James Session 8

Tom Shrader teaches through James 3:1-12, focusing on the power and danger of the tongue. He emphasizes that the tongue reveals what is truly in our hearts, using James's illustrations of horses, ships, and fire to show both the controlling power and destructive potential of our words. Shrader challenges believers to examine their speech patterns, particularly warning against gossip and encouraging words, as our tongues demonstrate whether our faith is genuine.

“The tongue is revealing what's in there - when we're dealing with these, so often in a marriage they'll say, we just don't communicate, but I find they're communicating really well, the problem is their heart.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: James (2009)

Recorded: 2009 at Cannon Beach Conference Center

Duration: 56 min

Themes: tongue, speech, words, gossip, encouragement, faith, heart, control, struggling with gossip, new believer, mentor, pastor, parent, navigating conflict, young adult, feeling convicted

Scripture: James 3:1-12, James 1:26, James 2:21-23, Exodus 20:3-5, Proverbs 18:21, Proverbs 25:18, Isaiah 6, Genesis 22, 1 Timothy 2:15, Acts 20:27

Theological Themes: sanctification, spiritual maturity, biblical authority, faith and works, heart condition, christian living, practical theology, spiritual discipline

Full Transcript

Well good evening, great to see you all. You get a kick out of this. It was so hot in here last night, I thought, well I'm going to wear short sleeves tonight. And then we went and we ate out, you know, over on the beach-ish area there. And I'm freezing, so I text, let's see if I can get this. So Susan and I are there, and I'm heading over, I'm just shaking. So I text Susan, I said, I'm freezing, will you bring my white jacket that's hanging by the door, thank you. Here's what she texts back, you need any notes? Ha ha ha. I never liked her from the beginning.

So, I got notes, man. That's the last thing I did. That's never happened to me, ever in my life. And then it happens two times in a row, it's unbelievable. So, you know, whatever, God is good. What I would love is, we just closed, and I know it's a bit of an audible, and I saw Chris leave. I don't know if Chris is coming back, is he coming back? He took off, you know, and I'm telling if there's anybody that needs this lesson tonight, it's him. And I see him going out, it's on the tongue, you'd think he'd want to hang around and hear this.

Tonight's Focus on the Tongue

I would love, since it's about the tongue, and we're going to talk about using our tongue, if we could call an audible, how can I keep from praising your name, that song, I love that song. So, who's ever back, can we just do it that way, Evan, is that alright? To close, when we close tonight? Yeah, let's do that. It's going to be, the transition will be a little rough, because they have no idea. But we're just singing that song, and I'm thinking, we're going to talk about the tongue, and, you know, if Chris is here, fine, or whoever's here, we'll get it close enough. And the key is to hear those words, and we'll pull them back up on the computer.

But James chapter 3 is where we're going to be. We'll finish up, we took a little run at chapter 2, we did the best we could. We are reminded that, and again, I want to thank the staff, a bunch of staff here tonight, and thank you all for being here, it was fun to be with you the other night, and to have you here again tonight is significant to me, so thanks.

The Question That Drives Our Study

James posed a question that started our whole discussion this morning, He said, What use is it, my brethren, if a man says he has faith, but he doesn't have any works? And throws us right back into the discussion that began this book, which is James is not writing a treatise on how to come into the kingdom of God. What James is saying is, because you're in the kingdom of God, now there should be a life change.

And He gave us a practical example that all of us could relate to. You've got a brother in need, and you say, hey, I'll pray for you. Well, the reality is you didn't do anything for him, praying is huge, but you had a need there that was able to meet, and you didn't meet it.

Abraham's Example in Reverse Order

And then He said, how about Abraham? And He gave us an example of Abraham. And if you look at verses 21, 2, and 3, and if we took the time, which we could have done this morning, but we cannot tonight, you'd see that what James has done there is put these in reverse chronological order. Verse 23, in chronology of the story of Abraham's life, precedes verse 22, and the conclusion is in verse 21.

So the call came to Abram to go. Go to this far land. He did. As he is wandering, God appears to Him and says, you're going to have descendants, and they're going to be as plentiful as the dust, the sand. He appears again and says, they're going to be as plentiful as the stars in the sky.

And then there's a period of time, and Abraham, at least in my mind, understandably says, hey, you know, I'll take this into my own hands. Sarah encourages it. He is with Hagar. The result of this is Ishmael, and then God comes and says, no, that's not it. There is this one, this promised one, promise will be fulfilled through this one, and His name, His only son will be Isaac.

The Ultimate Test

And after a period of time, and we said this morning, we really don't know. I've read kind of scholars, I am not one, that say that the time frame kind of between his birth and the time that we get to Genesis 22 could be 14 years, it could be 20 years, and you could move out from that. But we split the difference and say, let's say Isaac's 17, Abraham's 117, and he's told to go and to sacrifice him.

