The Power of the Tongue part 3 The Power to Bless

this portion of scripture, verses 1 through 12, that we have called the power of the tongue. Now we've had two messages on the power of the tongue before this morning. We saw the power of the tongue, the power to control. Then we saw the power of the tongue, the power to destroy. Those were from verses 1 through 4 and then from verses 5 through 8. This morning we're looking at the power of the tongue, part 3, the power to bless. The power to bless. Now I've tried to give us some good introductory material that will help us get our mind around what we're learning and what we're getting into with the scripture.

And this morning I want us to help us understand the power to bless and I want to take a little time to step back into time and to show you some words that were a tremendous blessing. Between June the 11th and June the 28th of 1776, Thomas Jefferson drafted what is called the Declaration of Independence. And at once it was one of the nation's most cherished symbols of liberty and Jefferson's most enduring monument. Here in exalted and forgettable phrases Jefferson expressed the convictions and the minds and the hearts of the American people. The political philosophy of the Declaration was not new.

Its ideals of individual liberty had already been expressed by people like John Locke and the Continental philosophers. Jefferson did was to summarize this philosophy in self-evident truths and he set forth a list of grievances against the king in order to justify before the world the breaking of ties between the colonies and the mother country. Now I took some time this weekend and read over some of the wording of the Declaration of Independence and I will read just a portion of one of the sentences that most all of you will know you remember or you have studied or read what Thomas Jefferson pen.

"I hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights that among these are life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness." What do we see with these words that were penned so long ago and are still familiar to some of us in our culture? The power to bless. I thought about another example from our American history. But in 1863, so matter of fact on January the first, our president Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation as the nation approached its third year of bloody Civil War.

"The proclamation declared that all persons held as slaves within the rebellious states are and henceforth shall be free. Despite the expansive wording, the Emancipation Proclamation was limited in many ways. It applied only to the states that had succeeded from the Union leaving slavery untouched in the loyal border states. It also expressly exempted parts of the Confederacy that had already come under northern control. Most people, most people, the freedom it promised depended upon Union military victory.

Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery in the nation, it captured the hearts and the imagination of millions of Americans and fundamentally transformed the character of that terrible war." What do we see here? The Emancipation Proclamation helped set into motion. It was part of those events that set into motion the freedom of the American slaves. What do we see here without other example? We see the power to bless. What am I trying to show you? With words from the Declaration of Independence, with words from the Emancipation Proclamation. Mankind were blessed by the words of other men.

That's what we're going to look at this morning. The power of the tongue, part three. We're going to look at the power to bless. We're going to be in verses 9 through 12. I've already put the main truths that I want us to look at on the screen for your convenience. But let's look at the verses and let's read from verse 9 to 12. The Scripture says, "With it 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 come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way." Verse 11, "Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water?

Would a fig tree, my brethren, produce olives, or a vine produce figs? Neither can salt water produce fresh." Now what we're looking at is, James is finishing off this great lesson on the tongue. I love how he started off in verse 1. He started off with leadership. He started off with those who would preach and teach the Word. And he just brings it down home to every believer, every Christian, every man and woman and young person who is listening to his teaching, who claims the name of Christ.

And he is showing to us the power of the tongue and we've just divided it up in these different messages to help us get the main message that James is trying to teach. Now there is a difference right here in these verses that I want us to see from the previous verses, verses 1-8. James is very inclusive in these verses. Let me explain what I mean. In verse 9, James uses the word "our" and "we", clearly addressing this teaching to Christians. Go back and look at the verse. "With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men." James is obviously, including himself, showing us that this is written to Christians.

Now we know the context. These were Jewish Christians who had been scattered from Jerusalem. They were scattered because of the great persecution. We know that the previous verses were written to Christians as well. That's why we see earlier in verse 2 where James says that we can become "mature in the faith and govern the tongue." What I want us to see is this is directed towards Christians. The English Standard Version, the King James Version, and the New International Version use the words "we" or "our". As a matter of fact, in the original Greek text, both of those instances in verse 9 read "we".

