Here’s another great Connie Mack quote:

“No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball.”

He said this in an interview with  Sporting News magazine in March 1951. He was 88 at the time, retired from the game, but he still couldn’t stop talking about baseball.

We’ve all known people whose conversations always seem to end up in the same place. Some inevitably get back to a dirty joke, or a bit of gossip, or a political rant. Others come to an uplifting thought, a prayer request, a word of praise.

It has a lot to do with what’s on your mind all the time, and also what’s in your heart. That’s why Jesus said, “What you say flows from what is in your heart.” (Luke 6:45)

What does your conversation always get back to?

Cartoonist Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes) said, “Sometimes when I’m talking, my words can’t keep up with my thoughts. I wonder why we think faster than we speak. Probably so we can think twice.”

His words remind us of Solomon’s: “He who guards his mouth and his tongue keeps himself from calamity.” (Proverbs 21:23)

Do you want to eliminate some trouble in your life before it happens? Learn to think twice and speak once.

A couple of weeks ago I preached on Ephesians 4:29 here in Rio. After the service, my seminary friend gave me an interesting insight into the wording of this verse in Portuguese.

The English says, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths.” (NIV) or “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouths.” (KJV) The Portuguese word for unwholesome talk or corrupt communication is torpe — this is an old Portuguese word that is also used to describe the smell of fish gone bad. Also, my friend pointed out, torpe has the same root as torpedo — which means the same in Portuguese as it does in English.

This tells us something about our words. The wrong ones stink — like bad fish. And they have the ability to do great damage, like a missile that explodes upon impact. Our words can do that, if we’re not careful.