Taking Dominion Over the Tongue

Well, good morning. Good to see you all and good to be with you all this morning. You can turn your Bibles with me to James chapter 3 for a message.

James chapter 3, verse 1 through 12.

My brethren, be not many masters knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. For in many things we offend all, if any man offend not in word, the same as a perfect man, unable also to bridle the whole body.

Behold, we put bits in horses' mouths that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also the ships which, though they be so great and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with a very small helm whithersoever the governor listeth. Even so the tongue is a little member and boasteth great things. Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth. And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. So is the tongue among our members that it defileth the whole body.

And seteth on fire the course of nature, and it's set on fire of hell. For every kind of beast, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind. But the tongue can no man tame. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.

Therewith bless we God, even the Father, and therewith curse we men which are made after the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be. Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter? Can the fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries even either a vine, figs?

So can no fountain both yield salt water and fresh. Wow, that's pretty heavy reading there, isn't it? The burden part of the burden of this message this morning is recently in my reading I was in James chapter I read a verse, a very familiar verse in James chapter 2, verse 26. James says, "If any man among you seem to be religious, religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain." You know, I pondered, I meditated on that verse, and you know I was just so convicted because I saw myself fall short so many times of that high standard that James is calling us to. I looked at that word religion and in the years past I'd read that verse and think, "Well, religion, I sort of connect that with maybe the scribes and the Pharisees and their history and so on that Jesus talks about," and so on.

But James here is talking to me, he's talking to us as Christians, as God's people. And the word religion there I went to my concordance and I found the word religion is used in several different ways in the original. And this one has simply the idea of our desire to serve God. Wow, that strikes pretty close home, doesn't it? So is he saying that everything I as a man of God consider myself a Christian, come to church, and pray to God, serve God, tithe or give or just give all my service and sacrifice, whatever sets me apart as a Christian, he is saying it's vain or it's useless if I don't have control or bridle my tongue.

Wow. James really hits this subject hard, and so does this is the James I believe is a half-brother of Jesus, we understand. And Jesus hit the subject hard.

In chapter 5, verse 12, we can just flip our pages to 5:12 and look what James says there.

So he goes down through a list of things for the brothers there in the letter. And then verse 12 he says, "But above all things, my brethren, swear not neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath, but let your yeah be yeah and your nay nay, lest you fall into temptation." Now Jesus says that almost in the gospel in maybe Matthew, almost a parallel to that, but he adds this yet, anything beyond yes or no is from the evil one. So every one of our words has a source. Somewhere it's coming either from good or evil.

And then if we read I did read it, verse 3 chapter 3, verse 2, another heavy one. "If any man offend not in word, the same as a perfect man," or could we say I think some translations would say, "a mature man, and able also to bridle the whole body."

So if we get this one down, we learn how to control our mouth. He's saying that our entire life will be under control and direction. Isn't that powerful?

The title of the message this morning is Taking Dominion Over the Tongue. We men love to take dominion, don't we? We love to take charge. We love to be in control, don't we? The challenge given to us, both men and sisters, this morning is James is calling us to take dominion over our tongue.

The psalmist says in 1:41, verse 3, "Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth, and keep the door of my lips." That word watch has the idea of a guard. Set a guard, O Lord, before my mouth to keep watch over the door of my lips. When we worked in Honduras, I've noticed one thing there at night when we went out to the store at night on the parking lot, they had an armed guard standing over in the corner of the parking lot just sort of overseeing the place.

That really stood out to me. I'm like, he what his purpose was there to guard the store, the door, the entrance of the store from the evil man. And the psalmist turns that around completely. He says, "Set a watch or an armed guard," could we say, "before my tongue to guard society from an evil tongue." See, it's just reversed from what we saw in Honduras.

That's quite the thing to ask of God. You know, this takes away we pride ourselves in America, don't we? We have this freedom of speech. We don't see that in scripture, not at all. There's two problems with freedom of speech.

One, it takes away freedom of hearing. Do you ever think about it? If a person just blows up and speaks his mind and the hearer has no freedom to not hear him, basically. It's just it's problematic in every way we look at it.

That's not the order, the model that the Bible gives at all, is to just be free with our speech. This morning I tried to copy Brother John a little bit with an outline, three things we want to look at here, all beginning with a P. So number one, the power of the tongue we want to look at, verses 1 through 6.