So it is obvious that this is written to the church to Christians. That's why in the main truths that we're going to look at, I chose the word "our". The action of our speech. The hypocrisy of our speech. The contradiction of our speech. These are truths right here in these verses that I want us to explore and learn from. Let's dive into these verses and I want us to see number 1, or Roman numeral 1, the action of our speech. Go back to the verse. "With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in the likeness of God." Now we know that what James is talking about is the tongue and it is speech.

That's been the subject all along in these verses. James is communicating that the tongue and speech is into great action right here in this verse. Let's previously take verse 5 for instance. "So also the tongue is a small part of the body and yet it boasts of great things." There is the action of the tongue, the action of speech. But that's what James is dealing with in verse 9. Go back to the verse. "But with it we bless our Lord." There's action. And then it goes on to say, "And with it we curse men." There is the action of our speech. But now I want you to see James gets into two specifics that can be found in this verse.

First I want us to see that we bless our Lord. There is the action of blessing our Lord. That's the first thing we see in verse 9. "With it we bless our Lord and Father." The New International, the English Standard, and the King James use the word bless. The New International Version uses the word praise. Now in our language, praise would be easier understood because what this word means, it means to praise God. It means to bless Him. It means to worship Him and adore Him for who He is and also for what He has done. That's what this word bless means.

I want to give you two examples, both from the Old Testament, that illustrate what we're looking at here with this word bless. You don't have to turn there, but in Exodus chapter 15 we see the story of when Moses had led the Israelites out of Egyptian bondage. They had gone through the Red Sea and they had seen the great defeat of Pharaoh and his army. What was Moses? What does the nation of Israel do upon that great victory for God, victory for Israel? In Exodus chapter 15 starting in verse 1, they burst out in this great song of what? This song of praise, this song of blessing God for what God had done in them and through them.

Now think about the great story. It's almost like one day they were slaves, one day they were in Egyptian captivity, the next day they are out of captivity and they are following the Lord God, becoming a nation, His chosen people. And they just pause them in it to praise God, to bless God because of that great victory. This isn't in my notes, but it fits. There are some things that we are praying for that we have been praying for for a long time that when God answers those prayers, some of you will burst out in praise.

And if you happen to be here that day, you might think some people might are going charismatic on us, but I'll tell you there are some lost loved ones we are praying for and when we see them come to know the Living Lord Jesus when they are born again and they come through this baptismal, you know what? Some of you might just stand up and praise and bless God. Isn't that what Moses and the people of God did? I'll give you another example. This might be less familiar to you. The story of David, King David. Now if you know the story of King David, David was a man after God's own heart.

The scripture says that in his generation he did everything that God wanted him to do. What a great testimony. But David had it in his heart to build the temple of God. And God had told him that there was going to be a temple built and David stepped up and he said, "God, I want to build this temple for you." But God said, "No, David, you're a warrior king. Your hand has shed too much blood. That is my job for you." And I want you to see a good lesson here. David did not presume to do the work of God just because it was a good idea and his heart was in the right place.

You can never say to someone, "Oh, his heart's in the right place." David's heart was in the right place. He had to obey God and what God said no matter what his heart felt. And what happened was David's son Solomon had the task of building the temple, but in 1 Chronicles 29 verse 10, we see that David praises God. David blesses God. Why? Because he was able to be used to gather the building materials for the temple and he was knowing that his son was going to build the temple and although he did not have the job to build it, he was a part of it and therefore he blessed God, he praised God, he worshiped God.

That's what this verse means in verse 9. James is saying, "With this tongue, with our speech, we bless the God that we love. We bless the Father. We bless the Lord." That's what he means here. But the second thing I wanted us to see in this action of speech, we see that we curse fellow man. With it we bless our Lord and Father and with it we curse men. The New American Standard, the English Standard Version, the King James Version, the New International Version, I prefer to those versions because those are versions that most all of us use at some time or another. They all say the same word and that word is curse.

