Lately, I’ve been really into speeches. It doesn’t matter if I’m at a birthday party, a dinner with my friends or even in class: I’m happy to write or recite a short, impromptu oration. For me, the most wonderful part of public speaking is experiencing how our words can bless people. However, if we want to be able to bless others with what we say, we first need to learn how to use language well.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF WORDS 

As an English major, I realize that most people aren’t as obsessed as I am with crafting a perfect sentence, and that’s okay. But I, and many of your professors, will say that learning to speak well is one of the most important skills we can develop as humans. Think about it: We talk to our friends, roommates and teachers — people who are a significant part of our lives — on a daily basis. Being intentional about the words we choose to communicate with them is one crucial way we can love the people in our life well.

If you’re not convinced that being careful with words can show that we love people, consider the life of Jesus for a moment. Jesus was an expert wordsmith who cared about saying the right thing at the right time, whether that meant encouraging the weak or calling out the Pharisees for their hypocrisy. Jesus not only understood that the way we use words shows how much or how little we care about people, but also recognized that our speech can be glorifying to God.

WORSHIPPING GOD WITH OUR SPEECH

One truth the church I grew up in reminded me of time and time again is that we can use every aspect of our lives to worship God. So how do we learn to worship God with our daily speech? To begin with, we have to learn to be silent — to listen to what those around us are saying. After all, how will we know when to cheer up our roommates if we’re not even paying attention to how sad and frustrated they sound?

We can also “listen” to great writers, such as Augustine or Shakespeare by reading their works. Historically, part of learning to be a good speaker involved studying how rhetorically skilled men and women of antiquity convinced their audiences. In ancient practice, students would copy speeches by Gorgias or Cicero to better understand the art of persuasion, which brings me to my next point.

SPEAKING IN ORDER TO LOVE OTHERS 

If we desire to speak well in order to love others well, one practical place for us to master our grasp of language is in writing. I’ve found that the effort and thought I put into the way I write my essays directly affects how beautifully or poorly I talk on a day to day basis. In writing, we’re given a unique opportunity to take time to find the right words to communicate our feelings and thoughts. Possessing the expertise to convey our exact emotions and theories requires practice, but it is a vital skill if we want others to understand us. Only God can read our minds, and so if we desire to help others love us well, we must be OK with pausing in conversation until we can discover the words we need.

Becoming a good speaker takes a lot of effort. People who speak well not only retain a huge vocabulary, but are also aware of when a word should and shouldn’t be used, how to navigate the rules of grammar and how to place verbs and nouns in such a way that it sounds beautiful. Learning how to do all of these at once seems overwhelming, but struggling with language is worth it.

Last May, my 26-year-old cousin, Morgan, passed away after a long battle for her life. Morgan wasn’t just my cousin, she was also my friend, and her death is one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced. Something that gives me peace about her passing, though, is that for the last two years of her life, I wrote her letters on a monthly basis. When I went to her funeral, I saw my letters on her inspiration board, and it made me glad to know that my words had comforted her and given her hope. I had blessed her, and I’ll never regret it.

Language matters because it is powerful, and we must learn to use it well so we can love our neighbor well. We must embody Christ not only in our actions, but in our words.