Episode 6- The Power of Words

Today we are reading from James chapter 3:3-12, Ephesians 4:29-32, Colossians 4:5-6, and 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 NIV. Thanks for following along! 

Transcript

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Hello and welcome to the Full Armor of God podcast. My name is Taylor. I am so excited to host you for episode six. Thank you for coming back for another week of the Lord's Wisdom. We are jumping right in. We're talking today about the power of words. We're going to be reading from James chapter three. That's the main chunk of our reading, but our supplemental verses are going to be from Ephesians chapter four, Colossians chapter five, and First Corinthians chapter 13. As always, I encourage you to read along with me as we go. If not, I encourage you to read these verses sometime throughout today, or even reading these chapters throughout this week. They're all just life-giving goodness. It's the Lord's word. It's so good. I cannot wait to dive in. If you have time to read through the book of James or just this one chapter of James, honestly, any one chapter of James, you'll find that this book is very straightforward. There is no sugar coating. He really tells it how it is. It's very practical. And I just love that. So we're starting off in James chapter three, verse three. He says, When we put bits into the mouth of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and they are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder whenever the pilot wants to go. 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 is also a fire. We're going to skip ahead to verse 9. It says, With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. Can both water and fresh salt flow from the same spring? My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. James is calling us to tame our tongue. It is something to be mastered, it is something to be tamed because so much destruction can come from it. He said a spark can produce a massive forest fire, meaning the words we say not only to others, but also to ourselves can cause a lot of damage. And then to elaborate on this, he points out that our tongue is often what steers our ship. Proverbs 18 tells us that the power of life and death is in the tongue. James is saying we can bless the Lord one minute and curse the man the next minute, and it shouldn't be that way. We should be fig trees bearing figs, not fig trees bearing olives, or a fresh water spring giving fresh water, not salt water. In other words, the words that we say are an overflow of what is in our heart. If we have bitterness in our hearts, that is going to come out in our words. If we have forgiveness in our hearts, that is also going to come out in our words. James is saying they should match. If I say I'm a Christ follower, I should be bearing Christ, just like a fig tree should be bearing figs, because it's just the nature of that tree. If I say I'm a freshwater spring, I should only have that fresh water flowing out from me, not this like salty, corrupt water. James is saying we should only have blessings flowing from our mouth instead of curses. So our goal should be to speak life, not just over others, but also over ourselves, to speak life and truth over our family, over our friends, over our business, over everything. Our words have weight, our words have meaning, our words are a reflection of what is in our heart. In Ephesians 4, Paul is talking about our hearts overflowing into our speech. Ephesians chapter 4, verses 29 through 32. Paul says, Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen, and do not grieve the Holy Spirit with whom you are sealed for the day of redemption. Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, brawling, and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, just as in Christ, God forgave you. I want to point out here that hurt people, hurt people. There's this broken cycle of hurt and pain and bitterness that works its way into every area of our lives, especially our words, when we let it. We could say, love one another, just as Christ loves you. It's this overflow of the goodness that he's poured out on our lives to live open-handedly with. It's that reflection of the change that's happened within us, reflecting outside of us in our words, in our speech, in our action. Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth because your heart has been made whole in Christ. And since we have the love and the forgiveness of Christ, we have received him in our hearts, and he is doing a transformational work within us. We should be living out of that place and speaking out of that place, this overflow of his love and forgiveness. We can find such great encouragement on this in Paul's letter to the Colossians chapter 4, verses 5 and 6. It says, Be wise in the way you act towards outsiders. Make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversations be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. Full of grace, seasoned with salt. In Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter 5, he tells us, he calls us to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. What does salt do back in that day and age? What was salt used for? Salt was a very useful thing. It's a very useful thing today, but it was a super useful thing back in Jesus' day and age because it was used for three main things, and it's genius. Genius what Jesus is laying out here. There were three main purposes that salt had. It was used to cleanse wounds. And the third thing, it was used on sacrifices in the Old Testament as a means of sanctifying and purifying the sacrifice set before God. This idea of our conversations being full of grace and seasoned with salt, Jesus tells us to be the salt of the earth, preventing decay, healing wounds, sanctifying and purifying. Like those are all things that the Lord does in and through us. And he can use us when we allow our words and our conversations to be full of grace and seasoned with salt. Paul is saying, you might be the only Bible that someone ever reads. Make the most of every opportunity to point to and glorify the Lord, especially with your words, because they reflect your heart. We can say, I follow Jesus, I love Jesus, all we want, but if we don't show it, especially in our words and our action, it's not believable. There's not fruit there. We might say we're a fig tree, but we're not showing the fruit that show we are a fig tree. You know what I mean? I don't know about you, but if I had these verses from Ephesians and Colossians on my mind, at the forefront of every conversation I had, both with others and myself, my conversations would just naturally look more like Jesus. Our next verse is found in 1 Corinthians chapter 13. This is one of the most famous chapters in all the Bible. It is used in so many weddings and it's so good. But it starts out in chapter 13, verse 1. It says, If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor, and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. And then it continues love is patient, love is kind, it does not envy, it does not boast. And it continues with that famous, famous verse that we've heard. Hopefully, if you haven't, please read it. It's so good. But if I speak even the Lord's word here, but I don't have love in my heart. My words are nothing but white noise. My love from my heart is conditional because I am human, but the Lord's is unconditional. The peace and the patience that I try to manufacture on my own, it waxes and it wanes. But the Lord's is steadfast. I want to be super clear here that we are not being called to be perfect. Everyone has their days, but we are being called to invite him into all of it and to stand back in awe as he works in and through us. The works are his works, they're not ours. And we are being encouraged daily to clothe ourselves with the love of Jesus, reminding ourselves how much he loves us and forgives us so that we can live open-handedly with that love and forgiveness to allow his perfect love to cover our imperfect love and his perfect grace and his perfect peace to fill in the gaps where ours comes up short, so that all of our conversations, both to others and with ourselves, can be filled with love and grace, seasoned with salt, and always pointing to him. Friends, my prayer for us this week is that we would be aware of our words, that they can be the spark of a forest fire if left unchecked, to be aware of our heart condition, asking God to show us the broken parts so that we can surrender them to him and live and speak from a heart made whole and to make the most of every opportunity in reflecting and honoring and glorifying our good, good, good, perfect Father in heaven. Just simply inviting him into every moment, every area of our lives. The Holy Spirit is here with us, for us, to be with us in everything. And he stands at the door and he knocks. He wants so badly to be intertwined with us in our hearts and our lives to show us his goodness, to show us his grace, to show us his mercy and his love and his divine power. He works the most incredible things in and through us when we let him. I know this was a shorter message this week, but I hope you found encouragement this week. I definitely found encouragement in these verses today. I look forward to chatting with you next week, and I'll be praying for you as always. God bless.