Now, if I were to fast forward that, which we did not do this morning, and apply this to our life, we would say, take a look at our own life. What are the things in our life that are standing between us and a vibrant relationship with God? God is saying to Abraham, are you willing to give Me your most prized possession? That's really important. What are those things in your life? We call them idols.

When Good Things Become Idols

They can be really good things. They can be good things that have gone really amok. I know guys for whom Bible study has become an idol. I've been a Christian, I'm going to say two or three years, and I came home one night, and Susan said, I came home from a Bible study, and Susan said, I'm really glad that you're into this. I'm really glad that you're not drinking and partying and messing around like you used to. But you go to a Bible study on Tuesday morning, and a Bible study on Wednesday morning, and a Bible study on Thursday morning, and a Bible study on Thursday night, you're in these Bible studies all the time. Though you're not out partying, it's functionally the same. You've got a wife and kids here.

You see why she has no friends, don't you? I mean, this is the way this woman is. Text messages like this, in my grill all the time. Well, she was right. It was a wake-up call. I had to go, oh, yeah, and I started readjusting my schedule. So what I would do is I would do all my Bible study stuff with people, like at 4:30 in the morning, 5:00 in the morning, 6:00 in the morning, but I always made sure I was there at night. So it can be a really good thing. What is that thing?

Hey, everybody, Chris is back. Welcome Chris back, would you? Chris is in the house. We're excited. I know you're

God wants nothing standing between you and Him. It's an idol. Remember what Calvin said? Our hearts are idol factories. We are instinctively idol worshipers. We want more to know about God than to know Him. And He is a jealous God.

If you were to turn back to the book of Exodus and the 20th chapter, what's happening here is God has given Moses the Ten Commandments. And He starts this way. God speaks, "I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Remember that? I'm the one who brought you out of the house of slavery. Remember that? And you shall have no other gods before Me."

The Power of Remembrance

He reminds them. That memory is a big thing. At our church, and I realize not every church does this, but in our church, every Sunday we take communion together. And it's just something we've done, and I'm not judging anybody else. I'm just saying it's something we do. We think it's really important for us.

Well, the key word for us at communion is what? Remember. "Do this in remembrance of Me." So when we get to the communion table, I'm constantly pointing out to them, for communion there is a past, present, and future aspect. So I remember what Christ did. "This is My body. This is My blood shed for you. Do this in remembrance of Me."

But that communion has a present value to it as well. I'm His kid, filled with His Spirit today. There's a present reality of Christ in my life today. But there's also the future component. There's that point in time, not long from now. Don't know when it is. Somewhere. When I will leave this earth and be with Him.

God's Exclusive Claim on Our Hearts

Remember that. This is what He's saying here to the nation of Israel already. "Remember, I'm the one who brought you out of Egypt. I'm the one who parted the Red Sea. I'm the one who took you out of the house of slavery. I'm the one. I did all that, and I want to make sure," Exodus 20:3, "that you have no other gods."

"You shall not make an idol for yourself for a likeness of what is in heaven above or the earth below. You shall not serve them or worship them, for I am the Lord your God." And here's an attribute of God we don't think of often, "and I'm a jealous God."

When I hear jealous, I think of it in a typically human way. So I mentioned to you, I think it was the first night, I'm just doing a little bit of a mini-testimony, that I met Susan when she moved into the apartment next to me. So she's in apartment 201, and then there's this rec room between us, and I'm in apartment 202.

Understanding God's Jealousy

Well, after a period of time, we end up dating. And we started going out on a fairly regular basis. She was working in a business, and the guy who owned the business had a son, and this son started dating her, too. So she was dating both of us. And I just wasn't secure enough for that. I think it might, maybe, I don't know. I think it would be different now, but I certainly wasn't then. And I couldn't handle it.

And this guy had more money than me, and he went to, I think he did his undergraduate work at Notre Dame and his graduate work at USC, so he's a loser. And I cheated to get out of St. Ambrose, so I'm losing on several counts. So I went to her one day, and I said, "Look, it's either him or me. It's either him or me right now."

And she said, "Tom, that's just not fair. I don't think you should do that. I don't think that's fair." I said, "Well, I don't know if it's fair or not, but I can't handle it. It's either him or me." So we were out. As I remember, it was a Sunday night and not going very well, and I'm saying, you've got to figure this out.

The Outcome of an Ultimatum

And she said, "All right, I'll make a decision tonight." I said, "Okay." So I come home the next day from work, and the loser's car is parked out in front of her apartment. It's like 5 o'clock. So I'm thinking, oh, well, she's over there telling the guy to take a hike. That's perfect.