And then number two, the problem of the tongue, verse 7 and 8. And then verse I mean, number three, purpose, the purpose of the tongue, verse 9 through 12. So let's look at the power of the tongue, verse 1 through 6. First of all, he says, "Let not many of you desire to be teachers or masters," in the Old King James. I understand that has the idea of simply teacher. Now why? This is a warning that he brings out. And maybe just a few things we can think as we ask, "Well, why? Why are we men?" Now, the sisters are off the hook because we just studied this morning that they're supposed to be quiet.

So this part is for the men. Don't you desire or be over-anxious to be a teacher, or a preacher, or a moderator, or one that gets up and speaks a lot. Why? Because he says, "There is upon you a greater condemnation or a stricter judgment." Now, we could ask, "Why?" Well, maybe one thing is a preacher, a teacher, a moderator, or one who gets up in a public way stands a greater risk of saying many words.

And the Bible says, "In many words there's potential for sin." So many words. Another thing it could be is because whenever we open our mouth now, here the sisters can be on the hook again. Whenever we open our mouth, we take a risk to say something that is damaging, hurtful, or not quite correct.

You know, when we as preachers get up and we preach, we have another risk we take. Every one of you sitting there this morning looking at me and listening to me, you're sitting there critiquing me, right?

Why did he have to say that? Why is the sermon so long? Why did he have to say this? And you know that criticism that comes against when we come up front here and we speak, teach, moderate, lead out in singing, or whatever it might be, we stand that risk. You folks that sit in your pews right now are avoiding that risk completely.

So men, don't be over-anxious to becoming a teacher or a master because you're going to be judged in a stricter way by your audience and also by God. Because the Bible says that in the end we're all going to stand before God and give an account for every word we said.

That is, I think, why the in my background in the church I grew up, after the sermon, they would ask two or three witnesses to get up or remain seated to bear testimony on the message. They took the scripture where it says that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. Do you see how vulnerable the preacher is, the teacher is? And this is a warning he brings out. Does that mean we should just shut up and not be teachers and preachers? No, he's warning, "Be careful."

And the next part he brings out, thinking of the power of the tongue, the whole body. If we're able to conquer this one, we're able to bring direction to our whole body. Remember in Isaiah and I think Wendell brought some of this out. But in the first several chapters, the first three, four, five chapters, Isaiah just really brought out the woes and the warnings and the destruction that was upon God's people. And he just, "Whoa, whoa, whoa," about different things in their life. And we come to chapter six. And Isaiah sees God. And what does he do? That woe turns right back to himself. He says, "Woe is me."

And he says, "Because I'm undone." That phrase undone has the idea of being unprepared or unequipped or incomplete. I'm just not this person that I hope to be and wish to be. I fall short of a holy God. That's what he was seeing. And then he goes on and he says, "Because I'm a man of unclean lips."

So it goes back to the tongue. He says, "Our whole body, our whole being, our whole direction of our whole life is going to be in order and going in the right way when we bring order and dominion to our tongue."

So if you this morning want the finishing touches on your life, learn to clean up your tongue. Change the way you speak and it will change the way you live.

Let's think about power to bring direction, verses 1 through 4, the bit and the rudder. And he uses this example, just very practical, the horse. "Behold, we put bits in horses' mouth that they may obey us." Think of the horse, 1,200 pounds average probably, the average horse. And the bit is only several pounds, if that.

And he uses that in the ship as well. Queen Elizabeth weighed approximately 83,673 tons, and the rudder of that ship weighed about 140 tons.

Can you imagine? 83,673 tons were dependent the course, the destiny was dependent on that tiny little rudder when you ride that horse that is unruly by nature, tamed by man, put a little tiny bit in the mouth. And the destiny, the direction, the is dependent on the rider and the bit.

What a tremendous picture he gives to us too. Let's think a little bit about direction. The Bible says that life and death are in the power of the tongue. Do we believe that? Life and death are in the power of the tongue.

October 31st, 1983, a Korean Airline flight 007 departed from Alaska for a direct flight to Seoul, Korea. Unknown to the crew, however, the computer engaging the flight navigation system contained a one-and-a-half-degree routing error. At the point of departure, the mistake was unnoticeable. At 100 miles out, the deviation was still so small and undetectable.