And you know in my study, I sought real hard to understand what this word curse means and I can only come up with a very simplistic definition. It means this. It means to wish evil or to wish ruin upon one. That's what this curse means, the word curse means. It means to wish evil or ruin upon one. And what is James saying? "With our tongue, with our speech, we bless our Lord, but yet with that same tongue and with that same mouth, we curse. We wish evil, we wish ruin upon other men." I'll give you two examples from scripture. Both of these are from the New Testament.

In Mark chapter 11, Jesus was with his disciples and Jesus was hungry and he sees a fig tree and he says, "Yes, there must be fruit on that tree. It was the time when fruit should have been there." And he goes to that tree and he finds that tree unfruitful. And what does Jesus do? He cursed that tree. He wished evil upon that tree. He wished ruin upon that tree. And then a little later, the disciples come back by that tree and they notice something about that tree. He's dead. Jesus had cursed it. He had wished ruin upon that tree. He cursed it. Just like James is saying, "These men are cursing other men." Here's another example.

In Luke chapter 6 verse 28, what does Jesus teach? He says, "Bless those who curse you and pray for those who mistreat you." That's the same word curse. Now earlier, Jesus curses the fig tree, but in Luke chapter 6, we see men cursing other men. What does he say? He says, "Bless those who curse you. Bless those who wish evil and ruin upon you." Pray for those who do these things to you. But I want to ask you a question. Who is being blessed by the speech and who is being cursed by the speech? Go back to the Scripture. With it, we bless our Lord and Father and with it we curse men. Who's being blessed and who's being cursed?

We see that God's being blessed, but it is also God that's being cursed. Go back to the remainder of the verse. What does it say? "Who have been made in the likeness of God." What is James saying? Go back and read the whole verse. With this tongue, with this speech, with our mouths, we bless, we praise, we worship our Lord and Father. And with it we curse. We wish evil and we wish ruin on men who have been made in the likeness of God. What is James trying to show us? When we look at the Scripture, we look at this last portion of verse 9, we see the one that curses, curses the humanity that God actually created.

When man curses man, man is cursing men who are made in the very image of God. Just like you and I are made in the image of God, others are made in the image of God. Although fallen humanity is falling, they are depraved, they are hopeless and helpless without Christ, they are still made in the image of God. So what we see is whether it's lost humanity or whether it's a fellow brother and sister, what we are doing is we are cursing those who are made in the image of God. So to curse another human is to curse that which God created and that which God loves. It's the action of our speech.

That's why I had to use the word "our." James says we, our, it's us. This is action, nothing but action in verse 9. And see, for us, we must see that we literally can come in here and sit in this pew and we can sing great blessings and praise to our Lord. And we can get in the car and as soon as the door is shut, it's nothing but cursing. We can open up our Bibles and we can have our Bible studies. We can talk about all the things that we love about the Lord and how the God has blessed us and God's working in our lives. But yet we can turn right around with the Bible still in our hands and curse other men and think nothing of it.

That's what's going on in the lives of these believers. James has been saying your tongue is like an unbridled animal. It's like a dangerous ship without a rudder. It's like a small forest fire that destroys. And now what is he saying? You turn right around and curse that which God loves. I guess it's kind of like this. You know, out one side of the mouth you bless God and out the other side of the mouth you curse men. You know, you've heard the old saying that, you know, you go to church and then you go home and eat lunch and have barbecued preacher. I'm sure none of you do that. What am I trying to illustrate?

The tongue in action, speech in action, this blessing and this cursing. Let's move on. Let's notice truth number two. You want us to see the hypocrisy of our speech. With it we bless our Lord and Father and with it we curse men who have been made in the likeness of God. Verse 10 for the same mouth for from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not be this way. What we see is James is showing the duplicitous speech which we can be guilty of. He says it's a double tongue action. As some would say it, we are speaking out both sides of our mouth. Blessing one minute, cursing the next minute.

And in this verse we see the hypocrisy of this action. Notice some truth out of verse 10. First I want us to see the exposing. The exposing. He says from the same mouth come blessing and cursing. That's a very short verse. But what is he doing? He is summarizing what he's been saying. It is simplistic but yet it exposes the problem. It exposes the hypocrisy. James is narrowing down the problem. He's coming right down to it and he's saying from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. It's exposing. Second, I want you to see the correction. From the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these are Christians.