Well, then it's like 5:15, 5:30, 5:45, 6 o'clock. How long can it take to say, "Hey, I don't want to see you anymore?" 6:15, 6:30. I'm thinking, wow. And at my door, bell rings. Ding, ding. And I go to the door, and there she is, dressed in this little red and white check thing that she had, this little one-piece thing she used to wear with jeans.

Then I said, "How are you doing?" And she said, "I talked to him tonight." I said, "Really? Hmm." And she said, "I told him that I didn't want to go out with him, that I was going to go out just with you." And I said, "Well, who didn't know that?" No. But everything in me at that moment was filled with jealousy.

The Difference Between Human and Divine Jealousy

When you hear jealousy, that's what you think of, isn't it? So now you go, God's a jealous God. Was He like that? No. See, what I wanted was not what was best for Susan. Probably, in all fairness, at that point in time, not knowing how life was going to end, at that point in time, her being with him was probably way better for her than being with me. God intervened, I think, and put us together, and God used us in an incredible way, and I loved that togetherness.

But I wanted not what was best for Susan, but what I thought was best for me. God wants what's best for you, and He's jealous. Because for you to mess around with any other guy, that's not good for you. In fact, that's what's worse for you.

The Call to Examine Our Hearts

He makes the point a little bit later in our study, and we'll look at it on probably Thursday, that He says in chapter 4, verse 4, "You are adulterous." Well, who's the adulterous? The one who makes a friend of the world. God is a jealous God.

So you need to do business. I can't look into your heart and figure this out for you. You've got to figure this out. What are the idols in your life? Is it just reputation? Is it the insecurity that says I need to be liked? Is it a person, a place, or a thing? What is it? Because God wants to take that away, at least in its place, and

The Teacher's Greater Responsibility

Put it in its proper perspective. Now we get to the point where He's done with all these things. He's been talking about what we've been talking about for five or six sessions, and he gets to chapter 3. In verses 1 through 12, he deals with the tongue. So we're going to spend our entire time on this.

He says, "Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we incur a stricter judgment. For we all stumble in many ways, and if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he's a perfect man, able to bridle his whole body as well." James has already warned them in chapter 1, verse 26, that if anybody thinks he's religious and he doesn't bridle his tongue, he deceives himself. James comes back again and again to the idea of the tongue.

It's not the speech itself. The premise is this: the tongue reveals what's in our heart. He speaks, I think appropriately enough, with the person who's doing the most talking, and that's the person in the front. "Let not many of you become teachers." Why? "You know that as such you incur a stricter judgment."

Paul writes to Timothy and tells him that we need to present ourselves approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed of accurately handling the Word of God. He says, watch out as teachers, not just for the tongue that you use and how often you use your tongue, but for what you say.

The Whole Counsel of God

Acts 20, Paul is saying goodbye to the elders of his favorite church, the church at Ephesus. There's this wonderful, intimate moment. They're hugging, they're crying, they're weeping. Well, right before that, Paul says to them, "When I was with you, I did not shrink from preaching the entire Word of God." He says it this way: "the whole counsel of God."

I'll get this question all the time because I do studies out in the marketplace. So it's not unusual for me to be dealing with people who haven't been around church or they're very unhappy in their church. They'll come to me and say, "I'm looking for a good church. What would you suggest?"

Well, I'll always say to them, "Where do you live?" You need to understand that if this screen represents Phoenix, East Valley Bible Church is way down here. If they live down here, I'm going to say to them, "You ought to try our church. It's not a perfect church, but it's a good church."

Here's a great lie. This is a lie we say. We say this a lot: "Oh, there's a lot of good churches." There aren't a lot of good churches. There's a lot of lousy churches. There's a lot of churches that aren't too bad. There aren't many good churches.

What Makes a Good Church

They'll ask, "What should I look for in a church?" I'll say, "What are you concerned about?" They'll say, "Well, I want them to meet my needs. I want to make sure that it's accessible. It's good ingress, egress. The people are friendly." I said, "You don't need a church. You just go to Nordstrom's. They do all that. That's what Nordstrom's does."

By the way, I don't know if you saw today, record heat in Seattle. Did you see that today? Highest temperature ever, 102. We call that cooling down where I come from, but 102, and we're here, and it's 65 or something. But that's what Nordstrom's does. "I want people that just talk to me and understand me." Join the Elks. I mean, there's something different about a church.

Now, we should have all of those things, but that's not the most important thing, is it? What I want first and foremost is a place that teaches the Word of God.

