleaded, “Pray ye to the Lord for me, that none of these things which ye have spoken come upon me” (Acts 8:20-24). Why? For those who know, words could be more powerful than the sounds or letters that convey them, and destiny could be helped or hampered by their potency.
- The Power of Thoughts and Words
According to Solomon, there is “power” in the tongue, and as much as life and death could hang in the balances of that power (Proverbs 18:21). In other words, there is a supernatural dimension to natural words, an immortal dimension to the words from mortal lips, and (atomic) “power” once detonated is not recallable. Mine the power.
Taste your words before you serve them (Colossians 4:6). You can never tell the wind to return your words once it has carried them away (Ecclesiastes 5:6). The Psalmist prayed, “Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD” (Psalm 19:14). In other words, while we bother about words that are heard, we should worry no less about thoughts unheard. Words and thoughts are both spiritually implicating and defining of our relations with the supernatural. Lucifer fell for his thoughts, before his acts were ever seen (Isaiah 14:13; Matthew 15:18-19). God hears the heart as much as He does our words, and one can be blessed or blighted for thoughts unheard no less than for words declared (Ephesians 3:20; Zephaniah 2:15; Revelation 18:7-8).
- This Man Learned his Lesson Late
There was a great man in history who did not know this truth, or so it seemed, so he spoke words thoughtlessly. Once upon a time, he came back from a business trip so hungry that he was willing to give anything away for the food he badly wanted then. Just then, he met a man, actually his brother, who had food for him, but then for a price. How much? Nothing much to go far for, just the birthright, to be paid in the ordinary currency of words. It is the familiar Bible story of Esau and Jacob.
Esau was the elder brother just returned from his hunting rounds, apparently without a game, without a catch. When Jacob informed Esau what it would mean to take the food that day, Esau casually said, “OK. I take your offer. From today, you are the elder and I have become the junior.” And he signed the deal by swearing in the name of the Lord. Words.
For Esau, maybe, it was just words that he had spoken, which could never reverse the solid historic fact of their births. Besides, he still had his birth papers, and could also speak other words, if need be, to unsign the deal, if any. He still had a mouth, after all. He was later to learn, sadly, that words, or all words, were not mere breath that one let in and out as one wished. He had lost the position of first born merely by the words that he spoke (Hebrews 12:16-17). Accordingly, the Registry of Heaven had promptly revised (or updated) his birth records (Genesis 25:30-34). Esau had spoken those weighty words in a casual moment of hunger, but they had been potent nonetheless.
- When Pay Day Came …
Days later, it was Pay Day. Their father Isaac was about to take off to the Other Side of existence, but he would download to his sons what he carried, before he died. There was Something for the first born. When that time came, Divine Justice contrived that Esau could not eat his cake and still have it. By several interventions, the blessing of the first born went to Jacob, to whom Esau had sold it by the words that he spoke. But that is not where my narrative is headed now.
For those who know the story, when Esau eventually reached Isaac to get his blessing, The Blessing, the old man had already downloaded it upon Jacob. As far as Esau was concerned, perhaps, that was no problem. It was words that Isaac had spoken. He could speak other words to retrieve what he had given to Jacob and put it upon himself. He cried, asking, “Hast thou not reserved a blessing for me? … bless me, even me ALSO, O my father” (Genesis 27:36, 38). In other words, “Can’t you just say something again? Just say it.” It was beginning to dawn on him. You don’t ‘just say’ everything.
- Irreversible Words
The story says that Isaac “trembled very exceedingly” when he realised that he had put the blessing upon the ‘wrong’ person (Genesis 27:33). He had blessed ‘by mistake,’ but it was potent all the same. He could still speak words, but they would be mere carcasses, for Something had left him with the words that he had spoken upon Jacob. The same words, even from the same lips, do not always carry the same force.
Now, this is my point in this message: If Isaac were any of our conventional pastors, Esau would have had no need to cry, for the pastor would simply have spoken more words, even loftier words than he had proclaimed over the first comer. But Isaac couldn’t, because it would be mere sounds without content, for the earlier words had carried the blessing to the first comer. Something had left that couldn’t be recalled (Mark 5:30). That day, Esau learned his lesson about words.
19 God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?
20 Behold, I have received commandment to bless: and he hath blessed; and I CANNOT REVERSE it (Numbers 23:19-20). Amen.
From The Preacher’s diary,
October 18, 2023.