JUST ONE MULLIGAN
Proverbs 17:27, 28
"He who has knowledge spares his words, and a man of understanding is of a calm spirit.
Even a fool is counted wise when he holds his peace; when he shuts his lips, he is considered perceptive."
This past week I hunted with my grandson for turkeys in south Texas. It was a special hunt as I was trying to harvest my 100th turkey. One afternoon Micah got a hen to answer his calls and after about an hour got her and three other hen came right into with a few feet of us. Right behind those, two big gobblers came strutting in. I was able to get a shot off as they got within feet of our position. Unfortunately they were so close that I shot right past their head.
I was discouraged but we kept going. Ann hour or so later we spotted two mature gobblers down a long straight dirt ranch road. We snuck up to the edge of the road and Micah called them right down to us. This time I harvested #100. That day I was given a mulligan in my turkey hunting career.
Now I'm not much of a golfer... in fact when I used to golf, the cost of the balls I lost outweighed the cost of green fees. I have on occasion woken up the neighbors of the golf course when a sharp slice ricocheted off there patio door early in the morning. The only way I could get any kind of respectable score would be to give me a mulligan on each hole.
The dictionary defines a mulligan as "a shot not counted against the score, permitted in unofficial play to a player whose previous shot was poor." In other words, a mulligan is a do-over.
Unfortunately, life is not really like a game of golf. We rarely get a Mulligan when we deal with real life situations. This is especially true when we are dealing with what we say to others. We need to be careful what we say, as once words are out if our mouths, we can't take them back.
James 3:5 tells us if the destructive power of a small tongue. "So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!".
What kind of fire can we ignite with our tongues? An enormous blaze that can not be put out by other words. Once our words have left our mouths they cannot be pulled back.
Deanna Wadsworth once said
There are Four things you can't recover:
The stone after the throw,
The word after it's said,
The occasion after it's missed,
The time after it's gone.
In life there are few mulligans. Be careful what you say.... You may never get a chance to take the words back.
All that being said. We do have one mulligan in life. When we look again the first part of that definition we see something wonderful, "a shot not counted against the score"
Jesus came to give us one mulligan in life, one do-over. He died so you and I could have one opportunity to receive the grace to accept the gift of one do-over, one mulligan. Do miss that one opportunity.
Help achieve the mission - GIVE today
Click the button to sign up for Dean’s Daily Devotional. FREE and delivered daily.