Sorry is just a word

When my nephews were just four and five years old, they would love each other to pieces one moment and then fight like cats and dogs the next. The older one habitually played tricks on his brother for fun, and the younger one, who was less adept at such trickery retaliated with action. One day I had to be their peace-maker, and asked the older boy to apologize for his mischief.  But before he even had a chance to respond, my youngest nephew, with tears in his eyes, protested to me and said "But sorry is just a word!"

Words can definitely become empty and meaningless if they are not followed by some change or other tangible action. We are so prone to say things we don't mean. We even train our children to say an automatic 'sorry' before first dealing with their hearts.  Gone are the days of verbal contracts, precisely because words without paper trail cannot be trusted. The apostle James concludes that no one can be found faultless in what he says, we all fail at being true to our word at some level. (James 3:2)

But Jesus isn't like that.  He lived out what he preached and thus qualified to call himself 'the Truth' (John 14:6).  His word and his deed were then and still are, one and the same.  And on this basis, we can put our trust in His words and live by them.