1 BE IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD (7/10/11) SCRIPTURES: I Peter 3: 8-16 & Matthew 5: 33-37.

KEY CONCEPTS: Truth, integrity, keeping promises, use of positive words. OPENING THOUGHTS: BE IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD. When did it become so hard to keep our word; to honor our commitments & to speakthe truth? When did we lower our expectations & stop holding ourselves & each other accountable to keep our word, to not break promises, toas our Gospel reading, states it, To let our YES be YES & our NO be NO? We need only to listen to the news of this past week or read any newspaper to see how off course we have become as a society: first with the nations fascination with the Casey Anthony trial & then closer to home with the CRCT Cheating Scandal in the Atlanta Public School system. What is going on? Culturally, the United States has moved away from truth, honesty & integrity as cornerstone qualities for us its citizenswhich makes Don Miquel Ruizs book, The 4 Agreements, all the more important especially for people of faith. For the next 5 Sundays were going to examine what each of these 4 agreements + 1 new agreement can mean for each of us personally & in our spiritual journeys. WILL YOU PRAY WITH ME? PRAYER: GENERAL SUMMARY OF THE 4 AGREEMENTS: (Online reading)According to this book, we make agreements with ourselves, with others & even with God that bring forth one of two responses: 1. Agreements based on fear, guilt, shame or blame cause us to create & spread emotional poison; reject ourselves & others (& even God); become self-abusive & selfrejecting, sucks our energy & very life away. Fear births more fear & it remains a vicious cycle of death & destructionfor us, for others & for the world. 2. Agreements based on love, light & truth creates positive energy while automatically adding freedom, authenticity & life. Love brings forth lovefor us, others, & the world. Essentially, our agreements become our belief system & until our agreements come more in line with Gods ideal, Gods callwe limit our potential with faulty beliefs. Many people in our world seem to be living in this way & the next 5 sermons are an attempt to call us to a higher possibility as human beings AND as people of God! AGREEMENT #1--BE IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD The word impeccable comes from the Latin word meaning without sin. Most religions talk about sin & sinners, so were well versed in this concept. However, Miquel, challenges us to consider that sin is not just something moral or religious, but rather practical & common sense. According to Miquel, a sin is anything that you do which goes against yourself. Being impeccable with yourself, then means, that you dont go against yourself; you dont judge or blame yourself. (Page 31) And just in case youre worried that this concept lets us behave badly without consequencefor our dear brothers & sisters from churches of origins that preach about guilt, repentance, etcbeing impeccable means that we take absolute responsibility for our actions. (Page 31) EPISTLE READINGI PETER 3: 8-16: Put another way, we see in our Epistle reading that we are called to be responsible during

2 times of suffering. The writer of this letter offered encouragement to a suffering group of Christianscalling them to stick together to offer sympathy, love, a tender heart & a humble mind. (I Peter 3:8) I Peter 3:10-11 calls followers of Christ (then & now). For those who desire life & desire to see good days, then let them keep their tongues from evil & their lips from speaking deceit; turn from evil & do good; seek & pursue peace. GENERAL APPLICATION: As seekers, as followers of Christ, we are called to react differently than the world does when hard, bad or difficult times come. And in addition to our emotions, the main way we express dread, fear or intimidation is by our words, by what we say which may be why God calls us to NOT speak deceitfully or allow evil to tell us lies. For words are not merely sounds or written symbols; rather words are energy; words are a powerful force for good and/or for evil. The word is a vibration of sound that tends to manifest its physical equivalent. (Companion Book, Page 61) Words allow us to better communicate & express what we think. Words enable us to create the events of our lives. Remember, God spoke& the world came into being. God also spoke, That all was good. So, I ask you todaywhat are speaking into being with your words? Is your speech without sin? Is it impeccable? THE TEST OF IMPECCABILITY: Want to know how impeccable your words are? According to Miquel you can measure the impeccability of your speech, your words by your degree of self-love. Love of self & how you truly feel about yourself are both direct correlations to the impeccability of your word. Impeccable speech brings forth the fruits of feeling good, happy & at peace. (Page 44) If you want to live a more freeing & fruitful life, choose to be impeccable with your word. Use words in positive ways. Use your words to share your love& begin with yourself. Tell yourself truthsmaybe it will seem strange at firstverbally tell yourself that that you love yourself; that you are a special & uniquely gifted human being. And that God delights in you as the apple of Gods eye! (Psalm 17:8) PET EXAMPLE: By a show of hands, how many of you have pets? I will assume that you love your pets? Okay, to clarify how to treat yourself I want to use our pets for this illustration. As we all know, many people in our community, often see their two & four legged pets as furry or feathered children. Can we agree with that? So for those of you that have petshow do you treat them? More importantly, how do you SPEAK to them? What kind of words do you use with them? What about your tone? Your intent? Are you careful with how you approach your petswhat words, sounds or voice tones you use? Soothing words? Words of love & comfort? WHAT IF YOU SPOKE TO YOURSELFAND TO OTHER HUMAN BEINGSTHE WAY YOU SPEAK TO YOUR PETS? How would this one change positively impact the world? And for those among us, without petsif you have children, how do/did you speak to them when they were young & small? How do you speak to older people/elderly/frail people?

3 CLOSING: BEING IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD: means that we take our best example of speaking to another living being & endeavor to apply it to all of our relationships. That we move toward:  Speaking with integrity  Saying only what I mean  Not speaking against myself  Not gossiping about others  Using the power of my words to create truth & love And in even more practical terms, those of us who are members of Our Hope MCC have committed to a covenant for how we will communicate with each other in this faith community. Every member that has ever joined Our Hope MCC has pledged to follow what we call Our Communication Covenant which states the following: TAKEN FROM OHMCC COMMUNICATION COVENANT: We, as members of Our Hope MCC recognize that good communication skills are essential for the efficient, effective & orderly operation of our denomination & our church. Therefore, as an individual, I hereby enter into this covenant between myself & other members of OHMCC in individual conversations, group meetings & written communications. I agree to support each member in upholding this covenant. In making every effort to communicate well with others, it is my intention to employ each of the following methods: (5 of 20) y I will admit & accept responsibility for myself, my thoughts, my attitudes & my behavior y I will be respectful of myself & others y I will deal directly with others. I will be loving & caring, yet frank (honest) y If a problem arises with another person, I will go directly to that person FIRST to resolve the problem y I will not gossip. I will listen to someone elses needs, or do something about a problem within my domain; but will not be a part of spreading rumors about an absent person General References: Ruiz, Don Miguel. The 4 Agreements. Amber-Allen Publishing. San Rafael, CA. 1997. Ruiz, Don Miguel. The 4 Agreements: Companion Book. Amber-Allen Publishing. San Rafael, CA 2000. The New Oxford Annotated Bible (3rd edition). OxfordUniversity Press. New York. 2001.