But as the giant 747 continued out over the Pacific, increasingly strayed from its proper course, eventually it was flying over Soviet airspace and the fighter jet scrambled into the air to intercept the 747, was shot out of the air, and all its passengers lost their life. You get the picture? Just the direction that that tiny little bit or that tiny little rudder and the ship he uses, that picture is going to determine where that ship or that horse and its riders are going to end up. What a picture. Now, let's think about we think our daily words that we use are sort of unimportant, but they are giving direction for the good or the bad in people's lives.

When we think about it, our life and the choices we make I look back over my life and I take my life in increments. The choices that I made throughout the years has its basis largely on the words that I heard from my parents, from my teachers, from preachers, line upon line, precept upon precept, a little here and a little there, all the way through our life. Now, you and I can be a part, a small part, as Brandon brought out, maybe in a silent way, a word here, a word there, to give direction to people, a person, or people's lives that will determine who they are 50 years later and where they're headed.

The Bible says, "Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God."

Many years ago in the city of Boston lived a man by the name of Edward Kimball. Has anybody ever heard of that name? Edward Kimball, very popular name, man, isn't it? No, about the only thing we know about Edward Kimball was he was a Sunday school teacher in a small church.

And in that Sunday school class, he had a young man that was, could we say, sort of wild and unruly and unconverted.

He was 18 years old, this young man. So on April the 21st, 1855, God laid a burden on Edward's heart to go speak with this young man. This young man worked at his uncle's shoe store in Boston. And it was right in the middle of the day through business hours, and Edward felt like a heel to go in and open business and seek out an employee in there to talk to him. But he felt God just put a burden on him. He needs to go and talk to this young man today.

So he met this young man in the back corner of the shoe store, stocking shelves. And he didn't know what to say for sure. And this is what he said. He ended up saying. He said, "God loves you and he's looking for your love in return."

Simple little words in the back of a shoe store. Those words were so powerful and profound to that young man that day that it made the difference for the rest of his life. His name was Dwight Lemon Moody, I believe, D. L. Moody, gave his life to Jesus. And he became very famous. We know about D. L. Moody, don't we? But we don't know about Edward, do we? That just simply honored and obeyed God's word that middle Monday afternoon.

So think of it. Your words, just a simple little message, "God loves you and he's looking for your return and your love in return." We can tell anybody that every day in a silent way in the corner of a shoe store. I was blessed by that. I'm like, not so much of D. L. Moody, but I'm so impressed by Edward just listening to that still small voice.

Let's be part of that and giving good direction to people that we interact with every day.

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold and pictures of silver. What about our wedding ceremonies when we say, "I do"? Changes the rest of our life, the rest of our journey, doesn't it? What about have you ever sat in a court system where everybody is sitting in there and listening to the court's, the judge's words?

Is he condemned or is he guilty? Guilty or not guilty, it doesn't so much matter what the judge thinks, but it really does matter the few words he says. That's how our words are. They have the power. In our words lie the power to give direction. The next part, verses 5 and 6, they also have power to destroy.

He uses that illustration of the tongue or the bit in the horse's mouth, the rudder on the big ship. And then he says, "So is the tongue."

Verse 5, "It's a little member and boasteth great things." I'm impressed with that. It's a little member, one of the smallest members of our body. But it's so impressive. Have you ever thought about it? You know that's what sets us men and women apart from the animal kingdom. Most animals that I know of have a tongue as well, but they can't do what yours can do and mine can do. It's taken to the highest level of communication known to man.

So in a matter of seconds, I can flap right out of my tongue what I think. We think the brain is amazing, isn't it? It is.

But in a matter of seconds, we use this little piece of membrane or whatever it is, and we communicate to all the hearers what's going on in my brain. Isn't that amazing? James says it's a small member, but it can boast great things. Now, there's also a problem with that. Do you ever hear the term, "Well, I just gave him a piece of my mind"? We do that sometimes, don't we? Is that a good thing?

You know our minds are funny too. What goes on in our mind, that's why the psalmist had to say, "Put a watch, a guard there so that this little tongue will not just blurt out everything that goes through the mind."

