2019-06-23 James 3:9-12 TAMING THE TONGUE (4): ITS POTENCY TO DISCLOSE

TAMING THE TONGUE (4): ITS POTENCY TO DISCLOSE (James 3:1) June 23, 2019 Read James 3:9-12 – Here’s a question. Who are you? Not who do you want to be. Not who do people think you are. Not who do you think you are, but who are you really? Want to find out? Just listen to yourself. The tongue is the great discloser. Mt 12:34b: “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” Mouth reveals heart. Problem is, we’re not very good listeners. But I can tell you one thing. If you don’t use your words to find out who you are, everybody else will. The worst thing that happened to President Nixon in Watergate was when the tapes came out. Bad enough that they showed illegal activities; but what really undermined him was the unguarded words that revealed his profaneness and meanness of spirit. I’m not trashing Nixon, but there was a nastiness there. Billy Graham who considered himself a friend and spent many nights in the WH said he realized he never really knew the man – not until he heard his unguarded words. The tongue is the great discloser! That’s Jas’ point as he closes this section. The unguarded tongue reveals who we really are! Full disclosure. It turns us inside out, revealing all. So let’s examine how the tongue reveals us and what to do about it. I. The Telltale Tongue So you go to church. You master the lingo. You look like a true believer. You feel good about yourself and everyone else feels good about you. But are you real? How do you know? 8) but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9) With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God.” How do you know if you’re real or not? The telltale tongue! Listen -- really listen – and you will know. Listen hard! If you find that you talk one way at church and around other Xns, and another way other times, you’ve deceived yourself. The tongue tells. “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” You say, “Well, I never curse people.” Really? Are you sure? Ever use the word “idiot” when someone cuts you off on the freeway? Ever talk about anybody behind their back in a way you never would to their face? Ever? Ever swear at someone under your breath at some perceived wrong? Ever say or think, “Damn you,” to anyone for any reason at any time? Ever speak with venom about someone who differs with you politically? Then you have cursed 1 someone made in the likeness of God – and you can’t make up for that by being sweetness and light at church or with Xn friends. Jas says, “10) From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so.” Why should that not be? Bc it’s a telltale sign of one of two things – either you are not a true believer at all -- self-deceived, or you are not living up to your calling. You are denying with your life the Christ you have professed. Either way, “these things ought not to be so.” The Pharisees claimed to bless God – were, in their minds, the great defenders of God’s Word. Yet when the living Word arrived, they accused Him of blasphemy and crucified Him. Their tongues revealed hearts which were had no relationship with God. We have theologians today who call the teaching that Jesus died for our sins “a form of cosmic child abuse.” They claim a God of love could never do any such thing. But their words deny God’s Word: Rom 5:8: “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Far from child abuse, the cross demos God’s love! But believers can have uncontrolled tongues, too. Peter confessed Jesus was “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Mt 16:16). But hours later he denied with he even knew Jesus. That revealed his cowardice, tho His heart as a true believer was revealed bc Lu 22:62: “He went out and wept bitterly.” But the damage was done. He’d denied the Christ he wanted to serve. John, who advised in I Jn 4:7, “Beloved, let us love one another,” once wanted to call fire down from heaven when some Samaritans rejected Jesus (Lu 9:54). Paul once called the high priest a “whitewashed wall” (Acts 23:3). Their tongues were sometimes out of synch with their true faith. If we sometimes fail, we’re in good company. But they knew “these things ought not to be so” – that they’d misrepresented the Father. They confessed and moved on. J. Vernon McGee worked in a bank while going to school. One day his boss said, “Vernon, I hope you’ll be a genuine servant of God. But the reason I’m not a Xn is when I set up Old Hickory branch outside Nashville, one of the tellers was a soloist at a church I attended.” He told how one Sunday he heard a woman say, “You know, that man is one of the most wonderful men in the world. He sings just like a angel!” He said nothing, but the woman was in the bank to see him on business one day when she overheard some very vile language coming from one of the tellers. He could not balance his accounts and responded with an explosion of profanity. The women said, “Who in the world is that?” The VP responded, “That’s your soloist who sings like an angel on Sunday.” The incident caused him to lose interest in Christ. 2 Could that be you? Who are you, really?! Hang a pretend tape recorder around your neck for a day and play it back that evening and you’ll know. Listen to your telltale tongue; it will tell us all we’re not quite who we’d like to be. II. The True Tongue In contrast to the untamed tongue, the Spirit-controlled tongue will reflect the fruit of the Spirit. 11) Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? 12) Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.” A fig tree doesn’t give olives and a fresh water spring doesn’t give salt water. The internal source determines the outward product. So an unbelieving heart could never produce Spirit-controlled speech. But Jas is addressing believers. So is he teaching sinless perfection? Not at all. But he is saying that to the extent that the tongue is Spirit-controlled, it will produce God-inspired fruit. What is that? Gal 5: 22) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23) gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” You’ll know if your heart is Spirit-controlled by whether or not these things are coming out of your mouth – even toward enemies. Lu 6:27-28: “But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28) bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.” If our tongues were perfectly true and tamed, this is what would be happening. So, why isn’t it? If we claim to be new creations in Christ, why isn’t this always reflected in our speech? Paul tells us. It turns out the HS isn’t the only force at work in us. Gal 5: 17) For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.” Our tongue is not always true because two sources of speech lie within –flesh and Spirit. My words indicate to which I’ve ceded control. Untamed responses show I’ve momentarily yielded control to the old me. The tongue never lies in that regard. Thus every word I speak or even think reflects a heart under the Spirit’s control at that moment or a heart under the control of the flesh. The fresh water