Taming the Tongue

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we are at James chapter 3, verses 1 through 12. Why don't we have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into God's Word. Oh man, we gotta pray. Today's about a hard one. Lord, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your Word. God, we need your help today. Lord, we need you to humble us and to teach us. to make us more like you, to turn us away from the things that we would normally want to be and to do, and to be more like you. Please, Lord, tame us in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, James chapter 3, verses 1 through 12. My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. For we all stumble in many things.
If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. Indeed, we put bits in a horse's mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body. Look also at ships, although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires, even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles? and the tongue of the fire a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it files the whole body and sets on fire the course of nature, and it is set on fire by hell.
For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and creature of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by mankind. But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil fool of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceeds blessings and cursings. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. Does spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh."
Well, we need to ask ourselves our three questions. A, what's this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what are we called to do? So what's this about? Well, he starts off, James, with not all of us should be teachers. It's a hard reality, right? Because teaching involves the tongue. Teaching involves instruction. And so here he says, what's the issue with that, right? Knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. I gotta tell you, this is one of the main things that kept me for years from being a pastor. I worried about my own heart, my own mouth. What if I said things wrong? What if I did things incorrectly? What if I taught people wrong?
And it's still a huge concern for me. I'm regularly worried about, am I truly teaching the word of God? Or just whatever I want the word to actually say. And there's a stricter judgment. I'm not saying our denomination is perfect, but I just got back from a presbytery where we spent hours wrestling with whether someone should be a teacher of God's word. Because there's serious issues with being a teacher. And one of them is that danger of leading people astray and being judged more severely. But here's the thing. We all stumble with many things.
If anyone does not stumble in word, he's a perfect man. You want to find somebody who's perfect, has no, no, no, right? Limish, no blot, no problems. Find the guy with the perfect tongue. Find the guy who's never said anything in the wrong way or at the wrong time to the wrong person.
No, if you're able to bridle your tongue, you're able to bridle your whole body. That's this point of self-control that's involved with the tongue, because the tongue is a very, very dangerous thing, is what James is talking about here. He compares it to a few different things. He compares it to a bit that goes in a horse's mouth, right? Our tongue pulling us one way or another, like a giant horse, but there's a little bit. Your tongue is that much control over your body.
Your tongue's like a fire, just a little spark. I remember growing up in Southern California and one time, pardon me, one time, somebody flicked a cigarette out their window and it lit over a million acres in the San Bernardino wilderness on fire. Just one little ember. The entire, entire mountainside ablaze for days and days and days. It's like a rudder. You can have a massive ship with just a little tiny rudder on the back and that little rudder changes the whole course.
Many people's lives are ruined because of speech. James tells us that the tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body and sets on fire the course of nature and is set on fire by hell. No man can tame the tongue. It is unruly evil, full of deadly poison. That's what Jesus is getting at when he says, from the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. Why is the tongue unruly evil? Because our hearts are unruly. Without the word of the Holy Spirit, insubmissive. In the tongue is the power of life and death.
And yet often we don't think about our words. I can't express the amount of sorrow I have for the number of things that I've said. Even true things but said in unloving ways or unkind times. Not thinking about the weakness that somebody was going through.
I mean, you even think about Job's friends. He had three buddies. who many times are saying correct theological things about God. Now, sometimes they're slandering, right? Just outright making assumptions and slandering Him, tearing Him down, and they're wrong, and it's horrible. Other times they say things about God and stuff that are true, but are horrible at timing, and not said with compassion, but said with an intent of trying to shut down their friend and squash him. But then there's the other side.
Sometimes we don't control our tongue because we don't say things and we ought to have said something. We sin by omission. We sin by not doing what we should have said. We say things that light the world on fire. Every kind of beast and bird and reptile and creature of the sea is tamed. It has been tamed by mankind, but no man can tame the tongue.
So what hope do we have? I don't think that James is telling us, right, well, you're choosing to give up, right? Don't care about what you say, because you can't do it anyways. I think he's warning us, warning us against false teaching, warning us against a type of faith that doesn't care what people say, because even our words are an action. They're part of our faith. They're not removed from it.
How we speak to people. And sometimes we need to say things that are difficult, but not always do we use our tongues to impart grace, to build people up or to tear people down. How do we use our tongue for the glory of God? God made the tongue, but when we speak, What does it portray or reveal about what's really going on in our hearts?
I think that's what James is getting at here. I think that's what the Holy Spirit is trying to get us at here. Stopping, evaluating our hearts, evaluating our lives. What do I really believe? What is the Holy Spirit doing in me? Because out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. And so we ought to be praying that love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, those fruits of the Spirit might be true even of our mouth.
Because against such things, there is no law. So, in my Bible, I've got verses, or verses, eight double underlined in my Bible. That's what I have for best verse, but see, calling what it would call to do. Plead to God for the sanctifying of his Holy Spirit.
I gotta pray for this, man, that God would make me love people with my tongue. that I would love Olivia, that I would love the kids, that I would love people in the church, that I would love community members, people I go to the gym with, people I meet at the coffee shop.
May we stop and ask, are we imparting grace? What comes out of our mouth? Does it show the living water in our souls that we want to share to others because we found Jesus? Or do our mouths betray us? That we're not really salt and light, but instead we're overflowing with poison out of our mouths. What's on our lips portrays what's in our heart.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word. We thank you for the blessing. that you have given us your Holy Spirit, but God, we confess to you that we are sinful, sinful people. We mess up in the things we say. We sin in our thoughts, we sin in our affections, and that leads us to sinful saying, speaking evil things. God, please, please, Lord, teach us to put away sin. Lord, we pray that we would learn to so be like Jesus Christ, full of grace and truth, that we might have a fitting word, that we might have tongues that impart grace to those who hear.
Thank you for the opportunities you give us to speak life to others in Jesus's name. May God bless you. May you impart grace to those who are around you. May your words be used to build others up for God's glory. May his spirit continue to comfort you, guide you into all truth. May the peace of Jesus go with you. I'll see you next time. Bye.