Methods of Teaching Scripture

There's a variety of ways to do that. I happen to be, by and large, a chapter by chapter, verse by verse guy. That's just me, and I'm convinced it's just because when I was saved, that's the kind of people I was around, and that's how we did it.

Somebody will ask, "Well, can I teach topically?" Sure. There's no problem with teaching topically. I mean, let it come from the Scripture. I'm okay with that. The tension with topical teaching is you get to pick and choose, and you'll tend to pick and choose and skip the hard parts. When you teach through a book, you got to do it all. When I'm teaching through 1 and 2 Corinthians, I got to talk about head covers. Well, I would never pick that in a topical study. So you got to deal with all of those things.

But here's the thing, first and foremost: that they teach the Word of God, that they teach the whole counsel of God.

Spotting False Teachers

We made this point to you already, but let me drive it home again. It's very easy to spot the adder-toers. So He says, don't add to or take away. The adder-toers are easy to spot. When they run an ad and say, "You got a Bible, but you need this book," the minute you see that, then you go, "Oh, there's an adder-toer." The minute the guy starts to go through all these gymnastics, trying to somehow explain away that this doesn't really say what it really says, that's an adder-toer.

The takers-away-ers are hard to spot because they just skip these big sections. I was in a church one time where the teacher was known as a chapter-by-chapter, verse-by-verse guy. That's the reason I went there. I just left another church, and I was trying to find a church that taught the Bible.

I happened to get there when he was starting the book of Ephesians. So he gets into Ephesians 1, and he starts and does, "an apostle, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." Okay, I'm down with that. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." All right, whatever. "Who chose us in Him before the foundations of the earth. Who predestined us." Hmm, my ears perk up.

What he says? He says this first chapter, it's divided a lot of churches and a lot of places, so we're going to kind of skip over some of that. Skip over it? Why aren't we skipping it? I don't care if it divides people. The Word of God divides. I'm not hard-line. I'm just saying at least give it your best shot. I'm not asking you to really do a great job with it, but to say we just skip over it? He chooses us before the foundations of the earth? That must mean something. He's predestined us? That must mean something. Well, it divides people. Well, you want the whole counsel of God.

So I've met some pastors here this week, and again, the studies I do in the week, I have a lot of pastors who come, and we actually have a lot of pastors who come to our church on Sunday night, and they will say we come here to get fed, and by that we mean we need to be fed, and so we love to come here, and it's just great. I love that.

The Serious Responsibility of Teachers

But I want you to get, when we look at James, there's a solemn warning to us. If you're teaching a precepts class, you're teaching a Sunday school class, you're up front taking the Word of God. He's not just talking about guys that are speaking at Cannon Beach, or the guys that are in the pulpit at your church. If you're a teacher, you better get it right.

Now, do I always get it right? Of course not. I know some of what I teach is wrong. Well, stop it. Well, I don't know what part is wrong. If I knew what part is wrong, I wouldn't teach it. But I'm sure there's things that I don't get right. I miss a nuance, or maybe I miss a great big thing. But understand the weight of this. Understand that when you teach in your church, there is a judgment, a strict judgment. There's a standard there.

Not just how you teach. I personally think it is so wrong to teach the Word of God and be boring. I don't understand how you can say, here's the owner's manual to life, here's everything you need for life, and make it boring. But even boring is okay if you get it right. It's an awesome responsibility.

The Tongue Reveals Our Imperfection

But He drives home the point, and He says in verse 2, for we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he's a perfect man. Again, the idea there is complete maturity. Here's what we're understanding. The tongue, and I'm not sure we get it this way, is a source of great temptation and sin. Proverbs 18, verse 21, life and death is in the tongue.

To kind of support this from a secular view, Benjamin Franklin said, from a slip of the foot you may recover, but from a slip of the tongue you may never recover. Think about the scope and the magnitude and potential of sin with the tongue. If you were to live to be roughly 70-ish, and if you were to sin once a day using your tongue, on average, it depends on the person, but on average we speak somewhere around 15,000 to 30,000 words a day. If you were to, in those, again, split the difference, 22,000 words you speak today, if you were to sin once a day, and I'm over quota, if you were to sin once a day, every day of your life, with your tongue, that's 25,550 sins.

That's what I mean. We have no sense of sin. We categorize it in a few of these big things, and then, outside of that, we just say boys will be boys, girls will be girls. That's just the way it is.

The Problem of Gossip in the Church

And, I'll tell you, I've got a few issues. I've got pet peeves. Here's my pet peeve. I've never been around a joint that gossips and talks more than the church. It makes me puke. It makes me sick to have somebody come up to me and say, I told them, I promise I wouldn't tell anybody, but I'm going to tell you. Note to self, don't tell them anything. I know I probably shouldn't say this to you, but you'll want to pray about it. No, if you know you shouldn't say it, don't say it.