My brethren, these things ought not to be this way. This is the correction. James is correcting Christians. His correction is strong. As a matter of fact, the word ought not. It is a strong negative in the original. And what that means is James is pointing out, he is making sure that they understand that this type of speech has no place coming out of the mouth of a Christian. He's being very forceful. I guess we can read it like this. From the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brothers, this should never be.

James is exposing the hypocrisy of their speech and he uses a strong correction, which would have been understood by the readers. It's a hypocrisy that comes with the action of speech. I thought about a scriptural example. It's a little imperfect, but I think you will understand. Y'all are familiar. We are familiar with Peter. Peter was a man of God and later became a great man of God and was used greatly. Yet Peter was not perfect. Of all of the disciples, it seemed like Peter was one of the best ones at opening up his mouth first. Sometimes he got it right and sometimes he got it wrong.

But yet even in the midst of his personality flaws and sins, he was still used of God. He was listed as the top three of the disciples. It was Peter, James and John. But at the Lord's Supper in Luke chapter 22, verse 31 through 34, Peter says to Jesus, "Lord, I will go with you to the death." Jesus had been saying he was going to die. Jesus had been saying that men were going to betray him. And what did Peter do? He opened up his mouth in Peter fashion and he said, "Lord, I will go with you even to death, even to prison." Well, a few paragraphs over. When Jesus was arrested, what happened? Peter denied Christ three times.

As a matter of fact, it says that he swore. He used profane language in his denial of Christ. Three times he denied Christ. He fulfilled what Jesus said. And yes, before the cockrode, the rooster crowed, when Jesus was arrested, Peter denied Christ. But Jesus, being the gracious, loving Lord that he is, in John chapter 21, Jesus comes to Peter and he corrects him. He says, "Do you love me three times?" And what we see is a great restoration here. But in this example of Peter, what I want us to see is the action of his speech and the hypocrisy of his speech.

Well, Peter demonstrates his hypocrisy in what he spoke and what he did and his actions were directed towards Christ, not towards his fellow man. But the context of James is the church. The context of James is fellow Christians and James is revealing the hypocrisy of Christians in their speech about other men. Just like Peter was a big hypocrite, these people were hypocritical. Their actions were duplicitous. They praised God in one breath and they cursed men in another breath. And James is showing that their action, it is hypocritical. And my question for you and for me, for us, is how hypocritical is our speech?

I mean, do we bless God and talk about the messages that talk about the things of God with our children and then yet turn around and just barbecue certain people? Oh, they have earned it. Are they justified? James gives no room for justification here. I thought about a story that will help illustrate the two truths that we looked at. I've said this numerous times. I like stories. I like illustrations. It helps me. The main truth number one was the action of our speech and then number two, the hypocrisy of our speech. Let me give you an example. And this is a church example, but I think it helps you understand.

I happen to be in the life of a church at one time that was going through some difficulties and struggles. The fact that were some of the church staff members that were leaving and there was kind of this power struggle going on in the life of the church. And I just tried to keep my nose to the grindstone. I tried to keep my attention on my job and I tried to keep my mouth shut and do what God had called me to do. And yet I prayed and I sought the Lord and I had a broken heart. And there were times in which God just prompted me, tapped me on the shoulder to open up my mouth and speak truth. I tried to keep my mouth shut otherwise.

And as a matter of fact, there towards the end, God just sealed my mouth closed. But in the midst of those church problems, in the midst of that power struggle that was going on, in the midst of the awful things that were happening, I had a particular church leader come up to me one day in the hall of the church. Now I was pretty innocent that day. I couldn't tell you what I was doing as far as my work, but I know I had gone to one part of the church to get me a cup of coffee. And I happened to be coming back to my little office to do my job and to keep my mouth closed.

