The Power of Words (Part I)
a commentary on James 3 (Context)
Thank you, Lord, for this day. May it be used for your glory!
Good evening everyone and welcome to this week’s Biblit on James chapter 3!
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Do you know what the most powerful muscle in the body is?
A quick Google search will tell you it’s actually quite debated. Some people believe it’s the glutes. That is typically the muscle that can lift the most in the gym.
But others debate it’s the masseter.
If you are like me, you had to read that twice and then admit you have no idea what a masseter is.
The masseter is one of the muscles responsible for powering your jaw. People argue it is the most powerful muscle because even though it is very small, it allows us to close our mouths with up to 200 pounds of force!
That is pretty wild!
Why do I bring any of this up?
Well, today we are going to talk about what the Bible says is the most powerful muscle in our bodies. It’s actually the most powerful part of our body all-together.
And it turns out the scientists were pretty close with the masseter.
Today we are going to talk about the Tongue.
Let’s jump into this commentary on James chapter 3!
Context
First, let me level set us. James chapter 3 is going to focus on 2 subjects. The first will be the power of the tongue. This is the first of 3 occurrences James will discuss the power of words and speech in his book.
The second topic we’ll dive into is wisdom, which goes hand in hand with controlling our words.
Let’s get into it!
The Power of the Tongue
The very first line in this section is actually an odd one. James warns us against becoming a teacher.
His reasoning here is that teachers will receive greater judgment.
From there, he jumps right into the power of the tongue.
He introduces it by saying, yes, we all stumble in many ways. And he declares that if someone somehow never stumbles in their words, then they are truly mature and able to control the entire body.
He already frames the tongue as the epitome of full self-mastery. In other words, the tongue is the hardest thing for us to control.
James then moves into a set of analogies about the tongue and how powerful words are:
The tongue is like a bit for a horse; small yet controls the entire animal
The tongue is like a rudder on a large ship; the wind may power the ship, but the rudder directs it even though it is so small
The tongue is like a small fire that quickly spreads into a forest fire
The tongue is the only thing that cannot be tamed; we can tame all animals, but not the tongue
After this James moves on to tell us how exactly we are using our tongue for immense harm.
He challenges us with a huge gut punch: with the same tongue we worship God and bless Him, but then turn around and curse others; others who are in fact God’s image bearers.
James says that this contradiction simply should not exist and leaves us with another set of analogies, the last of which is simply that saltwater cannot produce fresh water.
In fact, if you mix salt water and fresh water, it contaminates the fresh water.
Scientists also show that when you mix salt water and fresh water, the salty water is pushed down, forcing the fish to swim deeper and deeper.
Apparently, this can be pretty devastating over time and can destroy entire ecosystems, change the weather patterns, change the currents, and spread disaster throughout the world.
And this is the kind of devastation James is saying can happen if we don’t tame our tongues.
The Power of Wisdom
In the next section, James dives back into the topic of wisdom. This time he talks about wisdom in the context of work.
The entire passage is comparing what our lives and work will look like when we compare a life fueled by Godly wisdom and one fueled by worldly evil wisdom.
James argues that a life fueled by Godly wisdom will produce works of gentleness.
Gentleness and words of speech go hand in hand in my opinion. The first thing to fail when you’re trying to be gentle is your tongue.
He goes on to say that worldly wisdom does not produce gentle work, but works full of bitterness, envy, and selfish ambition.
Not only that, but working like this leads to disorder and many evil things.
In contrast, Godly wisdom not only produces gentleness in our work, but it is characterized as pure, peace-loving, gentle, compliant, full of mercy, full of good fruits, unwavering in faith, and without pretense.
And after that long list of amazing qualities, James leaves us with this one-liner:
“And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who cultivate peace.” (James 3:18 CSB).
With that, we’ll call it a day! Thanks for reading (or listening)! Tune in tomorrow and will dig deeper into James chapter 3!
In the meantime, it means the world to me if you share this with others!