Published On: Tue, May 18th, 2010

Messages to Delete

Whoever is acquainted with the United States Postal Service knows of the excessive amount of “junk mail” which daily floods most American households. With the advent of electronic mail, the same is also experienced by its subscribers. The advantage of the latter is that with one click on your keyboard you can delete an unwanted message without needing to open it. Some e-mail providers even take care of that for you, ahead of time, by diverting suspicious messages into the category known as “spam,” thus keeping unwanted e-mails from your inbox.

Dr. Synesio Lyra

On the personal level, you can also be proactive in not permitting unsolicited, negative comments to affect you, or harsh responses which may be given to your  inquiries, besides other unedifying messages you need not store in your inner being. That could contaminate the stream flowing from your own heart toward others.

In your daily interactions with people, both those you know, as well as many who simply cross your path once, provide a whole assortment of messages aimed at you. Some are written, others are vocally presented, besides many more which can be just as eloquent, albeit unspoken: an evil stare, an unpleasant gesture, or any other non-verbal type of communication.

Your best posture towards all these is to delete them from your memory as quickly as they come, long before they take hold of you and adversely affect you by poisoning the emotional reservoir which should supply all you need for the real challenges of any of your days.

I’ve met several people who, unnecessarily, daily endure a rather miserable existence because they hold on too tightly to grudges, resentments, and negative intimations which they allowed to lodge in their life. It may also relate to items they chose to interpret in a negative way even if that was not the original intent of the message. Whichever form it may take, the consequences are caustic for any life, often leading to illness, if not to death itself!

An expression the apostle Paul employs in several of his letters is the imperative “put away” which his readers were to observe. For instance, “Put away childish things…”(I Corinthians 13:11). And to the Ephesians, he exhorted: “Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice” (4:31).  In the same vein St. Peter urges his readers in “laying aside all malice” (I Peter 2:1) so as to reach higher levels of spiritual maturity and personal satisfaction.

Something quite sad is what happens when people delete the messages God had sent to be embraced and stored in the human heart and mind, to provide the directives for varied, unexpected situations encountered in daily life. At the same time, healthy pronouncements God wishes for us to receive and retain, sometimes cannot occupy human minds on account of too much corrosive negativity already lodged in that space. Such items need to be deleted so that you may “let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom” (Colossians 3:16a).

The peace of God can dominate your entire being so that in moments of chaos or times of tranquility, you utilize the right stuff to keep you thriving while you reflect on those virtues and flush out what is displeasing to God and injurious to your own life!

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