James 3:1-12 Taming The Tongue
Notes
Transcript
Opening
Opening
Good morning everyone,
It's great to be here on another Sunday morning with all of you, to worship with you, and enjoy the presence of this family that we have been adopted into.
Let me open us in a brief word of prayer.
[INSERT PRAYER HERE]
We’ll be continuing our reading of James today, this letter from the apostle James to the Jewish Christians of the Dispersion where he calls for his brothers and sisters to live lives according to the faith they profess.
To be more than just believers in name but believers also in their living.
In James’ words, Christians cannot just be hearers of the word of God, you and I must also be doers of the word of God.
Last week, we saw in chapter 2, verses 14 to 26 that it is a living faith that saves.
That a faith which is without works, without any impact on a person’s life, is like trying to live without breathing.
A life that is incomplete, missing an essential aspect, and one that cannot sustain you. It is wrong to live in that way and it is impossible to live that way. The only outcome from a faith without works is death.
And so, James calls for his brothers and sisters to have a complete faith and be complete people. He wants his fellow believers to be perfect, affected in every way by their faith and transformed so that their entire being agrees and works in cohesive wisdom and righteousness.
Towards that end, we are brought to the next part of his letter to his displaced brothers and sisters.
If you have you Bibles with you, I invite you to turn with me to the book of James, its 3rd chapter, verses 1 to 12. Again, James chapter 3, verse 1 to 12. For those of you who do not have a Bible with you, the verses will be on the slides.
1 Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. 2 We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.
3 When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. 4 Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. 5 Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. 6 The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
7 All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, 8 but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
9 With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. 10 Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. 11 Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? 12 My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.
Do you want to be what James calls his brothers and sisters to be? A person who is wise, complete and whole? A person perfected by their faith?
Here, in James chapter 3, verses 1-12, we can see this centrality of the tongue in being perfect.
He starts off this chapter by advising caution when considering a position of teaching among believers.
1 Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. 2 We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.
In speaking about strict judgment, we begin to think about the standard of God. This standard of perfection. And what James states is that among the many ways in which we fail to keep this standard, we most commonly and often fail through what we say.
We are prone to mistakes and one great maker of mistakes is our tongue, to the point where James says that perfection in speech translates to perfection in character.
James draws a correlation between a self-controlled tongue and a self-controlled body.
So you see, the tongue is important! The tongue holds a key place in the direction of your living.
In order to help us understand this, James gives us two illustrations in verses 3 and 4. A horse and a boat.
3 If we put bits into the mouths of horses so that they obey us, we guide their whole bodies as well. 4 Look at the ships also: though they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs.
One is a living creature, the other is a man-made vehicle.
These are large things, horses and boats move with immense power.
Have you ever seen a horse? They're big!
I don’t really know how else to describe them but they are much bigger than I had pictured them to be. When we quantify the strength of modern-day machinery, we use the term horsepower because horses were the measurement of strength. We tell people, this machine has this many horses worth of power.
By using a bit, a metal rod that fits across the inside of a horse’s mouth, people are able to cue and direct horses. A small tug lets the horse know which way it should turn, the bit guides the entire body of the horse.
And it is the same with a boat. We’re given this imagery by James, a large boat driven by strong winds. This boat is able to withstand the force of nature, it harnesses the power of massive air currents to be pushed across the waters.
Yet, using a rudder, a pilot is able to influence and change the direction of that force. The boat is steered by the will of the pilot.
These examples help us understand the effect of words.
The tongue holds a key place in the direction of your living.
It is the means by which even a body of great size is directed and controlled.
It is a small member of the body but it makes great claims which turns the body in unholy and ungodly directions.
5 Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.
The tongue boasts! It makes claims, it oversteps and it speaks in ill ways. We can see in verse 5 through the idea of boasting that this small part of the body is not leading its bearer in good directions, the proper helmsman is not at the wheel of this ship!
Instead of works of mercy and compassion, there is only death and destruction. What a great forest is set on fire by a small spark!
[Pause]
Since earlier this year, since around March and April, wildfires have been consuming Canada. I believe Chicago got a brief taste of the smoke and ash which drifted over from the north.
Now what I read in August was that wildfires had burned up 37.8 million acres of land and something interesting is that a good portion of these are started by dry thunderstorms.
It is lightning produced by the dry environment that sparks these small fires, fires which spreads across the dried out vegetation in the blink of an eye, blazing into massive uncontrollable conflagrations.
They are uncontrollable, they grow faster than they can be put out, destroying and displacing with no regard for anyone.
And James describes the tongue as a fire. Not just an object that steers but also a fire which wreaks havoc on everything around it.
6 The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
Look at that statement in the first sentence of verse 6, the tongue is a world of evil.
The present reality of wrongdoing in this world and all the unrighteousness that occurs finds its representative in the tongue!
The tongue is the part of our bodies which is used by God’s enemy to do harm. James points at it as a manifestation of evil that corrupts the body, the entire body, the part which directs the rest of our body towards a life of evil and destruction.
The tongue is itself set on fire by hell! James looks at the tongue as a power for evil.
Our tongues, holding a key point in the direction of our living, more often than not directs us toward evil!
Have you ever been in a situation where you found yourself processing hurt or anger?
Maybe we find friends or family to vent our thoughts to, maybe we even sit and mutter to ourselves, going over again and again how the offense happened. We work ourselves up into a rage, getting angrier and angrier or more and more upset as we hear our own words. Not just our spoken words but also our thoughts as we revisit them over and over.
