THE TONGUE SHOWS THE HEART

THE TONGUE SHOWS THE HEART
James 3:7-12
"Out of of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers this should not be." (v.10)

THE TONGUE, THOUGH IT MAKES ITS home in the body, is far from being domesticated. On the contrary, it is wild, "a restless evil, full of deadly poison" (v.8). Man has tamed all kinds of animals. I remember watching a circus once and seeing a man let loose a dozen crocodiles which moved or froze as he commanded them. Even these vile-looking reptiles could be tamed. But no one has yet tamed the beast of the tongue. Again, James warns us not to under-estimate the tongue, in particular, its perversity.

Though man was given dominion over the animal world (Gen 1.28), he, as a result of his sin, lost control of himself. He cannot be what he wants to be. And nothing accentuates this impotence more than the control of his own tongue. "With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men...." (v.9). Why the incongruity? The simple reason is that we have not trained the tongue to praise God only. It has rebelled against our wish and gone on to curse men.

But to bless God and curse men with the same tongue amounts to a monstrous inconsistency. No such inconsistency is found in nature: a spring does not issue forth fresh and salt water, nor does a durian tree bear bitter gourd. Yet, a tongue is capable of doing that! James argues that any produce must be consistent with its source. So our words (what we produce) reveal our true character (who we are). "For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks," our Lord says (Matt 12.34).

If so, the secret to the control of our tongue is the guarding of our heart. When a jar is jolted, what spills is what was in it. When a person is jostled, what comes forth is what was in him or her in the first place. When we keep our heart right with the Lord, and cultivate a reservoir of kindly, helpful, forgiving and truthful words, however we are agitated, what spills forth will be what we have kept in our heart.

No wonder our Lord warns of the day of judgement, "For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned." (Matt 12.37). When we open our mouth, our heart is on parade. We cannot afford to take our words lightly when God takes them seriously. Let us set a guard over our heart and a watch over our tongue. We may not be able to tame its prowess, but by God's grace, we can harness it for man's good and God's glory.

How am I guarding my heart and my tongue?