And this particular individual came up beside me and he put his arm around me and he began to talk about the problems of the church like I was upset about them and I was. And he said these words to me. He said, "Brother Chris, don't worry. All these other guys are going to be gone, but we're going to keep you." And I felt like I had the feather touch of a hand on my shoulder and I felt like there was a knife in the other hand. What was that individual saying? Words of cursing. He was trying to bless me and then he was speaking words of cursing against other people. What do we see? The duplicity of speech. That's just one example.

Now that's in the life of the church. That's leadership to leadership. But it illustrates what we're talking about. Words that are meant to bless one minute and then yet you turn around and curse the next minute. In the same sentence, in the same conversation. But we don't need to get all high and mighty because we do the very same thing. Don't we not? In the privacy of our own homes? When we're on the job site? When we're in our workplace? You know when it's just our friends? When we're with our wife and our children are not around? What do we do?

We open up our mouths sometimes and curse and wish evil on certain individuals while we bless God and say we love God. Let's move on to truth number three. Truth number three. That is the contradiction of our speech. The contradiction of our speech. Let's pick back up in verse 11 and 12. "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?" Two questions and then notice a statement. "Neither can saltwater produce fresh." James is using three illustrations to prove contradictory speech.

And like I said, James asks two questions and then he makes one statement. Now in understanding what James is trying to teach here and what James is trying to illustrate, I want us to see three realities out of these verses. Three important realities. First, or notice, I want you to see, we must see the absurdity of our speech. We must see the absurdity of our speech. Now see for the audience as well as our ears, for you, for us, and for the audience that received this book, these possibilities would be absurd. They would be crazy. Let me go back and read it.

"Does a fountain send out fresh and bitter water?" In other words, good water and bad water? No. That's absurd. That's crazy. "Can a fig tree produce olives? Can an olive vine produce figs?" No. That's absurd. That is crazy. "Neither can saltwater produce fresh or freshwater produce salt." What is James saying? This is crazy. This is absurd. And these are questions, but he is suggesting possibilities. Because what do we see in the lives of these Christians? These are born-again people. They love God. They have the heart of God. And what we see is the absurdity of their speech. They bless God one minute and curse men the next.

They bless God with one breath and curse men with the next breath. This is the absurdity of our speech. And these examples that he is giving, they're just absurd. They're crazy. If I were to tell you that you could run down to the Mississippi Gulf Coast and you could wade waist-deep out into the Gulf of Mexico and scoop up some of that water and drink it and it would be fresh water, you would say, "I was crazy." But that's what James is saying. He's absurd. "Can your heart that loves God turn around and curse men?" The second thing I want you to notice is that we see the contradiction of our speech.

We see the absurdity and now we must see the contradiction. The contradictions within these illustrations are obvious. Now these things to happen, laws of nature must be violated. Do you get that? This is a contradiction in terms all the way through. Can a fountain give good water and bad water? No, that would be a contradiction violating laws of nature. What about a fig tree? Can a fig tree produce olives and an olive vine produce figs? No, that would be a contradiction. It would violate the laws of nature. Can salt water produce fresh and fresh water salt? No, that would be a contradiction. It would violate the laws of nature.

And what do we see here? This is the contradiction of our speech. James is trying to say, "You have a new heart." "You have the heart of Christ." "You are violating the laws of the word of God and the character of God." Third, I want us to see that we must see the results of our speech. The results of our speech. Now, if these suggestions would be possible, what I mean is these illustrations from nature. If these would be possible, the fountain producing both good and bad water, the fig tree producing figs and olives, the olive branch producing figs and olives, salt water producing fresh and fresh water salt.

If these were possible, that would be what? Great pollution. Great pollution. What I mean is the fountain would be polluted, the fig tree and the olive branch, it would be polluted. The salt water would be polluted by fresh water and the fresh water would be polluted by fresh salt water. There would be nothing more than pollution. That's the results. That's what James is saying. Your speech is polluted. It's blessing and cursing all mixed together. James is pointing out the contradictions in the lives of these Christians. When you read these illustrations, it's absurd. It's crazy. And that's what James is saying.