And sometimes we even begin to take it out on other people and transgress against our brothers and sisters.
The tongue - our words - influences us, they stain and spread. The tongue corrupts the whole body, causing our hands and feet to stumble.
And there is terrible news beyond this. Look with me to verses 7 to 8:
7 All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, 8 but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
Think about how mankind has transformed all the things around us to suit our purposes, the multitude of animals that have been domesticated for our benefit.
Consider the blessing and command of God to Adam and Eve, to subdue the earth and have dominion over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.
We have dog owners and cat owners, these animals now used to living within human houses.
Our food and clothing comes from cattle, from sheep, from domesticated pigs.
Going even further than just animals, the very land on which we stand has been shaped by man. We’re here in Chicago and this place used to be a swamp.
And yet, even with all this accomplishment and ability, no human being can tame the tongue. While the things that inhabit this earth can be tamed, the tongue cannot be tamed by man.
This is terrible and sobering news.
Instead of us controlling our tongues, our tongues control us. Our tongues don’t just direct us towards evil, they are themselves a restless force of evil that continuously fights to corrupt every part of us.
Our tongues are like poison that infects everything we do and everyone we interact with.
[Pause]
And this is wrong. James makes it clear to you and me that this is not right at all!
The entire letter of James reminds those of us who are believers of Jesus Christ that we are not people of death but people of life!
Living children of God with a living faith who are called to both hearers and doers of the word of God.
In verse 9, we are presented with this reality of what comes out of the mouths of man.
With the tongue, we praise our Lord and Father. With the tongue, we curse human beings who have been made in God’s likeness. These are contrary actions, praises and curses strive toward separate purposes and, not only this, the curses are directed at those who are made in God’s likeness.
These are people who are the image of God, a faint reflection of the one with infinite worth who is worthy of all praise.
Curses against these human beings made in God’s likeness slander the very God who was just being praised!
And these come out of the same mouth, the mouth of supposed living children of God with living faiths. This should not be!
James, in his usual fashion, asks rhetorical questions again. Look with me to verses 11 and 12.
11 Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? 12 My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.
Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?
The implied answer and obvious answer is NO!
One, when drank, will satisfy thirst and the other will deepen thirst. These are different waters, they are not the same!
Can a fig tree bear olives or a grapevine bear figs? Again, the answer is no! This does not happen.
To borrow a line from one of my classmates, we are proved through what we produce!
Fig trees, being fig trees, bear figs while olive trees bear olives. They are not the same plant!
The same with a grapevine, grapevines produce grapes because they are grapevines. They bear their corresponding fruit.
And why are both praise and cursing flowing from the same source? How can both death and life be produced by the same tongue? What does that prove about the one who is speaking?
It is wrong. It should not be and it must not be any longer.
You and I are living children of God with living faith, words of evil and death have no place coming from us.
[Pause]
So then, knowing the tongue holds a key place in the direction of our living, that our tongues direct us toward evil, and that children of God should not be guided by or speak evil, what should we do?
Is the solution to work hard to control out tongues? Is it to, from this point on, put all our effort into gaining control over our words?
Obviously not, look back to verse 8, no human power can tame the tongue. It doesn’t matter how much effort you put in, you cannot force freshwater to flow out of a saltwater spring!
[Pause]
So what is the solution then?
Do you want to be a person who is wise, complete and whole? A person who is directed by righteousness rather than an evil tongue?
Then position yourself to be shaped and led by the words of God rather than the words of man.
Because it is not a word of life that comes out of you which transforms you.
It is words of life that are given to you which transforms you.
And God has given you his word to transform you!
James himself pulls from the wisdom literature of Psalms and Proverbs!
Here is an example. Look with me to the book of Psalms, chapter 1, verses 1 to 3. It will be up on the screen as well.
1 Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.
This person who resists evil and flourishes like a tree planted by streams of water, they do so by meditating on the word of God day and night.
Do you know what it means to meditate?
This is not the concept of clearing your mind.
You are not emptying, you are filling your mind. To meditate is to mutter, to murmur to yourself and speak the word of God as you read over and over.
It is not just a mental effort, it is this engaging of your person. It is an exercise of your lips, your tongue, your teeth. To meditate is to engage fully and to truly take in the word of God.
[Pause]
This person described here who is blessed? Who does not walk in ways of sin, is not directed by evil and instead meditates on God’s law day and night? This is Jesus!
Meditate on God’s word just as Jesus does.
This is not new, this is the same truth over and over again in this letter of James to his brothers and sisters.
Our actions and our behaviors are not the reason, they are the result. In chapter 3, James calls for believers to correctly display the state of their hearts through what they say.
Allow the word of God to direct the way in which you speak, be a diligent hearer of the word of God so that you become a diligent doer of the word of God.
And by doing so, do not prove a bitter and critical heart through bitter and critical words. Prove to be a living child of God with a living faith through living words.
Let me close us in a word of prayer.
[INSERT PRAYER HERE]
Citation
Citation
Davids, Peter H. The Epistle of James: A Commentary on the Greek Text. New International Greek Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1982.
Moo, Douglas J. The Letter of James. The Pillar New Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos, 2000.
Motyer, J. A. The Message of James: The Tests of Faith. The Bible Speaks Today. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1985.
The New International Version. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011.