I've got a million weaknesses, but I've got some strengths. Here's one of them. You can tell me something, it's in the vault, it's locked, and it wouldn't come out in a million years. I can't stand gossip. And here's why. I think it's as destructive to the church as any sin we know.

J. Vernon McGee used to say, righty old frown, I think the church is in more danger from the termites within than the woodpeckers without. Well, that's what he's saying. And we talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. And He's saying watch out.

What Our Words Reveal About Us

Somebody said it this way. Great minds discuss great ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.

In Isaiah 6, we made reference to it this morning. When Isaiah saw the Lord, His first response was, Woe to me, for I'm undone, because I'm a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips. What he's not saying is that their lips are dirty. He's not talking about hygiene. He's saying what's coming out of my mouth is what's in my heart. It's my heart that's despicable. It's my heart that's wrong. That's why the tongue is so important. The tongue is revealing what's in there.

I said it to you again before. When we're dealing with these, so often in a marriage they'll say, we just don't communicate. Well, I find they're communicating really well. She thinks he's a jerk. He thinks she's a witch. And they both get the idea. I think they've communicated really well. The problem is their heart.

You make me so mad. No, not really. I'm like a giant mirror, sweetheart. I just hold up what's already in there. That's how ugly you are on the inside. And the only way I'd know it is your tongue. You start yapping, and what comes out of your mouth is what's in your heart.

Personal Examples

So I don't have any problem. Again, I'm a little different. Like my daughters called me most of the time Tom. Even when they were little kids, they'd say Tom. And I had no problem. I liked that myself. And whenever they'd say dad or daddy, I knew it was going to be a different moment. So when we had grandkids, and again, you just learn. I had all these people ask me the same question, and I'd never thought about it.

My girls called me by my first name, and when I became a grandfather, I thought it would be cool if the grandkids called me Tom too. But my daughters said no, they didn't think that was right. I said that seemed hypocritical since it was okay for them but not for their kids. They settled on Papa, which is fine, though if you say Tom, I'm the only one coming.

I have an issue with being called "Pastor Tom." I'm purposeful about this because when you call me Pastor Tom, it creates a distinction between you and me. We're all in full-time ministry, and I don't want that separation. I don't call you Insurance Agent Bob, Car Salesman Fred, or Stay-at-Home Mom Barbara. It's just a personal preference of mine. When you use that title, it feels like it separates us, but I'm just like you and we're all ministering together.

You can almost tell whether kids go to public school or not by how they address adults. Some say "Hello, Mr. Schrader" or "Hello, Pastor Schrader," which is nice, but there's a little Eddie Haskell in all of them. I don't really care what they call me, though the parents do care. If you want your child to call me Pastor Tom or Mr. Schrader, I'm fine with that.

But when I hear a kid mouthing off, especially when they're in junior high or high school, and I catch just a snippet of their conversation as I walk by, what I love is not the information itself but the glimpse it gives me into their heart.

The Power of Small Things

James gives us three illustrations about the tongue - two constructive and one destructive. He uses the examples of a horse, a ship, and a fire. "Now if we put a bit into the horse's mouth so that they will obey us, we direct the entire body as well. Behold, a ship also, though it is so great, it's driven by strong winds, it's still directed by a very small rudder wherever the inclination of the pilot desires. So also the tongue is a small part of the body, yet boasts great things. Behold how great a forest is set aflame by a small fire. And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity, the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body and sets on fire the course of our lives, set on fire by hell."

I have to tell you, I'm not a horseman. In 1986 or 1987, I nearly lost my life in what is a riveting story, but I don't have time to tell it. Let's just say I was riding a horse at a dude ranch. We got there early and the guy said we were going for a ride. I headed for the Jeep, but he said no, we were taking horses.

I told him I'd never ridden a horse, and he laughed. I'll be even more honest - this was the first time I'd ever seen a horse that didn't have a number on it. That's my background with horses. So I got on the horse, and he explained that if you pull left, it goes left; pull right, it goes right; pull back, it stops and moves backward. This led to me being within inches of certain death, but we don't have time for that story.

The Example of Secretariat

The point is, here's this massive horse, and with just a bit in its mouth, I theoretically had the ability to control it - and someone who knows what they're doing actually does control it.

There are four things I've seen in my life that I'll never see again. You'll never see a band like the Beatles, never see a dynasty like UCLA basketball, never see a fighter and personality like Muhammad Ali, and you're never going to see a horse like Secretariat.

