Watch What You Say

Introduction:

Tongue twisters are a fun way to see how clever you are with using your words. Most of you probably know the ones like:

“Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”

These are actually great exercises for building up your enunciation. It’s also a great way to work out your brain.

We often have to slow down our minds and think more clearly about what we say when we are trying to go fast with a tongue twister.

This is a good thing! We need to be more careful in what we say as Christians. Once you say something, you can never take it back. It’s out there permanently and the damage is done.

This month we are focusing on starting out the new year and becoming the person God created us to be. This may mean starting some new habits or stopping some bad ones we have. It may even mean finding new life in Jesus if you don’t know Him as your Lord and Savior.

So in this new year, one goal every one of us should have is to watch what we say. Let’s use our words to honor Christ and spread the message of hope and the gospel.

We can learn a lot about how to do this from the Apostle Paul in his letter to Colossae. Let’s turn this morning to Colossians 4 and take a look.

Colossians 4:6 ESV

6 Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

Pray.

Now, Paul is writing to the church in Colossae that was experiencing some false teachers that were trying to sway the congregation. Many scholars believe that the particular heresy that they were engaging in was a type of magic religion with a shaman-like figure who was using some forms of Jewish legalism mixed with rituals and incantations to try to protect the people from evil spirits.

Paul wrote the letter around AD62 while he was imprisoned and he is adamant in this letter that no one preach another gospel than the one that had been given. In fact, the use of words plays a major role in the letter.

Paul closes out the letter with our chapter this morning encouraging the readers to use their words carefully to help encourage one another and advance the true gospel of Jesus Christ.

So this morning as we learn from Paul, we want to see three ways we can watch what we say.

Be gracious with our words.

Be helpful with our words

Be thoughtful with our words

1. Be Gracious

Colossians 3:16 ESV

16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

2. Be Helpful

Mark 9:50 ESV

50 Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

Matthew 5:13 ESV

13 “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.

3. Be Thoughtful

Let the words that we say be fitting for the occasions and help spread the gospel.

Proverbs 25:11 ESV

11 A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver.

No only are we to use our words carefully in the proper moment, but also we need to be clear in what we say, especially about the gospel

1 Peter 3:15 ESV

15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

Conclusion

The warning that Paul gives us is consistent with the warning that James gives us as well. He says,

James 3:5–12 ESV

5 So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell. 7 For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind, 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. 10 From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. 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.

Did you catch what he says there about the springs?

If our words are not seasoned with grace and they are not wholesome, what kind of spring are they coming from?

This morning, you are either a good spring or a bad one. You are either a good tree bearing fruit or your producing thorns.

The difference has nothing to do with your effort, but rather your heart.

You see a spring bubbles up from a source. The water in its pool comes out of the ground from that source. You can clean the pool out and try to start over again, but the pool is just going to get bitter again, because the source is bitter.

You can prune a bad tree, but if there is something wrong with the roots, it is still going to be a bad tree.

We have to fix the heart of the problem. The thing is, you can’t fix the heart on your own. You need Jesus to do that with a heart transplant. You need Jesus to take your old man and crucify it with him on the cross and you need to be raised to walk as a new man with His resurrection.

Jesus died on the cross to change our hearts and roots. He died to make us a new creation in Him, because sin has so affected us that every part of us is evil.

You and I are separated from God because of our sin and bound for Hell, but Jesus can correct your course and give you a new destination. You simply must come to Him by faith and let Him change you on the journey towards Heaven.

The invitation for you this morning is to come to Jesus and be saved. It’s to come to Him and be changed. Let him change your heart, your words, your actions. All these things can happen if you will trust in Christ today.