When Words Are Wind

Do you think that you can reprove words, when the speech of a despairing man is wind? Job 6:26 (RSV)

When in grief and pain and despair, people often say things they would not otherwise say. They paint reality with darker strokes than they will paint it tomorrow, when the sun comes up. They sing in minor keys and talk as though that were the only music. They see only clouds and speak as if there were no sky.

They say, “Where is God?” Or, “There is no use in going on.” Or, “Nothing makes any sense.”

Or, “There’s no hope for me.” Or, “If God were good, this couldn’t have happened.”

What shall we do with these words?

Job says that we do not need to reprove them. These words are wind, or literally, “for the wind.” They will be quickly blown away. There will come a turn in circumstances, and the despairing person will waken from the dark night and regret the hasty words.

Therefore, let us not spend our time and energy reproving such words. They will be blown away of themselves, on the wind. One need not clip the leaves in autumn; it is a wasted effort. They will soon scatter to the four winds.

How quickly we are given to defending God—or sometimes the truth—from words that are for the wind alone. There are enough words, premeditated and studied, that need our rebuttal, but not every despairing heresy blurted out in the hour of agony needs to be answered. If we had discernment, we could tell the difference between the words with roots and the words blowing in the wind.

There are words with roots in deep error and deep evil. But not all gray words get their color from a black heart. Some are colored mainly by the pain, the despair. What you hear is not the deepest thing within. There is something real within, where the words come from, but it is temporary—like a passing infection—real, painful, but not the true person.

Let us learn to discern whether the words spoken against us or against God or against the truth are merely for the wind—spoken not from the soul, but from the sore. If they are for the wind, let us wait in silence and not reprove. Restoring the soul, not reproving the sore, is the aim of our love.

- John Piper, A Godward Life, © 1997 by Desiring God Foundation (Multnomah).