The Bible says in Proverbs, "A fool uttereth all his mind." A fool. So whatever comes to his mind, he just spits out, spits right. That's really impressive though, isn't it? But as I said, that's a problem too. That's what gets us in trouble. It's what destroys people. It's what destroys marriages, doesn't it?

When a husband husbands, we don't always tell our wife everything we think about her right away, do we? We'd be in trouble a lot of times, wouldn't we? And vice versa. Some of those things we just need to bring under dominion, that tongue.

You know what I find really convicting? According to studies, they tell us, "I can hardly imagine this," but the statistics tell us that how many words do we speak on an average in a day? It says for women, that is approximately 30,000 with gusts up to 50,000. So if you're having a good day or a bad day, there might be 50,000 words, and for the men, it's 20,000.

Now, I don't think I say any less words than my wife does. I don't know why they sort of pick on the ladies when it comes to 30,000 words, but I'll tell you. Do you know how many words are in the book of Acts? We just went through the entire book of Acts in Sunday school. How long were we on there? Does anybody remember how long we studied the book of Acts?

Two years. Two years. Do you know how many words are in there?

24,229, depending a little bit, I guess, what version you use, but approximately 24,000 plus. Now, that's a little more than the men use in a day and a little less than the ladies use. Isn't that embarrassing? I cannot imagine that I spit out as many words in one day that we took to study two years in the book of the entire book of Acts.

That's a lot of words.

You know what I think? I think it's too many.

I'm preaching to myself this morning. I really am because I have I think if you would ask my wife, she could tell you that there's been improvement over the years. But I am not where I want to be with my tongue. I really I'm making that as an honest confession this morning, and it struck me hard. Sometimes when we hear ourselves preach on a subject, we actually help ourselves. And that's one purpose of this sermon this morning, is because I have failed so many times, and I still do at times with my destructive little weapon that Jesus and James and the entire Bible has something to say about. And in the end, I'm going to give an account for that.

So if we think we say too many words you know sometimes we say, "I just said too much. Oh, I wish I wouldn't have said what I did. Why did I say that?" Our natural reaction sometimes is, "Well, I'm just going to shut up then. I'm not going to say anything."

Have you ever seen people walk around just biting my tongue? We feel like biting that thing off so that we never use it again. Do you ever feel that way? You know that is not the right attitude, is it? God gave us that little tongue, that amazing little creation.

He gave it to us for a good purpose. So this morning, the point of the message is let's learn how to bring dominion to our tongue and use it to what it was meant to be.

A fool's voice is known by the multitude of words.

Solomon, I believe, said that.

"The best rule for talking is the same as the carpenter: measure twice and then saw once." I like that. What if we bring that rule into our daily life? Measure twice and then saw once. Think twice. Now, what I'm about to say, does it have the roots in Jesus or, as Jesus says, from the evil one? Where's it coming from? What is the source? How's it going to land on the ears of the listener?

A little quote I ran across. Someone said, "Thou art master of the unspoken word, but the spoken word is master of you."

James here tells us that our words can start fires. Do you ever start a fire with your words? You know how a match you put a little match, and he uses that picture here he gives how great a fire can a little fire kindle.

Contentious words. "Where no wood is, the fire goeth out. So where there's no tail-bear, the strife ceases, as coals are to burning coals and wood to fire. So is a contentious man to kindle strife."

What about gossip? "A whisperer separateth chief friends." That means best friends. If it has the ability to separate best friends, does it have the ability also to separate best brothers or sisters or good relationships? A whisper, I think, is just another way of saying gossiping or speaking behind people's back.

You know the story goes of this husband and wife that had this awful habit. After church, they would go out the driveway, and they'd get in the car, and they would just rail on the preacher or something in the service and just make their comments all the way home. And they trained every one of their children to do the same.

In a case like that, the one little boy pipes up, and he said, "Dad, you must admit the whole show wasn't too bad though to think it only cost us a nickel."

He had all ears, and that's a good advice, I think, for us. You know if we feel like being critical over the preacher, Sunday school teacher, you leave the place here. You want to go out there and just be critical. And that critical spirit spills out in your little tongue, and you begin to talk and criticize the service, the something someone said or something like that.

