Seasoned with salt

‘Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that we may know how ye ought to answer every man.’ (Colossians 4:6). When Paul wrote those words, he was not just urging us to talk about the grace of God (this we will do), he is telling us that our speech and general conversation should reveal the grace of God in us and be ‘good to the ear and a blessing to the heart’. Hard words reveal a hard heart; unkind, cutting remarks reveal a bitter spirit; cursing reveals and unregenerate soul. Grace is to the speech what salt is to meat – it makes it acceptable, profitable and useful! Grace in the heart will not only determine what we say, but also how we say it. There are plenty of folks who have made a study of the doctrines of grace whom we avoid because they usually manage somehow to offend, hurt and uselessly wound even the Lord’s people. God forbid that we should add to the burdens and sorrows of God’s children by our sharp tongues!