of the Spirit cannot spring forth from my tongue when it is tapping into the salt water of the old me. A surgeon takes his car in for repairs. Soon part are strewn all over the shop. A friend comes by, sees all the parts and says, “You know, Doc, sometimes I think this work is as complicated as the work you do.” The surgeon replies, 3 “Maybe -- but let’s see him do his repairs – while the engine is running!” That’s exactly what causes inconsistency in the speech of a believer. The HS has been invited in, and given license to make God-inspired changes. But the believer is a living being who can grab control back at any time. In other words, the HS is operating while the engine is still running, do you see? So how do we cooperate with Him in producing a truly tamed tongue. It’s not easy. Prov 16:32: “Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who take a city.” It’s not easy to tame the tongue. But true believers work at it to bring healing rather than hurt. But how do we do it – tame the tongue – bring it under the Spirit’s control? Three things. III. The Taming of the Tongue A. Acknowledge the Crime – Repentance is part of the lifestyle of those who belong to Christ – and that applies to the tongue. The moment we sense our tongue has betrayed us, we must confess it. It felt so good to set the other person straight, to pass on the juicy bit of gossip, to assassinate an unworthy character, to blast an offending spouse, to defend the violation of my rights, to one-up a fellow-worker. It felt so good. But then the Spirit brings these words to mind: “The tongue of the wise brings healing.” And we’ve been brought up short. Time to submit to the Spirit rather than the flesh. That means confession – first to God. I Jn 1:9: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” That’s the magna carta of the believer. Cleansing thru confession. But that also requires a second act – confession to the one we’ve offended. So hard to do. So painful. But required. Mt 5:23: “So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24) leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” There are a lot of reasons the Lord asks that, but one sure reason is, there’s nothing like the humility of a heartfelt apology to help think twice the next time before we run off at the mouth, right? I saw an interesting sign in a restaurant one time: “Sorry – we’re open!” That didn’t exactly inspire confidence! But having to say to someone, “Sorry, my mouth was open when it should not have been” will indeed invite trust and inspire thinking twice the next time. So the first step to taming the tongue is – Acknowledge the crime. Call it what it is – to God and the one offended. 4 B. Ask for Control – Ask who? God, of course. Pray for help. It’s an admission we can’t do it on our own. We know that by now. How many times have you resolved never to lose your temper again – to count to 10 before you speak – to consider the consequences before you talk? How many resolutions have you broken? So, seek help to control your tongue. God loves to help His children when they acknowledge their need of Him. I realize it’s hard to confess the same offense for the 50th time – that day, and then ask for help. But ask yourself, would the Christ who told Peter he needed to forgive the same sin 70 X 7, would that Christ Himself withhold forgiveness? Would the God who said, “I will forgive their iniquity, and will remember their sin no more” (Jer 31:34), would that God withhold His help? Perhaps we don’t ask because we feel like that’s using God as a crutch. Ted Turner once called Xnty “a religion for losers” -- people who can’t get thru life on their own. But who is the loser: the person who knows he can’t do something on his own and asks for help, or the person who thinks he can do it on his own and keeps failing? When it comes to the tongue, we all need help. The difference is believers have a place to get it! So, ask for help. A few years ago a couple of teen-agers in Detroit discovered a woman unconscious in a phone booth as a result of a heart attack. They carried her to a nearby house and ran the bell, asking for help. The reply – “Get off my porch – and take her with you.” God will never do that. Ask – and keep on asking. C. Act to Correct – So you asked God. Now what? Sit back and wait. Of course, not. It’s always a two-way street, isn’t it? Phil 2:13 told us, “It is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” God is always the ultimate source of victory. But the verse just before that says, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” We can’t ask God for something we won’t to invest in ourselves. Yes, ultimate victory depends on Him. Acknowledge that. But get busy doing what you can. Set up guidelines. Count to 10 before you speak is some of the best advice I ever got. Gives the HS time to impose himself in my thoughts. Memorize Prov 12:18: “There is one whose rash words are like sword thrusts, but the tongue of the wise bring healing.” The Spirit will use that to ask, “Which do you want to be?” Make a study of gracious people and see how they speak. Learn their words and patterns and begin to make them yours. 5 One that helped me more than any other. Anticipate. How often do you find yourself going thru the same old argument with your spouse or kids or someone at work? It’s like déjà vu all over again! But you know the definition of insanity, right? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results? The same applies to words. So replay your repetitive failures. Think ahead of time how you could vary words and tone to get a different outcome. You’ll be amazed how quickly you can change the rut you’re in. Do the same thing every night. As you bed down, replay the day, Repent of the failures and consider what you could have done differently. Act to correct the speech patterns you are asking God to heal in your life. Conc – Okay – we’re at the end of the series. So here’s your tongue assignment. Do the following for the next week. 1. Do not complain or grumble. 2. Do not boast about anything at all. 3. Do not gossip or repeat bad information about someone else – something you wouldn’t want repeated about you. 4. Do not run somebody down, even a little bit. 5. Do not defend or excuse yourself – no matter what. 6. Do always affirm other people. Keep that assignment. “If you can do it for an hour, you’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.” But even if you could do it for an hour, remember, you’re not allowed to boast about it, right? The point of the test is to help us see our failures of heart, to see how hard it is, and to drive us constantly to God for forgiveness, cleansing and change. Words kill. I know a man in his late 70’s who still recalls how his father-inlaw belittled him at a Thanksgiving meal over some little disagreement: “You know, I never had much use for you anyway.” Just words – but never forgotten and still painful. Let’s make ours words of healing, not words of hurt. We all stumble in many ways. Let’s determine with God’s help to stumble a bit less. Let’s pray. 6