Secretariat was just unbelievable. He won the Triple Crown essentially with track records at all three places. There was a timing malfunction in one of them that they went back and clarified, though they still argue about it. But coming up to the Kentucky Derby, Secretariat ran in the Wood Memorial and finished a distant fifth, which had everyone concerned.

Secretariat was just beautiful. If you've never seen or it's been a while since you've seen a picture of Secretariat, go online and find a color picture of Him running one of the Triple Crown races in the blue silks. It's unbelievable - massive structure. When they did the autopsy on Secretariat, they discovered His heart was twice the size of the heart of an average horse. That's how He could pump so much blood and oxygen.

The problem in the Wood Memorial was that Secretariat loved to run with His head up. When you watch a horse that's really running, those ears are perked, that tail is perked, and generally that head is up. But Secretariat had something like the equivalent of a canker sore, and the bit was rubbing against it. For Ron Turcotte to get that head up, he had to really pull. He didn't want to put that pressure on the sore, so he was letting the bit go, and Secretariat was running with His head down. It's amazing testimony to what

The Tongue as a Rudder

James uses the illustration of a great horse that finished fifth in the Wood. The point was, the greatest horse that's ever lived was controlled a little bit. Then he says, it's not just a horse, it's a ship.

Here's this ship. Now, it would be a little bit different in their day and age. I watched on the Discovery Channel, I don't know, two or three months ago, a special on an aircraft carrier, and this massive aircraft carrier, and the pilot of the aircraft carrier is sitting on a little stool, driving this whole thing like a steering wheel. Well, that's not what's going on in this illustration here.

This would be a boat that's driven by strong winds. So this would be a boat out on one of these seas, where one of these winds and storms would come up, and it would just be blowing, and even in the midst of that, the pilot could control this, in the midst of these winds, because he controlled the rudder. With his rudder, he controlled the entire ship, wherever the inclination of the pilot was.

The Fruit of the Spirit in Storms

So the fruit of the Spirit, if we stick to our discussion on trials and temptations and difficulties, the fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control—is evident in the midst of the storms, as we have control of our tongue. What comes out of there? What's in there? You can't fake it very long when all hell's breaking loose around you.

My mentor, Larry Wright, it's a Wednesday, they're going in, they're doing surgery, they take out half His, literally all of this, it's all cancer. I come to the hospital, and I've been in Tucson, and drive back, I get to the hospital, they said it was cancer, we had to do surgery. And so I'm there, calm, and they said, He's in OR, He's just coming to, He's in the recovery room, He's just coming to, He wants to talk to you.

So I go in, and there He's laying, with half His neck gone, there's just staples in there now. And He looks up, and I say, "Hey doc," "Hi Tommy," I'm known for saying stupid things in this moment, so I said, "How do you feel?" "Okay." "Does it hurt?" Now at this moment, He's still groggy from all the drugs. At this moment, He still doesn't know. Whatever comes out next is what's in there, because you can't fake it at that moment. You know what He says? "Tommy, God's grace is sufficient." And then He falls asleep.

See, that tongue showed me what is in His heart.

The Destructive Power of the Tongue

Now, the tongue can also be used for destruction. Proverbs 25:18. I'm going to read from one of the paraphrases. It says, "Telling lies about others is as harmful as hitting them with an axe, or wounding them with a sword, or shooting them with a sharp arrow."

So He talks about fire. Fire can be used for good, for heating, for cooking. But it can also be destructive. The great Chicago fire that Evan talked about the other night, 17,550 buildings, 300 were dead, and 90,000 people were left homeless.

Yet, I believe, this again is just me, I think even within the church, we've institutionalized certain sins. And as we said, the list, you know the list. If you're gay, you're divorced, you're involved in pornography, boy, those are bad. But you gossip, you run your mouth off, you start talking about other people, we don't do anything about it.

Confronting Gossip Head-On

Early on at our church, we determined that if you're going to talk, we're coming after you. So if you say, such and such and such and such, we're going to say, where did you hear that? "Well, I don't want to tell." Well, we're going to beat it out of you. I want to know where you heard that. "I heard it from Connie." Perfect. "Connie, we were talking over here to Barb. She said, this is what you said. Did you say that?" "Yes." "Where did you get that?" "Got it from Bill."

And we're going to hunt you down like a dog, because we're not going to let our church be destroyed with a bunch of people yapping. And we institutionalized that.

I'm telling you, within the body of Christ, it's that whole thing. "I shouldn't tell you, but I will. I know you'll want to pray about that." I think there's a lot of pride in it. We like to tell somebody, "Did you know?" Because it makes us look like we're in the loop when we aren't at all. It's so destructive. It hurts people so much. It reveals what's in your heart.

