Don't Run Your Mouth! Series

“DON’T RUN YOUR MOUTH!” James 3:1-12

FBCF – 10/23/22

Jon Daniels

INTRO – (https://www.sermoncentral.com/church-media-preaching-sermons/sermon-video-illustrations/the-power-of-words-4968-detail)

How many of you know someone who runs their mouth too much? How many of you run your mouth too much? How many of you know that running your mouth too much can get you in trouble?

We use a lot of words over the course of our lives. Think about these things:

- Lord’s Prayer: 56 words. Gettysburg Address: 266. 10 Commandments: 297. Declaration of Independence: 300. A US gov’t order to set the price of cabbage: 26,911!

- It has been estimated that most people speak enough in 1 wk to fill up a large 500-page book. Means in avg lifetime, that amounts to 3000 volumes or 1.5 million pages! It’s a scary thought to realize that Jesus said in Matthew 12:36-37, “And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak. The words you say will either acquit you or condemn you.” (NLT)

Everyone has heard the “Sticks & stones…” statement. The first past of that statement is very true. But that second part is very false. Words DO hurt when they are used careless, maliciously, & deceitfully. That’s why we see James returning to the subject of the tongue in our passage today. He’s already said that we need to be slow to speak (1:19); that claiming to be religious w/out controlling your tongue shows that your religion is worthless (1:26); & that speaking down to someone in a discriminating way is evidence of evil motives in your heart (2:3-4). Now he circles back to the issue of our words & our mouths in 3:1-12.

EXPLANATION – James 3:1-12 (p. 1012)

Small things make a big impact.

- Heart attacks & strokes – Tiny blockage of plaque or tiny blood clot that breaks off

- Cancerous cell turns into a life-threatening tumor

- Pebble in shoe

- Eyelash in your eye

“Small” sins that seem insignificant quickly escalate & become major lifechanging, life-altering problems that devastate our lives & the lives of so many others.

- Remember the progression of temptation & sin that we saw in James 1:14-15?

James gives some illustrations of small things that make a big difference:

- A bit in a horse’s mouth – Avg weight of a horse – 1200 lbs – Bit weights ½ a lb.

- Rudder on a ship – Nimitz-class aircraft carrier – Has 2 rudders that each weigh 110,000 lbs. “Wow! That’s huge!” But not if you compare it to total weight of the ship which is in the neighborhood of 100k tons – 200 million lbs!

- One tiny spark from a careless campfire or a cigarette flicked out of a car window can set an entire forest on fire.

Same is true of the tongue. Avg length of human tongue is a little over 3 inches & avg weight is about 2 ½ ounces. Considering that avg weight of a person in the US is about 178 lbs., the tongue is definitely a “small member” or “small part of the body” (v. 5). Crazy that something that’s less than 3 ounces can totally wreck your life & the lives of a multitude of other people.

But that’s exactly what James is telling us in this passage.

APPLICATION – Remember that your words have impact, both positively & negatively.

WRONG USES OF YOUR WORDS:

BLAMING GOD – James 1:13-14 – Temptation is a part of the Christian life – “…we all stumble in many ways…” (v. 2). Happens to all of us all of the time. There’s the tendency to lay the blame elsewhere when we are hit w/ a hard temptation. We don’t want to own up to the reality that we have weaknesses & areas of vulnerability. Want to give the appearance that we always have it together, when in reality, we are getting beat up & beat down by temptation.

We find it easy to blame God when those times of temptation come. We might find ourselves thinking & saying to ourselves, “God is the one who made me like this. He’s the one who gave me this weakness. He’s the one who put me in this situation. I just can’t help myself b/c God is the one who made me this way.”

We may not come right out & say the words to God Himself, but that is what we are doing when we think like this. It’s a scary to think that someone would shake their fist in the face of the God of the universe & say “I blame you for this!”, but that’s what we are doing. And that’s a wrong use of your words.

BAD LANGUAGE – Ephesian 4:29 – “No foul language should come from your mouth, but only what is good for building up someone in need, so that it gives grace to those who hear.” (CSB)