For those who might be joining us for the first time our current series of sermons has been focusing on God’s wisdom in the book of Proverbs, which was written by one of the wisest persons who ever lived, Solomon. God wants us to grow in wisdom which basically means we are able to consistently make the right choice in every circumstance because wisdom comes from God.
Last week we focused on the first half of our memory verse from Proverbs 12:18, “reckless words which pierce like a sword.” Solomon in his Proverbs included many ways we use our words recklessly such as through gossip, lying or deceiving others, speaking in anger, speaking selfishly or pridefully, complaining, foul language or swearing, abusive words. As Christians, who follow Jesus and are filled with the Holy Spirit, what comes out of our mouth should reflect our faith. Yet unfortunately this is not always true, our mouth tends to run off and get us in trouble. Jesus told us that the real problem is not with our mouth, it is with our heart, “out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks (Mt. 12:34).” If we’re having problems controlling our mouth, it’s because something is wrong in our heart. We have a heart problem. Last week we asked God to reveal to us where we have used our mouths recklessly and have pierced others like a sword with our words. We asked for God’s forgiveness, and then we invited God to change our heart because only God can change the inside. If God is speaking to you today about your mouth I pray that you would do the same and invite God into your life to change your heart.
This week we are moving toward the second half of our memory verse which says, “the tongue of the wise brings healing.” Today we are going to look at how we can Master our Mouth so we can use it the way God intended it to be used, to bring healing, or to help others. Solomon gave some very practical advice on Mastering our Mouth, in fact you may find his wisdom overly simplistic however as simple as it is, we still don’t practice it very often.
I. Wisdom for Mastering our Mouth
1. Hold Your Tongue
How many times have we opened our mouth right away only to put our foot in it? Like the guy who saw his wife in huge curlers and asked, “What happened to your hair?” She replied “I set it,” and his response was, “when does it go off?” We can laugh at that, it’s funny, but it probably wasn’t the best Christ-like response. God’s wisdom tells us:
NIV Proverbs 10:19 When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise.
NIV Proverbs 21:23 He who guards his mouth and his tongue keeps himself from calamity.
If we seek to be wise we must learn to hold our tongue more often, or as we might say it today, bite your tongue. In other words we don’t just blurt out the first thing that comes to us because it is probably not going to be a word of healing. It will probably be sarcastic (even if it is funny), cutting, or spoken in anger. The quicker we respond to someone, the greater the danger of using reckless words, and saying something harmful which will hurt the other person, and our relationship with them. If we hold our tongue it will give us time to do the second piece of wisdom for mastering our mouth, which is:
2. Think before you speak
NIV Proverbs 15:28 The heart of the righteous weighs its answers, but the mouth of the wicked gushes evil.
Rarely do quickly spoken words have any thought behind them. If we would just think about our words before we open our mouth we would get in a lot less trouble. This is such a simple principle but practiced so seldom. Yet Solomon tells us wise people consistently think about what they are going to say before they say it. They measure their words carefully. Because once the words are out of our mouth we cannot put them back in, they have already done their damage.
If we hold our tongue and think for a second we can ask ourselves, “is what I am about to say given in love and consideration for the other person, or will it hurt them?” “How can I say it in a better way?” If you can’t think of a better way to say it, we can follow the modern day proverb our parents taught us, “if you can’t say anything nice…(don’t say anything at all).” Bite your tongue, keep your mouth shut until you think of a better response which reflects our God given commandment to speak in love to others as we would want them to speak to us.
3. Learn to Listen Before Speaking
Hold your tongue, think before you speak, and the third piece of wisdom…learn to listen before speaking.
NIV Proverbs 18:13 He who answers before listening-- that is his folly and his shame.
Many times we are more interested in what we have to tell others than we are in what they have to say to us. How many times have we called someone and knew exactly what we were going to say before we even began the discussion? We knew what topics we wanted to discuss (usually our favorites). It didn’t matter what they wanted to say to us.
If you tend to dominate conversations spending more time talking than listening, have you ever asked yourself why you do that? Seriously. Is it because you like the sound of your voice? Whatever our reason, when we dominate conversations what we are subconsciously communicating to the other person(s) is that I care more about my affairs, my opinion, then I care about what you think or have to say. We are being self-centered. Yet the Bible teaches us:
We should “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.” Philippians 2:3-4
If we are truly looking out for the interests of others it means we will listen more than we talk. God has given us two ears and one mouth for a reason. Perhaps it is so we can listen twice as much as we talk? One of the best ways to master our mouth is not to use it at all.
Dale Carnegie in his classic book on dealing with people, How to Win Friends and Influence People, gave several rules (many of them Biblical since he was a Christian):
“Become genuinely interested in other people.”
“Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.”
“Let the other man do a great deal of the talking.”
“Talk in terms of the other man’s interest.”
Imagine, this book, written by a Christian, was marketed as a secular means of being a successful business person, and it comes right from God’s Word. Mastering our mouth affects not only our relationship with our family and friends, but also our work relationships. To succeed in any relationship we must master our mouth.
If you struggle with talking more than listening, try this for practice, try withholding your opinion in a conversation unless someone asks for it. It will be difficult at first but you can learn to listen first.
While it’s good to hold our tongue and listen, obviously we need to talk some of the time, so what are we supposed to say when we open our mouth?
II. Words of the Wise
1. Are Encouraging
NLT Proverbs 12:25b an encouraging word cheers a person up.
In the NT the Apostle Paul similarly wrote:
NLT Ephesians 4:29 “Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.”
Notice Paul wrote, let everything we say be good and helpful so that it encourages others, or as other translations say, to build others up, or to edify them. Not just some of the time or some of my words, or when I’m having a good day, but all of my words all the time. How often do our words encourage and build up those around us?
Words of encouragement
• It’s good to see you
• I really appreciate it when you…
• Way to go
• You did a great job
• Thank you for…(ministry, helping, )
• I’m praying for you (assuming of course you really are, we don’t want to lie)
Jesus encouraged his disciples in a little bit different way, by teaching them about the coming of God’s kingdom, the good news. We can encourage one another by reminding each other of the Good News about Jesus Christ. When we point our attention back to God we are encouraged because we remember what is possible with God. We are encouraged because we are set free from sin and bondage through Jesus Christ. We are encouraged because we know we have a heavenly home awaiting us.
What would our homes look like if we always spoke words of encouragement with one another? What about our churches?
2. Are Kind and Gentle
Lastly, words of wisdom are kind and gentle.
NLT Proverbs 16:23 From a wise mind comes wise speech; the words of the wise are persuasive. 24 Kind words are like honey-- sweet to the soul and healthy for the body.
Proverbs 15:1 A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Someone once said, “you get more bees with honey than with vinegar.” If you want to be persuasive don’t be abrasive. Kind words spoken with a genuine heart are sweet to the soul and healthy for the body of both the person saying the words and the ones to whom they are directed. How many of us like it when people speak with kindness? We all do don’t we? Likewise gentle words are pleasant because they calm us, disarm us, and diffuse potentially explosive situations.
There was a reason I put these two together: kindness and gentleness. In the NT we learn that kindness and gentleness are fruits of the God’s Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control), or we might say they are a byproduct of God’s living and working within us. If we have a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and are filled with God’s Spirit our lives should increasingly bear these fruits. This includes the words of our mouth too. We can ask ourselves are my words filled with or spoken in: Love? Joy? Peace? Patience? Kindness? Goodness? Gentleness? Faithfulness? Self-control?
Closing
If our words do not reflect God’s fruit there is something wrong within us. As Jesus said, “out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.” We may think we’re just fine because we don’t swear, or lie, or gossip, or are abusive, but as Christians this is not far enough because it isn’t just about what we don’t say, it is also about what we do say. Do our words reflect our Lord Jesus? If our words do not then we need God to change our hearts, to bear fruits of kindness and gentleness because God will hold us accountable for the words we use here on earth, whether we use bad words or avoid using kind and gentle words when we should have. Our words will only become more gentle and kind as we get to know God in a deeper way and allow him to work in our heart. Only God can make us more kind and gentle.
Perhaps some of you here this morning don’t know God at all. You may know about God, perhaps you’ve read the Bible here and there, or gone to church a few time in your life, but you don’t know God personally. You can try to clean your mouth up and do the right thing, perhaps say the right words, but without God in your life, I’m here to tell you it won’t stick without knowing Him. The only way to know God personally is to receive the free gift he has given us in his Son Jesus Christ. He sent his Son to cleanse us from all sin. So we can be his friend and part of his family. I encourage you to take a step and say yes to Jesus.
For those who have faith in Jesus, perhaps you have recognized that there is a disconnect between your faith and your mouth. Even though you have faith in Jesus, you have a personal relationship with God, it hasn’t changed the words of your mouth. They are just as reckless as they have always been or maybe they aren’t reckless, but they fail to bring healing through encouragement, kindness, or gentleness, or any of the fruits of the Spirit. We can ask for forgiveness for our failure to use our mouth the way God intended, it is a beginning step but it isn’t enough we need a closer walk with God. Are you going to keep toying around with God holding him off at arms length or are you going to let God close, to have all of you, your heart, your soul, and your mouth?
