Scripture - Ps 19:14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.

Observation - the Psalmist is concerned not only about his spoken conversations, which God can audibly hear, but the conversations taking place in his mind while he was silent. He asks that God help him to even have thoughts that are pleasing.

Application - this verse represents one of the great doxologies used by the church to end various gatherings and send people on their way with an intentional direction for their steps that follow. I can remember corporately saying these words before leaving church services as a kid.

I think we all recognize the sin in coversations we have or words we speak that are inappropriate. They sound bad. Other people hear them. We are embarassed. We are wrong and we know it.

I think it is much harder to recognize when the meditations of our heart (our thoughts) are wrong. Thought happens, often without even recognizing the activity. We worry, we argue, we lash out, we doubt, we rebuke, all within the confines of our minds, and then we move on to other things without realizing where we have been or what we have done. It can easily become a pattern for living that we are oblivious to. We end up inappropriately handling things within the confines of our mind without realizing it's damaging capacity to our health, our way of living, or our relationship with God. We can become negative, bitter, argumentative, etc, all because of what is happening in our skulls!

I am reminded to address this issue today. How is my thought life? Is it healthy? Is it pleasing to God?

Prayer - Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.