Run With It: What is Unwholesome Talk?

Monday, June 26, 2023

What is Unwholesome Talk?

Ephesians 4:29

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” ESV

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” NIV

“Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.” KJV

So, I looked up this word “unwholesome.” The word means: rotten, worthless, useless, corrupt, depraved, unfit for use, putrid. Synonyms: tainted, polluted, immoral, unethical, dishonest, crooked, shady, fraudulent, perverted. The opposite of this is: honest, decent, moral, and upright.

And the Lord gave me an example of this, which I will personalize:

An example of this unwholesome talk or corrupt communication is: Someone pretending to be on my side, pretending to be my friend, pretending to be supportive of me so that I would now trust that person, but what this person is really trying to do is to get me to support the opposition, my adversary, my enemy, my rival. So it is deceptive and manipulative, trying to make me feel accepted so that this person can get me to support the enemy.

And as I read back over that example, the Lord brought to mind the fact that we have, at least here in America, many men (and some women) who serve as pastors of church congregations (or of what is falsely called “church”) who are “sucking up” to the people (trying to win their approval and good opinion by praising them insincerely) in order to gain their trust so that they can get them to support and agree with what is not of God and what is opposed to Christ and to the cross of Christ.

So what they are doing is immoral, shady, unethical, dishonest, and crooked. For they are trying to convince the people that they are on their side and that they support them in what they are doing. And they may even give the impression that they are on the side of truth and righteousness, and that they are on God’s side, but while they skillfully and dishonestly and craftily scheme in finding ways to lead the people to support what are the lies of the enemy, thus supporting the opposition.

So, this “unwholesome talk” is not just crude and foul language. This is about underhanded schemes to lie to people and to make them feel good, so they will feel that they are being supported and agreed with only to then turn around and behind their backs scheme in how to convince them to now come around to the ways of the opposition and to give their support to what is not of God. And so they won’t lie to you outright. They will use misimpressions (indirect lies) to deceive you into accepting the lies as truth.

And an impression is “an idea, feeling, or opinion about something or someone, especially one formed without conscious thought or on the basis of little evidence” (source: Oxford Languages). So a misimpression is a willful and deliberate attempt to get someone to form an idea or opinion about something or someone that is a lie, but it is an indirect lie, and indirect lies are very difficult to prove for they are not outright. They are more like suggestions to the subconscious mind, but they are successful.

So, when this tells us that we should not let any unwholesome talk come out of our mouths, this goes beyond just using language that is considered offensive to the bulk of the population. And I apologize in advance if anyone found “sucking up” offensive, for I did look it up, and I did not find it to be a generally understood offensive term. For it just means to give insincere praise to people in order to gain their approval and good opinion so that you can lie to them in an underhanded way for deceitful purposes.

And the point of this is that “unwholesome talk” goes way beyond just what is offensive to the general populace to using underhanded schemes as a way to lie to people to where they don’t realize they are being lied to but to where they will accept the lie as truth in their subconscious which will eventually move its way to their conscious mind without them even realizing what is taking place. So, we must not be dishonest people who use misimpressions (indirect lies) in order to deceive other people.

Instead, we are to be those who are speaking the truth in love, one to the other, to help one another to grow in our walks of faith to maturity in Christ, and so that we aren’t led astray by these charlatans and wolves in sheep’s clothing who are deceiving the people in underhanded ways into believing the lies as though they are truth. We, as followers of Christ, are to be people of integrity who do not lie to people, in practice, either outright or in backwards, deceptive, and underhanded ways. So always tell the truth!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOtwcY7YWNY

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The Battle for Truth

An Original Work / May 18, 2013

Based off Malachi 1-4