We often hear the regurgitated words of importance concerning communication today to the point that often they fall on deaf ears.
In today’s area of technology not only do we need to listen and speak with clarity but read and write as well since so often now we are communicating via some form of electronic device. We need remember these tools are merely an extension of the tongue and the use of them come with the same responsibility as if we were speaking them.
I recently tried an experiment during a staff meeting devotion time. I simply had the person next to me read silently a sentence I wrote on a piece of paper. It read “A bear stole a beer from the refrigerator and drank it, but he didn’t get drunk.” The person then, from memory had to repeat it quietly to the person next to him. This sentence was quietly passed from person to person until it had gone around the entire conference room. When it had made its way through the approximately eighteen people in attendance, I asked the last person to report what had been shared with her. She stated, “The operator drank a beer and got drunk.” Wow, how did we get there! Was it really that difficult of a task? I thought they would do much better at this. However, when I consider all the people sitting around the table, all the different accents, all the different backgrounds, I began to understand how this could happen. It only solidified my position that communication in whatever form we use is so vitally important.
This exercise truly does reveal how important our communication is and how it can have great impact on the work we do. However, we should consider all our communication and how it impacts those around us as well. As Christians we are warned about the power of the tongue. Proverbs 18:21 declares “The tongue has the power of life and death.” The Apostle James had more direct words to say about our communication when he wrote speaking of the tongue “with it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God, from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way.” James 3:9-10
May we speak with clarity that all would understand.
In His service,
Barry Campbell
Corporate Chaplain
Newby Management