I’ve always believed that the truest measure of a society isn’t in its laws or its leaders, but in how it treats the raw, unfiltered voices of its people. Free speech, in all its messy glory, isn’t just a right. It’s a mirror. It lets us peer into the human heart, where the real stories unfold. Think about it. When someone speaks freely, without fear of censorship or backlash, what spills out? Joy, anger, wisdom, folly, love, hate. All of it. And in that outpouring, we catch a glimpse of what’s truly beating inside us all.
Jesus understood this better than anyone. He didn’t shy away from the hard truths people carried in their words. In Matthew 15:18-19, he cuts straight to it: “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.” It’s stark, isn’t it? Our speech isn’t some superficial chatter. It’s the overflow of our innermost being. Mark 7:20-23 echoes this with even more detail: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”
These words hit home because they remind us that silencing speech doesn’t purify the heart. It just hides the mess. Jesus called out the religious elite of his day for exactly that. In Matthew 12:34, he tells them, “You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” And in Luke 6:45, he flips it to the positive: “A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” Free speech forces us to confront this reality. It invites us to listen, to learn, to repent, or to stand firm. Without it, we lose the chance to see ourselves and others as we really are.
But let’s be honest. The human heart isn’t just a source of varied words. It’s a battleground, tangled up in deception from the start. Scripture paints a sobering picture of our shared condition. We’re all caught in a web spun by the great deceiver. Revelation 12:9 describes it plainly: “The great dragon was hurled down, that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray.” The whole world. That’s us. Blinded by the “god of this age,” as 2 Corinthians 4:4 puts it, our minds clouded so we can’t even glimpse the light of truth.
It’s no wonder we oppose God so often. Romans 8:7 lays it bare: “The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.” We follow the rhythms of this world, under the influence of “the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient,” Ephesians 2:2 warns. And John 8:44 drives it deeper: Jesus tells a crowd, “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” No one escapes this. Romans 3:10-12 seals it: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”
This isn’t a judgment to condemn. It’s a diagnosis we all share. I’ve felt that pull toward deception myself, chasing shadows instead of light, speaking words that twisted my own heart further from truth. And if we’re paying attention to free speech, we’ll hear it in others too. The rants that reveal resentment. The boasts that mask fear. The silences that scream doubt. We’re all deceived, all standing in quiet rebellion against the One who made us.
So what do we do? We don’t lash out or shut down. We pray. Hard. For every voice that grates on us, every word that wounds, we lift it up. Because we’ve been there, blind and stumbling in the same dark. Jesus calls us to mercy, not malice. Pray for the deceived, as Ephesians urges us to wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces that bind us all. Guard your own heart in the process, like Proverbs 4:23 advises: “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Let prayer soften what speech reveals.
And here’s the hope in all this: truth isn’t a distant dream. It’s a daily choice. With every conversation, every post, every quiet decision, we can turn toward it. Choose truth today. Let it shape your words, heal your heart, align your steps with the God who speaks life into chaos. It’s not about perfection. It’s about pursuit. One choice at a time, we step out of deception and into the light that exposes, forgives, and transforms.
If you’ve tasted that shift, if truth has become your anchor amid the noise of free speech, come join us. We’re teknaTruth, children of truth, walking this path together. Follow along, share your voice, let’s build a community where words lead us closer to the heart of God. Your story matters here. Speak it freely.