Sermon Tone Analysis

Tear Them Down With Words

James 3

Hello, students!

It is great to see you again.

Hopefully you liked what we talked about last week—about the need to get rid of friends—and have tried to put in to affect the art of being an uncommitted friend.

However, if your pals are just too dimwitted to notice that you have been trying to ignore them, you may need to take it up a notch.

So, if you have acquaintances that keep coming around despite your best efforts to be scarce, then you need to listen up, as tonight we are going to share with you our second step to being a bad friend and getting them to leave.

TEAR THEM DOWN WITH YOUR WORDS.

If they are going to insist on being around you, then make their time one of misery.

Let your words be so hurtful to them that they second-guess their decision to consider you a friend.

What do I mean by this?

Well, let’s take another look at this old book of wisdom from the Bible called Proverbs.

(NIV)

A perverse person stirs up conflict, and a gossip separates close friends.

If you continued to read the book of Proverbs, you would hear time and time again of the wicked capabilities that it says the untamed tongue can possess, but this one verse sparks the imagination to several ways one can cause drama amongst one’s peers.

I can’t tell you of the number of friendships I’ve seen turn sour (both in person and online), because people were careless with their words.

It doesn’t matter if you’ve just got a filthy mouth constantly toward someone, or you just let one juicy story out that you were entrusted with … you can be sure that it will cause problems.

In fact, it will cause more than just problems, it can cause pain.

Look what Proverbs says earlier.

(NIV)

The words of the reckless pierce like swords.

Pain can be a great reason for someone to leave a relationship, and it can come in a variety of ways, including physical, which I would not suggest since that is quite likely to get you in legal trouble.

So, if you are taking notes, we are going to look at three verbal ways …

TO BE A BAD FRIEND, AND TEAR THEM DOWN!

1.) BE JUST PLAIN MEAN.

The easiest thing to do is to call them names.

They can be generic, rude things (dork, freak, loser), or you can play them off of personal details.

If they just missed a game winning free-throw, call them something like “Dead Shot,” or if some girl quickly dates a boy after breaking up with some other guy, call her a “floozy.”

Don’t be afraid of the more explicit ones, either.

If you can’t come up with clever names, I encourage you to insult them directly.

Just mock their features and failures.

Let them know that you disapprove without a doubt.

Also, make sure that they know that you are far better than them in every way they have failed or not measured up.

Saying things like, “Wow, you failed that assignment?

What a moron!

I didn’t even try on that one and got an A,” covers all the bases to make a grand slam of an insult.

If possible, when undermining them, try to do it in front of others.

This one is great if you can’t come up with anything bad on them, because you can just speak badly to them.

When in group conversations or settings, always find a way to cut them off or make an excuse for why they are not worthy of saying anything relevant.

If they are talking about something with the group say, “This is boring,” and change the topic to something you deem more interesting.

If it is something interesting, they can still be wrong about it, so tell some good reason to the group why he or she doesn’t know what they are talking about, even if it’s just, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve heard, you don’t know what you’re talking about!”

2.) EXPOSE UNNESSESARY PERSONAL INFO.

There is a pretty easy model to follow with this step.

Simply take any non-public knowledge that would embarrass or make others think less of them, and share it openly.

This could be things said to you in confidence, like crushes, worst fears, and family drama.

It could also include things they’ve gone through.

Perhaps how they cried when they heard that their crush liked someone else, or that they wet the bed at a sleepover in the first grade.

Once you have picked out your juicy tidbit, just bring it up for no good reason at all (other than to try to gain everyone’s attention).

It also helps if after you’ve shared it with one person, you to go ahead and continue to share it with others.

After all, there is no harm, since it’s no longer a secret, and it will ensure that your soon to be ex-best friend knows that it was you who shared their dark secret with everyone else.

3).

WHEN IN DOUBT LIE, LIE, LIE.

If they are boring, or just haven’t trusted you with any secrets, it doesn’t mean you can’t make up some.

Try and make them believable, yet still surprising.

I suggest spinning facts that you do know.

Here are a few examples of what you can do:

· Is their parent easily upset?

Say something like, “I’m pretty sure their dad has an anger problem or something.”

· Is their parent easily upset?

Say something like, “I’m pretty sure their dad has an anger problem or something.”

· Is their parent easily upset?

Say something like, “I’m pretty sure their dad has an anger problem or something.”

· Did they get called to the office mysteriously?

Tell the kids in your row that you heard he is getting screened for a drug test.

· Did they get called to the office mysteriously?

Tell the kids in your row that you heard he is getting screened for a drug test.

· If they have been dating someone and are gone from school for a few days, tell everyone, “You know she must be pregnant.”

· If they have been dating someone and are gone from school for a few days, tell everyone, “You know she must be pregnant.”

The more outlandish it is, the better it will sever your relationship, because it will cause more pain thus driving them further from you.

BECAUSE THAT IS THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT FRIENDS DO …

[BREAK SARCASM]

Again, we find ourselves in some pretty gruesome situations, pretty easily, because it is easy to be a bad friend.

In fact, words make it really easy to be an enemy.

Our words sometimes cut the deepest, and while our “friends” my laugh, and brush it off, deep down they are hurting by your words.

Or maybe you have friends— and sometimes things they say hit to close to home, you know what I am talking about, it is that moment that they say something and it hits like a ton of bricks, you get quite, maybe give off that shy smile because you don’t want them to know they hurt you, because it is like shark when it smells blood, it will attack you even more.

We know what it is like to be hurt by words and we know what it is like to hurt others by our words.

We understand this, and so does James, he got this too.

In the book of James we look to it as the book about Christian living.

James hits so many things right on the head and one of those is how do we speak, how do we control our tongue.

If you have your Bible flip open to we will start in verse 2.

James 3:2-

We are all guilty

James 3:2-

We all stumble, we all cannot be perfect.

Actually you see no one is perfect, expect Jesus, I hope that we can all agree on that one, that Jesus lived a perfect life.

Guess what you are not Jesus, you stumble.

Stop thinking you are free from sin because you ain’t!

Because if you were, you would be able to control your tongue, that is what James is getting at here.

If you were perfect this would not be an issues, but since it is, Jame is now going to highlight how tricky the tongue is.

But James in not taking about perfect that no one can match, but James is really getting at the speech side of things.

You see believe it or not it was of high virtue for someone to say as little as possible.

It showed maturity, it showed that you were able to control your tongue and your whole body.

But since I believe that we all are not mature in what we say, I think it is pretty easy to say, we are not perfect, i struggle with my words, as I am sure you do as well.

But just because we are all guilty does not mean that we chalk that up and say oh well, what you get is what you get.

As we draw near to Jesus and our faith continues to grow in this area of our life we should also see growth in controlling our tongue.

You see the your words direct much of your life, James is comparing this big creature a horse that is controlled by a bit that as the person on the horse you can tell the horse where to go with just a little pull on the reigns.

James goes on to describe how being on a boat the boat is controlled by a small rudder.

Something so small in contrast to the big ship has such a critical role.

My brother and I use to fight all the time and every once in a whole we would fish hook each other.

Fish hooking is when you literally put your finger in their mouth and pull on their check, while yes gross but super effective, because you now have control over your opponent.

I thought it was a great trick until the day Matt fished hooked me, I did not like not having control of my head, it hurt, it was painful, He controlled my direction.