James 3:7-10 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.
Have you ever been sharing with a friend important or personal information and all the while you can see the anticipation welling up inside them? They are waiting for you to simply take the next breath and then bam! out comes the response… You have barely even started, let alone finished what you had to say and before you know it the conversation turns and they are talking and talking and talking… and talking some more! Now I know you have never done that, but we all know someone who has. It can be extremely challenging having conversations when those we are communicating with are waiting for the next moment to jump in and say their “two cents.”
Taking control of our tongue is hard. Often I have to stop myself from speaking when someone is in the middle of saying their piece and it can be quite difficult. James says that no one can tame it, and worse yet, it is a restless evil filled with deadly poison. That means that our tongue is so without restraint it is like a venomous serpent slithering around waiting for the right moment to strike at its next victim. And then he says a real sobering fact; with our tongue we bless the Lord and curse people who are in His likeness. “May it never be!” as the apostle Paul would say. Similarly, James says that these things ought not to be.
How is it that we can praise the Lord with the same mouth we say evil things to those around us? One moment we are in a place of worship, the next we are frustrated at traffic and yelling at the car in front of us. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. Whatever flows out of our mouth comes from the heart, so if we find ourselves in need of taming of the tongue, it generally is a bigger issue that is rooted deep inside. Since our words come from somewhere deep inside of us, simply trying to stop them at the tongue is like trying to put your finger in the holes of a dike. Eventually you run out of fingers… Real transformation and taming comes from a transformed heart that only takes place when we surrender to Jesus Christ. Not simply saying a prayer and becoming a Christian, but to realize that being a disciple means that we are a new creation. The old self is gone and the new self has come.
The point James is making here is that we sin with our mouth. The deadly poison we spew out is sin and it is in need of correction. Paul says in Romans 6, “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
The taming of the tongue requires death. When you tame an animal it is said that you “break” its spirit. You bring it into submission so that it no longer has its own will nor does it do its own thing. Same holds true with you and me. When we say yes to Christ we abandon our will for His and in so doing we become submitted to Christ. As we live daily in Christ we not only turn over our life to Him, but we turn over our heart which then causes the words that come out of our mouth to sound more and more like Christ.
Prayer
Lord, I surrender to you today and ask that you transform my life to reflect you. May the words of my mouth be acceptable in your sight. Amen.