A Personal Test of Pride

I'm in a meeting the other day. This is great. We're at our conference table. And I don't know, there's like 18 of us at this meeting. And we're talking about this issue, whatever it was. And this guy says, "I think we should," and then He lays out like a five-point plan. It's absolutely brilliant. It's a breathtakingly, insightful, marvelous, innovative idea. It was one I gave Him the week before.

The whole room stopped. Everybody said, "That's amazing. That's innovative, marvelous, unbelievable." Now, I'm sitting there and I want to go, "Hey guys, He's dumb as a brick. You think He could have thought of this? That's my idea. That's my thought. That's me."

And God is so good. Because I just sat there the whole time. And when it got to me, I said, "I want to tell you something. That's really good."

What was going on in my head? Do you see that? That's all pride. That's all pride. That's my heart. It didn't get out of my mouth. It stayed in my heart. My mind dealt with that sin. I confessed it right there as sin. "God, that's my pride. I want the praise that's going to Him for my idea."

And I say all along, it doesn't matter. It's Reagan-esque. It's what Reagan said. "It's amazing what we can accomplish if we don't care who gets the credit." I say it all the time. I preach it to the staff. But at that moment, it mattered to me. What was my tongue about to reveal? My heart. See that? That's why it's important. That's why words matter.

True Wit Versus Humor at Others' Expense

I don't think that very many people are really funny. I think people try to be funny. But most often, it's not funny. It's funny at somebody else's expense. Like to have real wit and insight and cleverness and pull stuff together and see it. Very rare. There aren't many of us. See, that was clever and witty.

The Power of Destructive Words

See how that's done? Now there's an example for you. But most people, I'm going to give you a little tip because I used to be this way. I'd find myself taking a shot at somebody and I found myself three or four times a day saying, "Oh, I'm only joking." Well, the damage is done. You aren't joking. It's the power of the tongue to do good. It's the power of the tongue to be destructive.

I know it because I've done it. I've been on the giving end. I've been on the receiving end. Jeff mentioned that tomorrow, talking about why did he cut his hair? Well, my hair last summer was halfway down my back. I mean, I had really long hair. I just started cutting it a little bit and then cutting it more, whatever. There's no great answer. I don't know why. I had one last little flip and I couldn't get it straight and I thought, whatever, let's try it. Now we can grow it back out.

When my hair was really long, it was really a point of contention for some people in our church. My hair was a revealer of their heart condition, I felt. So I'm walking in one day, and this is a picture of a critical mind. This guy said to me, this guy I've never seen before. I'm walking by him and he said, "If I give you the money, will you cut your hair?"

Let me put it in real time for you. He is where the pulpit is. He said, "Hey, if I give you the money, will you cut your hair?" I look at him, I said, "If I give you the money, will you join a gym?" I knew it was wrong because it felt so good. I've populated a lot of the other churches in town. Never saw the guy again. But that's not right. That's wrong.

A Kindergarten Memory That Lasted 55 Years

I've been on the receiving end. This is my favorite story. I'm five at the time. I'm in kindergarten. So this is roughly 55 years ago, over half a century ago. We're in a room, a kindergarten room. My assumption is it's about, in my mind it's as big as this whole room, but it's probably the size of this platform. There are tables set at an angle. They're kind of a V, kind of a herringbone with the teacher in the middle.

We are coloring a picture. I can tell you what the picture was. It was three kids, two boys and a girl, playing in the snow, making a snowman, throwing snowballs. Our task was to color it. I completed the task. We pass in the papers. We're doing something.

Now I'm going to face you as the teacher. We're doing something when the teacher, Miss Julie, says, "Hey, everybody look up here. Everybody look up here now." She said, "Look at this." So I'm over here. "Look at this. Look at this. Look at this." Well, I realized it's the picture I colored. I thought, wow. My first instance of affirmation in a public setting. This will be incredible.

So "Look at this. Everybody look up here now. Look at this picture. You see this? Tom. Tom, you colored this?" "Yes, ma'am." "Okay, everybody look at this. Tom colored this picture. Do you see this? Tom put these kids in red snowsuits with orange mittens. Don't you ever put red and orange together. Never, ever, ever put red and orange together."

Words That Echo Through Decades

55 years ago, and I'm pretty much over it. Just a vacant, foggy memory of my past. Long ago. I have no idea. I've lost track of Miss Julie. It's 55 years ago. My assumption is she was probably 30 at the time, so 85. My assumption would be she's dead. In hell. I'm not done. I'm eternally sitting next to somebody in a red and orange suit.

Isn't that an amazing story? The power of the word. 55 years ago. I can take you to the room. I can describe this silly thing. I bet we colored 200 pictures that year, but I remember that one, those words. That's the power that lies in the tongue.