The little guy had it right when he said, "It only cost us a nickel." We need to ask ourselves, "What did it cost us? How much input do I have in it? Did I pray for the preacher? Did I pray for the Sunday school teacher?" Maybe it's partly on you because your investment in it has been a nickel or less.

Let's think about it. Before we criticize people and we whisper behind their backs and we just spill out careless words of disrespect and critical words, there again, I'm preaching to myself.

The Bible motto is that if there's problems in relationships, go to that person all by yourself. Just you and him, and you'd be reconciled. Don't go to the community. Don't go to everybody else and just spill out your feelings and what your mind thinks right then and just bring more hurt and damage.

Offensive words. You remember what Jesus said about the one that offends? Pretty serious business, isn't it? We offend with our words, don't we?

What about hurtful words? You know as humans, we can go into our history if we allow ourselves, and we can make a list of things that have hurt us, words that people have spilled out at us.

Verse 7 and 8, let's look at the problem of the tongue.

I like what he brings out in verse 7. He says, "Every kind of beast and of birds and of serpents and of things in the sea is tamed and hath been tamed of mankind." I think that verse is very much a parallel verse, and I think he must have been thinking about Genesis. Genesis 1:28 says, "And God blessed them after He created what He created, created man and woman. He blessed them, and God said unto them, 'Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.'" That was the blessing that God pronounced on our parents, Adam and Eve.

You know that didn't change with the fall, did it? Now, James says we still do that. Man and woman still have dominion over the beast of the field, the birds of the air, and go to the zoo and just look at what man can do with anything from insects to elephants. What about the sea creatures? I'm just impressed and amazed when I see what man can do with a sea lion or a whale.

I've even heard of people training spiders. Can you imagine taking a spider and training him and taming him and teaching him to go against his spider nature? You know that's a God thing. God blessed that into man's existence in Genesis, and that didn't go away. Here we are today, and we're recipients. Nobody can tell me that this all just happens.

This was given by God. He has put man in charge of the animal world, given dominion. The problem is in verse 8, he turns around and he says, "But no man can tame the tongue. No man." The emphasis on that in that verse is on no man. That means you.

That means you. It means me. No man can tame the tongue because why? The problem is it is it's an unruly evil.

That idea, I guess, has its uncontrollable, its unstable, its unpredictable. It's just simply out of man's control, and it's full of deadly poison. Now, we don't get real close to things that are filled with deadly poison, do we?

That's our tongue, and that's a major problem. But the biggest problem at all that I see in this part is that no man can tame it.

We go about, we try it. Like I said earlier, we pinch our mouth shut, we bite our tongue, and we walk around with a look on our face, "You're never going to see me talk again." But you know what? Eventually, that person's talking again.

Do you ever notice that? I've seen people walk around with a pout on their face, and I knew what it meant. They said something they shouldn't have, and now they're going to be quiet. But guess what? Next month, they're talking again.

No man can tame this tongue. It's unruly. It's restless. It's full of deadmen I mean, deadly poison.

How do I relate to this? One person said it this way. To relate to my tongue problem, he said, "Every time I went to a meeting that I was tempted to speak, I would have my notebook, and on the top of the first page, I would have written in bold letters, 'Shut up.'" Does that work?

So he goes to the meeting. He's tempted to just lash out, but he gets out his notebook, and there it's a reminder, "Shut up." That'll only work for so long. Sooner or later, he's going to look across the letters, "Shut up," and he's going to speak his mind. No man can tame that tongue.

Another person said it this way, and I like this. I think it's a good exercise for all of us. He said, "I've exercised myself in this, and whenever I would go out and about where he had a tongue problem, obviously, he said, 'I spelled the word weight. Why am I talking?

Why am I talking?'" Question. Weight. So exercise. Go out and about, weight. Pull it back. Now, that would fit with what James says, "Be slow to speak. Take time and think and swift to hear." Weight. Why am I talking?

We can exercise those things. Good exercises for us. And then James goes into this part of the inconsistency, and I believe he tries to answer what he just told us. We cannot. No man can tame his tongue or, could we say, bring dominion to his tongue. No man can do it.

The inconsistency, he says in verse 9, "We bless God with our tongue, even the Father, and therewith curse we men which are made after the image of God." That is so inconsistent and so ridiculous. You know we people are so tricky and so filled with hypocrisy by nature through the fall that if we're not careful, we fall into this category.

