Social Worker, Suaan Nichter, tells this story: "Once there was a little boy who had a bad temper. His father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper he must hammer a nail into the back of their fence. The first day, the boy drove thirty-seven nails into the fence. Over the next couple of weeks, he learned to hold his temper/tongue and the number of nails hammered into the fence dwindled.

When the day finally came that he did not lose his temper at all, he told his father of his victory. His father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper/tongue.

Weeks passed and the boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. The father took the boy to the fence and said: "You have done well, but look at the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger they leave a scar just like the holes in the fence. It won't matter how many times you say that you are sorry, the wound will still be there." A verbal wound can be worse than a physical one!

Families are amazing relational/social institutions. They are able to endure huge amounts of anger and remain intact. People dissolve friendships, change church memberships, resign civic club responsibilities because of a fraction of the amount of anger they encounter in their families.

Here is a strange phenomena. We are more likely to use words to injure our family than we are to strangers. Most folk are polite around people they hardly know. They would never speak to someone else's mother as rudely as they do to their own. They would never speak to a friend's child in the tone of voice with which they speak to their own.

Words spoken in anger crush dreams, damage spirits, and like some pesticides, they remain in the mind for years.

But you can't do that when you are flying words.

"TREAT STRANGERS LIKE FAMILY AND FAMILY LIKE STRANGERS." I think I am beginning to understand what this pithy saying means. "Treating strangers like family" is to bring them in, make them feel at home, make them feel that they belong. "Treating family like strangers" is to be respectful, to be kind, to be polite---you know, like you are to people you don't know.

Watch your words this week! Make sure that your words bring healing and not injury. Don't be guilty of bruising tender buds with harsh words. "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can kill me."