So when you say to your kid, "You're dumb, you're stupid, you always, you'll never amount to," when you say those things, do you understand how much that hurts? You're destroying those kids. I wrote this sentence: "I don't care how influential you are, how secure you are, how mature you are. Genuine encouragement never fails to help." Most of us need huge doses of encouragement as we slug it out through life.

The Need for Encouragement in Marriage

I'm not the best at it. Susan and I had a discussion the other day, and it became apparent in the course of the discussion and the text messaging back and forth that I wasn't holding up my end of the bargain. I said to her, "I am really sorry." Because obviously you are not getting from me—I don't mean physically, there may be something there too, I'm not aware of—but in terms of my mouth, my mouth is not building you up.

I'm pretty public about it. There's nobody in this world that's more important to me than Susan. The only thing more important to me than Susan is Jesus. But somehow she wasn't feeling that. Now there was a day when I would have said, "Well, suck it up and figure it out." But I know now, if she's not feeling it, it's because I'm not giving it to her.

That's my job, to love her as Christ loves the church. That doesn't just mean, "Hey, you got a roof over your head and plenty to eat and plenty of clothes. You ought to be happy. Lots of people don't have that." We hit a little nerve right there. We found just the spot. It's always funny who reacts when. I mean, I think I'm a good provider. But it's way more than that.

She has emotional needs, and she is not a needy person. So whatever her need quotient is, I didn't give it to her. Not only didn't give it to her, something in my tongue was telling her something else. I'm really sorry about that. You never outgrow the need for this.

The Daily Impact of Our Words

So when somebody spends five minutes with you and they walk away, are they encouraged or discouraged? It's really a chore, isn't it? I've got certain people, and I'm telling you, I can be doing something. I'm over here. I've got certain

There are certain people—the minute they get in my range of vision and I see them coming at me—I can just feel the energy drained out of me. I have certain people that I spend 10, 15, 20 minutes with, whatever it is. When I'm done, this is a great word picture: I feel like a car that sat all night with its lights on. This is how I am.

There are other people that just to look at them, I know they're going to put courage into me. I know they're going to build me up just to look at them. So which one are you?

"Well, I just shoot straight. I just tell the truth." Well, so did Jesus. But they didn't hate Him for telling the truth. They hated Him for God and who He was. But the commoner was attracted to Him.

The Problem with Truth Without Love

We've got way too much—this will be misunderstood—but we've got way too much truth telling and accountability holding going on. We're holding everybody accountable. I don't get that from here. I get a lot more "love one another" and "serve one another" than I get "hold one another accountable." If you love me and serve me, then we can get to accountability, I think.

The Untameable Tongue

It's the tongue. He closes this out and we'll stop. "Every species of beast and of birds and of reptiles and creatures of the sea has been tamed, but the tongue hasn't been tamed by the human race. No one can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil full of poison."

He says we've tamed all the beasts. I was watching a show where they were taking these dolphins and they had trained them to dive, identify the type of bomb that they came across, make a distinction of it, and they were able then to figure out, detonate it, figure out what kind of bomb it was, where it was. I watched a film where this guy trained—get this—crickets and spiders for movies. They were using them in movies and they trained the crickets and spiders to move in certain ways.

The minute I read it, I thought of this. We can train all of these creatures, but not the tongue. No human ever has on his own, but God does.

The Heart Behind the Words

He said this is incredible: "With our tongue we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not be this way. Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water? Can a fig tree, my brethren, produce olives? Or a vine produce figs? Neither can salt water produce fresh."

He's saying listen, what's coming out of that heart is what's in there. If you say Jesus is Lord, then I ought to be able to see it in your life. I ought to be able to understand it in your life. It ought to be manifest by what comes out of your mouth.

I don't know about you, I need to go back to that again and again and again. Because I used to think my problem was my tongue. My problem wasn't my tongue; my problem is my heart. What's coming out of there is what's really in there.

I love the fact that He says with the same mouth we both bless God and curse His men. I want us to close our time tonight by blessing Him. By singing. By having the team come and close us. It's going to take them a minute to get set up. They didn't know this and it catches them off guard.

So let me pray as they come and then we'll close our time together.

Father, thank You for these amazing principles. They're so practical. We have occasion to sin with our tongue thousands of times each and every day. But God, You tell us the tongue's not the problem. The heart is. That our hearts are evil, torn. God, bring our heart back to You. I pray now as we end this time, and in a few minutes we just head down to the beach. We've got a fire and s'mores and fun. That as we leave tonight, we sing this song. We sing it louder and more boldly and more honestly than we did 45 minutes ago. God, let this indeed be the desire of our heart. We pray it to You in Christ's name. Amen.