Oh, we come to church, and we come to prayer meeting, and we just pray the right words. We might even lift up hands while we do it. We just act so spiritual.

We sing praises, and oh, we do this worship. And then he says, "With that same mouth, you curse your fellow man." I've ridden with Christians already in their car that can be so pious and call people idiots on the road that pull out in front of them.

How does that work? I trust that we have more dominion than that, but that's what he's saying that we do, we as humans. We bless and we curse. So inconsistent. He says, "These ought not so to be," verse 10.

And then he brings to us a law of separation, and he asks these questions, powerful questions. "Do the fountains sent forth at same place sweet water and bitter?" Does that need an answer? You know I think this property has two wells on. There's the one fed by a sulfur spring, sulfur water. The other is fresh water. That would fit here, wouldn't it? We know where we want to go. If we want fresh water, we always go back there in that little corner where the fresh water is.

You know we have that at home. We have a well that has iron water. All my years I can remember, we had the well. That doesn't change. It's the consistency of God. Every time I want to taste iron water, I know which well to go. If I want fresh, good water, we have another well. And he uses this to say, "Look at God. He's so consistent in His creation. If you want a fig, you go to the fig tree. If you want a pear, you go to the pear tree or whatever it might be. You want grapes, you go to the grapevine."

That's just what we expect of our God, and I think James is using the same idea, this train of thought here to get us thinking. How is it consistent if we go to the berry patch and we expect oranges to be there? How is it consistent if we go to the man of God and we hear words that shouldn't be coming out of his mouth? Is that consistent?

No.

The measure of a man are his words. So if a man is immoral in his heart, those kind of words are going to come out. If a person is critical in his heart, those kinds of words, criticism, is going to find its way out. Oh, we come to church on Sunday, and we just bless God, but we leave the church and we're critical. We have a problem. We're inconsistent. Something's wrong. We're incomplete. Like Isaiah said, "Woe is me. I'm an undone man. I'm not done.

I'm not complete. I'm immature. My life is a wreck. I have no direction. My whole life is a chaos. Why? Because I'm incomplete. I have not learned how to relate to my tongue."

You know Jesus told Nicodemus that he must be born again. He must be born again. There is no other way.

And you know if we have a tongue that just keeps saying things, and I have to constantly be conflict and there's this constant conflict between my mind and my tongue, there's a huge problem. We don't need to go through life that way. We just don't, where we constantly have to battle back our tongue from what our mind wants to speak.

Jesus, James gives us a better remedy. We need a transformed mind, don't we? A heart that is completely changed and that had done surgery on. The prophets of old said that this person of Jesus is going to come, and he's going to take away our old heart, and he's going to give us a new one. In Colossians, Paul talks about putting off the old man and putting on the new. Part of putting off the old man is part of putting away that filthy communication.

So my message to myself this morning is, why do I just beat my tongue up all the time? I need to start working at my heart. Why is that thing in my heart? Why? You see, the tongue is only an instrument. It only does what the heart and the mind communicates to it, to translate.

Oh, let's take the model that Jesus, the example that Jesus set to us. Isaiah 53 tells us, "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth." Powerful. That's Jesus. Did Jesus open his mouth? He did. At the time was right. But do we see any regrets that Jesus had when he had opened his mouth or not opened his mouth?

Now, there was the perfect example. He was afflicted. He was oppressed. That's real to us, isn't it? We know how that is. When we're afflicted and oppressed, we want to open our mouth, but Jesus kept it shut at that time.

Let's look at the purpose quickly here in closing of our tongue. What really did God have in mind when he created our tongue? So when Adam and Eve were there in the garden, and Adam was there formed from the dust, and then God came down upon him and breathed into him eternal life, and he gave him a tongue that was able to communicate. I love that picture right there. I believe God had something in mind: communication, fellowship.

How Edward said it, "God loves you, and he's expecting a response of love back to you." Do you think that's why God gave you a tongue? Oh, to utter those praises and adorations back to our great God. Revelation 14, John says it this way, "I heard the voice of the 144,000." It sounded like many waters, great thunders.