They are supposed to have pure speech which comes from a pure heart, but they have absurd speech. They have contradictory speech and they have polluted speech. I was reminded of this truth taught here years ago. Quite a few years ago when I was working construction full time, I found myself working around all kinds and most were not Christian. On the construction crew that I was a part of, most of the guys were not Christian. The electricians that I would work around, most of them were not Christian. The roofers, the landscapers, you name it. Most of them were not Christian.

But I'll never forget one day I was on the roof as we were doing some repair on a roof and there happened to be a roofing crew there. Now there was a young man on that roofing crew that used to work with us. When he graduated from high school, he started working with us. He was just a young man, low man on the totem pole. We just ordered him around and he did what he was supposed to do. And he went from working with us to getting a job with the roofing crew. So we went way back. And I was on that roof and some of those roofers were asking me questions and they were talking.

And when some of them found out that I was a preacher, there were some that started making comments like this. "Well, I know what kind of preacher he is." "I know how he'll act when he gets a chance." "I know what he'll say when he has an opportunity." "Oh, I know what kind of preacher he is." And I was just close enough to here but far enough to be out of the way. And I heard that young man answer him like this. "No, not him. He doesn't act that way." "No, he doesn't talk that way." "No, he doesn't use those kind of words." "No, when he gets mad, he doesn't talk like that." And he went on to defend me. I didn't ask for that defense.

It surprised me. But what was he saying? He was saying, "There's no bitter water going to come out of that fresh well of his heart." "Was I perfect? No." But what he was saying was, "I did not see him sin in the area of speech." I'd witnessed to that young man on numerous occasions. I'll never forget, as he was telling me one time, "Oh yeah, I'm saved." I said, "Saved from what?" "It wasn't saved from much." I witnessed to him several times. And yet what that told me was, was my witness in my speech was valid. Because why? He did not see contradictory speech in my life. He did not see hypocritical speech in my life.

He observed the action of my speech. And what did he see? He saw a valid Christian witness. And I want to ask you, do people see contradictory speech in your life? When you were in your home, when you were in your workplace, what about your children and your neighbors and your grandchildren? What do they hear coming out of your life? If you were to go to them and say, "Yes, I am a born-again Christian," would they step back and say, "That's as absurd as bitter water coming out of a fresh well." If you were to go to them and tell them about Christ, would they say to you, "Oh, that's like trying to pick olives from a fig tree.

It's absurd." Now, as we begin to conclude, when Thomas Jefferson and the other signers of the Declaration of Independence signed that famous document, they set in motion a chain of events which affected so many. They affected so much. They affected you and me. It was the power to bless with words. When Abraham Lincoln spoke the words of the Emancipation Proclamation, they had up the process of events which affected so many, which affected so much. That was the blessing of words. See, what about these verses? What about these messages that we've been looking at? What about the title of these three messages, the power of the tongue?

And we've looked at the power to control, the power to destroy, the power to bless. And I want to say to you as we begin to close, your words set things in motion. They have power. Notice that every message is being the power, the power, the power. And there was power within our speech, power to affect our children, power to affect our spouse, power to affect people in our workplace, power to touch the lives of strangers that we come in contact with, power. And look, power to either bless or power to destroy. Power to honor Christ and bless God. Our power to be nothing more than a contradiction and a hypocrite.

What is the difference between men like Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln and us? What's the difference? Those men made great impacts in time. Those men made great impacts that are contained by time because these speeches and these words have no eternal significance. They might be moral. They might be biblical. They might be true. But what I'm showing you is as born again Christians, we have the ability to impact eternity with our speech and we can impact the lost loved one for Christ. We can mold and model our children into the image of Christ. We can impact our spouse for Christ.

We can witness and have a valid witness to that lost person, that lost neighbor, that lost friend. What am I trying to show you? Those men impacted time, but we affect eternity by the power of our speech. So what we've seen is verses one through four, the power of the tongue, part one, the power to control. Then we've seen verses five through eight, the power of the tongue, the power to destroy. And then this morning we finish these verses up, verses nine through twelve, the power of the tongue, the power to bless. Let's pray.