Leviticus 27: 1-2 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When a man shall make a singular vow, the persons shall be for the LORD by thy estimation.
What are Your Words Worth?
Is talk cheap? Talk is only cheap when we do not follow it up with action. The truth is that talk should never be cheap on our lips. It should mean something. Do you remember back when Hannah offered and gave her son Samuel to the Lord? There was a provision for people to make a special, voluntary gift of themselves, their house, or their property to the Lord. God placed a certain monetary value on each of those things in the event that a person decided to change his mind.
A man who made a vow to the Lord to serve in the tabernacle, and then later decided he didn’t want to do that, owed about fifty months of salary, a big price, to the Lord. There was actual monetary value placed on a vow, so that if he changed his mind, he owed that money.
This teaches us that God values our work. There is a price for it. Whether I value my work or not, God values it.
The bigger point of Leviticus 27 is that God values our words. People were not to make a vow haphazardly. Leviticus 27:1-2 say, “And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying… When a man shall make a singular vow, the persons shall be for the LORD by thy estimation.” These verses speak to the fact that God values our work, but also that He values our words even more.
How much do you value your words? Talk should never be cheap on our lips. You and I should value, save, and spend our words with as much care as we would our money, maybe more. Watch your words. Some people say things just for shock value or to be mysterious. Some people prize themselves on just saying whatever they think. That’s great if what you think is valuable, but if it’s not, don’t make it public. Value your words.
Save your words. If words were money, some of us would be paupers because we spend them all. We should value and save our words because they become more valuable in the supply and demand world we live in.
We should also spend our words well. That is defined by backing our words up with action. Value your words, value your possessions that you steward, and value your work.