I think that's another way of John saying, "I don't know how to describe what I just heard. It was beautiful. It was like many waters." No, it was like great thunders. Whatever it was, I don't think he could completely describe it. And then he described it. He said, "There was a song there that no man can learn but the redeemed, those that are pure and holy and right and complete before God."

Do you think someday you and I can learn that song? That was a new song, he said, "As it were a new song." Do we want to learn that song then or do we want to begin to try to learn it now in this life? I believe we can with our tongue. "Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord." Psalm writer said that.

What about words of delight? I love that little story in Numbers 22, Balak and Balaam, when God, when Balaam, Balak, wanted Balaam to come and pronounce the curse on God's people, and God said, "No, you won't. No, you won't." And all the gifts and the offerings that were put to Balaam to come and pronounce a curse on Balak's enemies, and he came. Do you remember what he told Balaam or Balak when Balak scolded him? He said, "I took you to curse mine enemies, and thou hast blessed them altogether." Now, I don't know what all attitudes Balaam had, but I love his quote. Let's quote him together. I'll say it, and then let's say it together a few times.

Balaam said this in response to Balak. He says, "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." Let's say it together a couple of times. "The word that I" I'm sorry. Let me start over. "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." Okay. "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." Let's do it again. "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak."

You know what? Every time he opened that mouth and was going to curse, what came out? A blessing. I think that's an object lesson that God gives to us to show that we give our tongue to Jesus, and we allow Jesus to be Lord of our tongue. And every time we open our mouth, guess what's going to come out? Blessing and delight. Words that build and not destroy. Words of encouragement. Words of life. What about words of life in a dying world? Oh, I love that. I think the Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of Jesus, that Sunday morning, they came out to that tomb, and they were grieving over the loss of their son Jesus and those angels and that young man that came and said, "Who are you seeking?"

He said, "They said he's not here, but he's risen." Folks, today, that is those are words of life in a dying world. They were looking for you know I think God has given us a tongue not only for His benefit and glory but to be a bright spot in a dark and a dying world, and let's use it faithfully and take charge. It doesn't mean just pinching my mouth, shutting up, and not using my tongue.

No. It means bring dominion and use that tongue, what it was created and designed for.

That new song.

What about words of healing? Maybe there are victims running around today of your tongue in the past. Maybe you have said words that were hurtful and damaging and send a person on the course towards destruction. Maybe that person needs to hear words of healing. Somebody said it this way, "An apology is the superglue of life. It can repair just about anything." You know that's the part of the tongue we forget about sometimes. We say, "Oh, I said that. I wish I wouldn't have said it. That must have been hurtful. It must have been damaging." We all make those mistakes, and we can't as we say, we can't pull those words back in. But the simple thing and the profound and the right thing to do is when we do that is go back and say, "I'm sorry.

I was wrong." And those words can bring healing over the wounded person. Let's be quick to do that. It's hard sometimes for us to do that. We say the damaging words. Let's bring dominion then and go back and bring healing where we can.

What about words of encouragement? We live in a discouraged world, don't we, right now? Things look dark and dismal, don't they? What about the kingdom of Christ? Do they look dismal and dark? Not really because guess what? He's not here, but he's risen. And if we base our hopes on this life, Paul says, we're going to be miserable people. But if we base our hopes on something greater and higher, our world's not dismal today.

Words of encouragement. Statistics tell us three billion people go to the bed hungry every night, but four billion people go to bed hungry for a simple word of encouragement.

Someone said a word of encouragement during a failure is worth more than a whole book of praise after success. I believe that's very true. What about kind words, pleasant words? The Bible says, "Pleasant words are as a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and health to the bones."

That's powerful.

Do you have charge of your tongue?

You know it's interesting. At the fall, what happened at the fall? We have not lost dominion over the beasts. Man is still in charge, but we've lost dominion over the tongue, and the only way to gain dominion back of that tongue today is through Jesus.

It's through Jesus. He came to bring correction to the fall, didn't he? Where man has strayed and wandered and rebelled against God, Jesus was sent to this world to redeem us and to bring us back. And my encouragement, my challenge for myself and all of us, let's give our tongue, our mind, and our heart. Let's give it all over to Jesus. And again, in closing, let's quote Balaam together. I'll say it, and then you pitch in. "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." "The word that God puteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." May God bless you. Are there any thoughts before we close?