LETHAL WEAPONS: THE FINGER AND THE MOUTH

Greetings O Ye Holders of Lethal Weapons...where are you fingers pointed...and who are you shooting your mouth off to today?

Our first picture is one of my favorite preachers on the planet...the Reverend Will B. Dunn. He is a character from the comic strip Kudzu by the recently deceased creator of the strip...Doug Marlette. The Reverend goes about...doing the work of the Lord...oblivious that the things that he stands for and fight against...are the same things that he has in his life. When we begin to walk in the light as (Jesus) he is in the light...we suddenly become aware...that our pants are down... and our dignity goes out the window.

So it is with our fingers and our mouths. We tend to point at the other person...with accusations and blame...and then as we have the "other person" in our finger scope...we then shoot off our mouths (the gun) with the bullets (our words). Some of our mouths (guns) are derringers...that are easily concealed but still can do maximum damage...while others have the Clint Eastwood Specials...a 44 Magnum Mouth. Some of the damage that is done with our weaponry...is accidental like Dick Cheney on a hunting trip. Oooops...sorry...didn't mean to shoot you....while other damage is sprayed out of anger that appears in the moment of passion and once the passion subsides you are truly sorry for what you have done. Other damage is pre-meditated...well thought out...festering, brewing, revenge...that you have been thinking about for days...months... even years...and then "suddenly" you explode with a shotgun blast from your lips. There can even be a Valentines Day Massacre mob hit...as you gather with others...and machine gun your words...leaving people in bloody pile.


I know for a fact...that when I begin loading up my mouth (gun) by thinking about how wrong the other person is...I am very justified in my feelings. I am right...they are wrong... end of story. They deserve what they get...I am the executioner...they are the guilty.

Pogo...the comic strip by Walt Kelly...is the tale of the critters in the Okefenokee Swamp. The most quoted line from the strip is when Pogo and Porkypine are lamenting the trashing of the swamp...and Pogo sighs out..."Yep, son...WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY...AND HE IS US."

Other people may be in the WRONG...there "ain't" no doubt about that...but just because they are WRONG...does not mean we are RIGHT..or at the very least...that we have the RIGHT...to lower ourselves to their VERBAL LEVEL...and SHOOT OFF OUR MOUTH in SELF-ish DEFENSE.

When a cold front meets a warm front....there will be a STORM. The old saying is ..."Fight fire with fire." That may be true in firefighting...but in interpersonal relationships...it does not work.

As the old song goes..."It's not my brother or my sister but me O Lord...standing in the need of prayer...It's not my husband or my wife but me O Lord...standing in the need of prayer." We have met the enemy...and it is not the other guy...it is ME. What I do with the attack...the offense...will determine my level of righteousness, peace and joy."



The question is...(1) how can I handle my mouth (gun) (2) How can avoid the other guys mouth (gun)? Well...you can either have Gunfight At The Ain't O.K. Corral...or you can us a deflection method that is better than Wonder Woman's bracelets.

The mouth is an amazing piece of work. We use it for (A) chewing (mastication) of food that (1) place food in the mouth (2) masticate (3) form the food into a ball (bolus)
(4) propel the food back with our tongue in set up for the swallow (5) Swallow the food that will then be digested and nutrients will be extracted and the unnecessary will be excreted in the form of fecal matter.

(B) Expressing love by utilizing the obicularis oris muscle (aka The Kissing Muscle).

(C) The verbal expression of our thoughts (good, bad, or ugly). This is where it gets tricky and dangerous.

With our mouths (our guns)...we can shoot bullets of bitterness, hate, resentment, frustration, fear, doubt, unbelief, anxiety, curses or blessings. The same mouth can be a healing agent...or an agent of death.. You can be the MOUTHPIECE OF GOD...or the mouthpiece for your self-interests. IT IS YOUR CHOICE. The question now is...HOW CAN I LOAD MY MOUTH...and once it is LOADED what are the proper MOUTH SAFETY RULES?



The Bible speaks of "tongues of fire"...but our volatile blowtorches do more damage than those God sent tongues.

There is no magical formula or step by step answer to the problem of our tongues...our thoughts or words or our deeds. In the Ruminator Class...we say it over and over and over again...UNRESTRAINED THOUGHTS (what we think)..produces in UNRESTRAINED WORDS (what we say)...resulting in UNRESTRAINED ACTIONS (what we do). Without restraint...we don't care what we say...we don't care who we hurt...as long as it makes us feel better about how we got even with the offender. We need to place a RESTRAINING ORDER on our guns (mouth).

Part of the RESTRAINING ORDER...is RENEWING OUR MINDS. We choose what BULLETS (our words) we load in our MINDS (the chamber for the bullets)...that we shoot off with our GUN (our mouths). Also in the RUMINATOR SUNDAY SCHOOL CLASS (that meets every Sunday at Smyrna Assembly in Smyrna Tennessee at (9:00 for food, fellowship, and the Word)...we use our object lesson of shaking a cup of coffee until coffee comes out of the cup. The question is...why did coffee come out of the cup? The answer is usually given...because coffee is in the cup. That would be the wrong answer. The reason coffee came out of the cup...is because that is what is in the cup....the shaking only revealed what was in there. As Bruce Lee has said..."You must first empty your cup of tea...before you can taste my tea." As long as you are FULL OF YOURSELF...you will never experience what God has for you. That is what renewing the mind is all about (Romans 12:1,2,; Ephesians 4:17-32) As Bob Dylan came to realize..."Changed my way of thinkin'...found myself a brand new set of rules."

FINAL THOUGHTS...FINALLY

Bishop Joseph Garlington has taught..."Would you rather be RIGHT...or RECONCILED." I have taught before you can either be RIGHT or you can have a RELATIONSHIP." What is more precious to us...getting even...shooting off our mouths...killing someone else...and having our BULLETS ricochet...and wound us also?

Paul Clark as a song on his AIM FOR THE HEART album called ANOTHER VICTIM. It speaks of the words that "come blastin through the wall"...that people thought was a gunshot...but turned out to be..."the words from a tongue cut the heart of ANOTHER VICTIM." He ends the song with these words of wisdom...

Somebody tell me where the problem lies
Somebody tell me what's the deal
Somebody tel me when they'll draw the line
'Cause far too many people are needin' to be healed
The time has come...to lay down the GUN in your TONGUE
Pull the ROOT from your PRIDE
And ABIDE in THE LOVE OF GOD.

Love and Sharp Shooter Kisses of Love
Rodney "Forgive Me If I Ever Wounded Any Of You With My Bullets" Boyd