Up at 2am again!

After a 2 day sleep over with my daughter and friends here I am wanting to sleep but finding myself awake aaarrggg! I suffer from insomnia sometimes so against my better judgement,(you can get some scary thoughts at 2am) instead of sleep I thought I would blog! This last Sunday in the kids church, a teacher mentioned the saying "sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me". He was talking about how un-true that statement is. words can hurt immensley. I think about girls who are anorexic because one person told them they are fat and they believed it. Then there's the kids who were teased mercilously and go on to commit suicide. The havoc wrecked on relationships by gossip. Even "good words" can hurt like public prayers that convey way too much information that doesn't need to be said. I had read somewhere that emails are misconstrued 60% of the time. The receiver understands the message in a way the emailer never intended. As many women do, I have struggled throughout the years with gossip. My husband works to curtail a sarcastic sense of humor that some people just don't get. Now my kids and their friends are dealing with the same issues. I was talking with my young son, for what seemed like the millionth time, about his talking back and sarcastic sense of humor (I wonder where he got that from? LOL). I thought about an object lesson we used in church and it really seemed to hit home with him. Think of a watchdog. What does a watchdog do when danger is near? He barks, he growls. What happens if we don't listen to his warning? We get hurt, in trouble ect. We have a warning watchdog inside us that lets us know when we shouldn't say or do something that is wrong. We just have to pause for a moment and listen before we speak. He really seemed to grasp that. I asked him to pray and ask God to help his dog to bark loudly and for him to be able to hear. He needs a Pitbull not a Poodle(thanks Gretchen for that). I think this could work the other way too. On Sunday the kids were asked to think of how God sees them when someone says a hurtful thing. Listen for the watchdog to guard your heart against these types of attacks. Know that the words said aren't the truth as the warning bark sounds out. Hopefully this lesson will stay with my son and with me! I hope I didn't ramble too badly. I have to take kids to school and start my new workout this morning Eeek! I guess I had better try to get a few hours sleep.